Day 3: The Suggestion

[York99]

Justin York’s Philosophy on Improv
Day 3
Today’s Topic: The Suggestion

If you haven’t already, please read my post from Friday June 16 in the Classes section titled “So you think you know more about improv than Del Close, do you?â€

[erikamay]

a few years into improv, i dismissed the idea that the suggestion had to be used repeatedly.

however, springboarding from the "chicago-style conversation/debate" before the weekend, the audience suggestion is the audiences only interactive tie to the work you produce. to ignore it is a bit of a f*ck you in a craft that tends toward the masterbatory - without checks, and selflessness on the part of the players - as it is.

as i was taught, del LOVED the invocation as an opening because it served to not only:
a. use the audience suggestion (repeatedly), but
b. exalt the audience suggestion to a god-like status that drove the subsequent theme of the show

the suggestion also serves as what a traditional marketer would refer to as "a reason to believe" (consumers believe in the authenticity of the product you are producing - it *IS* soapy! it *DOES* remove stains! they *ARE* making this stuff up on the spot just from the word i gave them!).

good stuff. i want to get over to talk about plot vs. furthering character in the harold in your other posts jtown. its a fine distinction, but worth clarity.

e

[Wesley]

The suggestion is simply a jumping off point for the players onstage. If the show is good enough, the audience will forget about the suggestion and be dazzled by what the performers do with it.

Now I'm more of a Crouchian-trained guy than a Del or Johnstone one, but I have my own mixed feelings about the suggestion.

I think the suggestion is one of those things that we on stage think less of than the audience does. And I think the way we think of a suggestion--as a "springboard"--is not always the way the audience thinks of it (unless we train them to, which here in Austin we have not). I think they will let you wonder away from it, but it has to happen organically. However, I've been to shows where the players have asked for a suggestion (BBQ), then launched into some word association game (without telling the audience what was going on), and wound up starting a scene about ice hockey, only for me to overhear the audience member complaining to his wife, "Didn't I say BBQ?" In general, I think that, even if we "get away with it," the audience rarely forgets the suggestion as much as we think they do.

I'm of the mind similar to Erika's, I think. That this art lends itself to the self-masterbatory and if you don't want a suggestion, I say simply don't take one. Pgraph's done several shows without soliciting audience suggestions. Once you do take one, though, I think you owe it a nod at the least.

That said, I don't always think it has to be taken literally or in the context they immediately associate with it. Blue has a myriad of meanings beyond the color. I think it is fulfilling for an audience to see you take the suggestions and tweak and tangle them and make them your own, or even use the same suggestion in three different ways. But it shouldn't be so abstract that they don't know that's what you've done.

Also, I think Austin improv tends to feel too rushed. Probably all the 25 minute shows we do, but I don't think a suggestion needs to appear right away, or even in the first few scenes at all. If the suggestion is "pitcher," you can do 4 scenes with a family and then, once they are established, have the daughter drop her mother's antique pitcher and use that as a turning point in the family dynamics for the rest of the show. Personally, I like that because it is a delayed gratification to the audience (who may be wondering "where's the suggestion"), but when it happens they know it has happened and they like the way it happened. I also like using it as an emotional(?) bookend for the show, though it is hard to do right. Like having the suggestions of "necklace" and having a scene with a husband and wife getting ready to go out and her having a throw away line asking if he's seen her lost necklace. Then you go the whole show without mentioning it again and the audience thinks you've dropped it. But you circle back in the last scene to the husband and wife 20 years later and he is giving her an engraved necklace. That not only unexpectedly brings back the suggestion in a powerful way, but uses it to encompass the essence of the show despite having not been present until that moment (because the engraving can be about things that happened).

I think here in Austin we either too often seem to ignore the suggestion entirely or use it too literally right off the bat (like washing dishes when the lights come up if the suggestion was "dishwasher." That's valid, but it shouldn't happen every time). I also dislike how sometimes we will creatively use the suggestion and then call it out to make sure the audience "gets" what we've done (and I've been guilty of this). Like if the suggestion was "king" and you opened talking about The Shining. I think people make the connection without you saying "All I'm saying is that it was the best Stephen King movie ever made." That's one of those uses that is better left subtle IMHO.

Suggestions are largely smoke and mirrors if you want them to be, but they can be a strong connection witht he audience if used wisely, and why are we up there if not for the audience?

[York99]

Thank you both for falling right into my trap. Those are exactly the responses I hoped to elicit. Those arguements are also the reason why I flip-flop on my opinion.

First, I don't think there is anything wrong with using the suggestion more liberally or literally. On the other hand, I think if you take the audience with you on your journey of extrapolating themes from their suggestion, you are doing as much if not more to honor said suggestion. There is nothing wrong with saying to the audience, "We need a suggestion from you to get started. The show won't be about what you say, but we will use it to come up with ideas and themes."... or something like that. It's fun as an added bonus (lagniappe, if you're from Louisiana) to throw the suggestion in literally here and there.

I don't mean at all that one should throw the suggestion away. But you're right, Wes, in that it is in the troupe's best interest to let the audience know how the suggestion will be used.

On another note, yes it is about the audience. But giving them a super duper show is enough. It might even be better if a troupe concentrates on the themes generated by the suggestion rather than focusing on the arbitrary word or phrase given. There is no rule that you have to stay true to their suggestion... or that you have to take one in the first place.

My opinion is subject to change at any time.

