Truth in Comedy: The Manual of Improvisation (12 page)

Scenes are much more interesting when the idea is seen, rather than
talked
about.

Active choices forward the scene.

Passive choices keep it stagnant.

There's really no choice, is there?

LISTENING FOR THE GAME

Careful players will note that the structure of any good scene is usually a game, one that is
discovered in the first three lines of dialog.

A game doesn't have to be as specific and organized as some of the improv exercises
explained throughout this book. Games are found within scenes. One example is one-upman-
ship, where each player tries topping the other with every sentence (and of course, the opposite
—
continuing to lower one's own status —
is equally valid). There are countless other games
that develop within scenes that have nothing to do with status. Players may find themselves
saying the exact opposite of what they are thinking during the course of a scene; in another

51

scene, the actors find an excuse to touch each other every time they speak (this is also a good
exercise to teach physicality).

Howard recalls one ImprovOlympic performance attended by executives of Budweiser,
who were there to decide whether they wanted
to sponsor that year's playoffs. When the
"Baron's Barracudas" team took the stage, sure enough, the suggestion for the improv was
"beer." However, the players instantly discovered an outrageously successful game: they
began mentioning different brand names of beer, all in a favorable context. At the conclusion
of the scene, they burst into a room, saying it was filled with "the finest beers in the world."
They rattled off the names of dozens of beers —
none of them Budweiser —
and the response
grew with each successive beer.
By the end of the scene, the executives were on the floor
laughing, and the name "Budweiser" had never been spoken. Thus, the players discovered the
"Ignore Budweiser" game, which proved to be the most successful possible choice.

To discover the potential games in each scene, players must pay close attention from the
start. They must be especially careful to notice their own lines, since players often aren't aware
of the games they are setting up themselves. There is a part of the human brain that is very
skilled at improvisation, and it is usually setting up a player's scenes for him (however
subconsciously). So, he has to be careful not to get in the way of his own ideas!

When an actor pays the same attention to his own lines as he pays to clues in a murder
mystery, he sees his scenes instantly. Unfortunately, players often let their egos get in the way.
They think they have a funny idea, and that is what the scene
must
be about. While they plan
what they think
should be happening, they are ignoring what actually
is
happening.

Some improvisers are so busy searching for the scene, they don't notice it pass them by.
However, if they force their egos out of the way and trust the choice made by the group, they'll
all discover their scene
together. They need to remember they are not playwrights —
they are
improvisers.

PATTERNS IN SCENES

Players must not only be alert to game moves, they must also be aware of the patterns in a
scene —
and then play them. For example, one way to end a scene is to return to the beginning

52

of that same scene, whether through a line, a gesture, or a completed cycle. All of life follows a
cycle, and improvisation is no different. The patterns become part of the scenic game. When
the players recognize the patterns
in a scene, they'll set each other up for game moves to
forward that scene. And when they understand the game they set up for themselves, and play it
full tilt, they've got it made!

Find your game, and you've found your scene.

Del is fond of the "group mind" concept that develops during improv when everything
works, and the ability to wire human minds together to become "Supermen."

"We are releasing higher and greater powers of the human being," he explains. "That is
what we mean when we say that Harold 'appears.' A melding of the brains occurs on stage.
When improvisers are using seven or eight brains instead of just their own, they can do no
wrong! Time slows down, and the player has a sense of where he is.

"I was talking with Gary Fencik of the Chicago Bears, and I asked him what it felt like
when they were beating New York in the playoffs, on their way to winning the Super Bowl. He
told me that he knew what everybody was doing and where they were. He had a complete
holographic image in his mind, a three-dimensional picture of the field."

A similar event occurs during a successful improv. "On stage, one has a complete picture
of what is going on, and also a clear sense of all potential moves. They are almost laid out in
time. The pattern-making mechanism is kicked on, and yet, one's intellect does not desert
him," explains Del.

"Somehow, the improviser is in the balanced right and left hemisphere state. He can
almost see time as a dimension, as he can almost see his potential moves extend physically into
the future. It's then very easy to decide which move to choose, and then go with it. Since
everyone is on the same wavelength, each player sees what the other sees.

"It's an absolute thrill, a tremendous surge of confidence, energy, and joy. I've given up
searching for happiness, now that I realize joy is very easily achieved!"

KEEPING ACTION IN THE PRESENT

There's little point in a player discussing the past or planning the future in a scene. A good
improviser shows us the now) It's always much more interesting to see it, rather than near
about it. After all, this is a visual medium!

This also applies to actors discussing events that are happening off stage. If the audience
is told that the most interesting action in a scene is occurring elsewhere, why should they care'
about the discussion they are seeing in front of them? An improv audience prefers watching the
action.

All of this is a part of taking the active choice —
show the audience, don't tell them.

SILENCE IS GOLDEN

Too many performers are terrified when the stage is quiet, but a few moments of silence
doesn't mean nothing is happening. Just the opposite —
it often leads into the most important
moments in a scene.

53

An improviser needs to consider the most intelligent response he can give to a statement,
and so he must feel he can take the time to stop and think. These moments of silence make a
beginning improviser very nervous. He often tries to fill
the silence with useless chatter, which
only adds clutter to the scene.

Improvisers have no reason to fear silence —
in fact, more experienced players learn to
appreciate it. The silence creates tension and draws in the audience. There is action in thought,
and the audience finds a player's response worth waiting for.

When an actor has a strong initiation, but becomes very verbose, he diminishes the
importance of the line, and babbles away the energy behind his ideas.

By taking his time and being thoughtful about his work, a player ends up economizing his
words: he discovers that he can say more by saving less. The actor's cliché is very true: less is
more.

THE RULE OF THREES

For some inexplicable reason, things are funnier when they happen three times. Two isn't
enough, and four is too many, but the third time something happens, it usually gets a laugh.
This is a basic, but mysterious, rule of comedy. The same mechanism in the brain that likes to
see patterns seems to thrive on this "Rule of Threes."

Del teaches pattern recognition in workshops, not to train actors to do it, but to
demonstrate that all human beings already have
an extremely sophisticated pattern mechanism
in their heads.

"They needn't worry about things like structure —
it's already there," he says. "The 'Rule
of Threes' is a deeply ingrained biological phenomenon. "Nobody really knows why it's
funnier when things happen three times, but I have a theory. We have three brains —
the
neo-cortex, the mammalian cortex, and the reptilian cortex. My theory is that each brain gets a
joke at a different rate. Of course, it might be something else entirely!"

KEY POINTS FOR CHAPTER SEVEN
*Keep it simple. Less is more.

*Avoid exposition.

*Start scenes in the middle.

*Take the active choice to forward action.

*Be specific. Avoid generalities.

*Listen for the game move.

*Welcome the silences. There is action in thought.

54

CHAPTER EIGHT

One Mind, Many Bodies

Following the Unconscious Choice

The subconscious is a lot smarter than most people think.

Very often, when a beginning improviser gets the impulse to say or do something in a
scene, he ignores it.

When his subconscious provides him with a sudden idea for the scene, and he doesn't
understand the reason for making this "crazy" choice, his ego considgxsJLaniistake. The only
real
mistake here is ignoring the inner voice.

Inexperienced players disregard the unconscious choice, and continue on with the scene
as if that choice was never made; it doesn't fit in with what they "think" the scene is about.

They couldn't be more wrong. As explained in the previous chapters, a scene is
never
about what the player thinks it is going to be; glossing over this "mistake" actually ruins a great
chance to make discoveries.

As the players grow more experienced on stage, they discover they have an inner voice
which, when followed, leads them to interesting twists in the scene. The unusual choices result
in the most interesting scenes.

The ego is the part of the mind that hangs on to preconceived notions about scenes, so the
best improvisers always strive to overcome their own egos.
They've learned to trust their inner
voices to
their unconscious right choices.

And when a player reaches the level where he lets his subconscious make the correct
choices, his level of confidence on stage will soar! One of the most difficult feats for a
beginning improviser is trusting his unconscious mind to lead him down the right path.
Eventually, he learns that there is a part of his brain that really does know how to do this work
quite well —
if he would just get out of his own way!

THE GROUP MIND

After an improviser learns to trust and follow his own inner voice, he begins to do the
same with his fellow players' inner voices. Once he puts his own ego out of the way, he stops
judging the ideas" of others —
instead, he considers them brilliant, and eagerly follows them!

This is why there is no such thing as a "bad idea" in improv. Players take each other's
ideas —
no matter what they are —
and make them work. As we know, the actor's business is
to justify. One person's idea becomes the collective idea of the group, and is therefore played
brilliantly.

In the world outside of improv, the more minds that are involved in an undertaking, the
lower the intelligence of the group —
just look at the government (any government), or most
TV and films that are created by committee! Too many cooks definitely spoil the broth.

55

The situation is very different with improvisation. We already know that people have
incredible individual capabilities. Unlike the real world, however, when a number of players
are on stage, their intelligence is actually
increased.
The group intelligence is much more than
the sum of its parts.

When a team of improvisers pays close attention to each other, hearing and remembering
everything, and respecting all that they hear, a group mind forms. The goal of this phenomenon
is to connect the information created out of group ideas —
and it's easily capable of brilliance.
People who have never experienced it may be skeptical, dismissing it as New Age nonsense,
but the group mind is a very real phenomenon. This is not to say that each person can read the
others' minds or project specific thoughts; but when a group mind is achieved, its members
have a very strong sense of the group as an entity of its own, and connects with its feelings and
requirements. There is an empathy among the individuals involved, almost an instinct. The
members exist to serve the needs of the group, much like the Innuit Indians who place
themselves in a group trance to attack a polar bear or a whale. If everyone fails to do the right
thing, they will die!