[Rev. Jordan T. Maxwell]

I've had this discussion/argument with Jeff a lot of times over the years, especially while doing the Great Mundane (a troupe where we'd take a suggestion and then have to go back afterwards to see if we'd even bothered incorporating it. ). I'm a fan of taking a suggestion. But not necessarily being a slave to it. I think it definitely gets the audience more involved and gives you a nice tow line to bring them along because, even if only nominally, they were involved in the creation of this piece. At the same time, I don't think it's a good idea storytelling wise to completely bend to the audience's whim (the notion of giving people what they need instead of what they want). So playing it kind of loose with the suggestion is the best way to go. It's your tool, use it how you will. As has been pointed out in this thread already, it's incredibly malleable. There is no hard set rule as to HOW you use your suggestion. How does it inspire YOU? What does it conjure in YOUR mind? Is it a plot device? A recurring theme? A throwaway or running gag? A play on words? Like, if Wes's suggestion of pitcher were taken...yes, the antique water pitcher is broken...but then perhaps the oldest son has dreams of playing major league baseball...and then their redneck cousin comes to visit from out of town and wants take lots of "pitchers" with his new camera for the folks back home. Three different meanings of the word which don't dominate the story, but introduce new elements. These are all ways in which a suggestion can be used, and none of them is more or less right than the others. Just let your mind be open to what the suggestion inspires, and go with it in that direction. And of course be open to how your fellow players onstage are interpreting and being inspired. Think about how you can play your inspiration off of theirs and create that kind of unique alchemy that only happens in improv. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But that's the nature of improv and really all live theatre. The risk, the chance of the unexpected, the dual hope of the audience that you succeed and create something wonderful or catch on fire and die onstage. That's why anytime i have to ask for a suggestion, i tend to lean towards the esoteric. Colors don't interest me. Occupations don't interest me. Playing off of a suggestion like world religion or favorite smell are more interesting to me because i'm not just playing off of blue or doctor for the millionth time. And i think it also gives the audience a little more of why they chose to come and see an improv show...the act of creation, of seeing a show that has never been performed before and will never be performed again, something new and raw and beautifully mad. And where else are they going to see a show inspired by someone's favorite smell?

That'd be an interesting experiment in suggestion taking, and you'd need a really savvy audience to pull it off. But from one half of the audience, you take a suggestion FOR a suggestion...that is to say, a general subject matter. Like occupation or historical period or whatever. Then take that to the other half of the audience and get the actual suggestion. The improvisers are working from a completely blank slate then because they don't even get to come up with what they're asking a suggestion for. I don't know, I think it'd be cool.

But I was taught more in the Bearded Lamb school of prov than Close or Johnstone, so maybe i'm just talking out of my ass. But perhaps my ass is very wise and should be paid attention to more often.

[ChrisTrew.Com]

I like making the audience think, believing that they chose to see this improv show as opposed to a movie because they wanted to be challenged. They want to make the connection themselves and not have it written out for them. That's what I believe. It's so much more rewarding that way, as an audience member.

I remember playing Maestro one time and the suggestion was "cigarette" and I did a scene on the edge of a building. That's what "cigarette" made me do. The game was "Scene 3 Ways" and after the first scene, someone in the audience said very loudly, "You weren't even smoking a cigarette!"

She was right!

[ratliff]

I have less experience than anyone on this forum with performing, but I'm also the person who most recently was an audience member with no preconceptions about improv, so filter accordingly:

I can tell you that when I went to see improv before I learned the principles behind it, I DEFINITELY noticed when suggestions weren't (or didn't seem to be) followed. I didn't feel cheated, necessarily -- in fact, my tendency is to assume the fault lies with me and wonder what I missed -- but it did detract from my enjoyment of the show, because part of my brain was trying to make things fit. I know firsthand that Chris Trew is a fantastically entertaining performer, but I would have had the same reaction (albeit unexpressed) as that woman.

My feeling is that by asking for a suggestion you are making an implicit deal with the audience. I agree that there's a a lot of leeway about how to fulfill the terms of that deal, and I don't think that you have to bring it down to the lowest common denominator, but it is a deal, and in the case Chris cites, there's no discernible difference between "That's what the suggestion made me want to do" and "I have chosen to ignore your suggestion."

Also, I would like to believe that improv audiences come to be challenged, and I'm sure a lot of them do, but given how often the word "comedy" is used in marketing improv, I don't think it unlikely that some people register "funny" and get no further in considering how it might be different from standup or sketch. At the same time, even people who understand what improv is are unlikely to be familiar with all the different ways in which it can unfold. So I strongly feel like letting the audience in on what's happening benefits everyone. It can keep them from feeling like they don't know what's going on (which can undercut their enjoyment of the show), and it gives them a greater appreciation of what the performers are trying to do in addition to being funny. Which means that they have something to pay attention to other than just waiting for the next comic payoff.

To the extent that improv involves creating a safe space in which the collective unconscious can be unashamedly unfurled, I think creating that for the audience is just as important as creating it for the players. If you want people to emotionally engage with what they're seeing, they have to feel like it's safe to do so, and if they're confused they're going to resist engagement, even if that's all happening subconsciously. I don't think it's a show killer -- I have no doubt that even the woman who yelled about the cigarette had a good time -- but rather one more element to take into account when developing the relationship with the audience.

I sure talk a lot for someone who has no idea what he's talking about.

[York99]

Wow! You couldn't be more wrong! You are a terrible person.

Oh wait... Did I say wrong? I meant right. You couldn't be more right.

Thanks for the insight.

[arthursimone]

whenever I see audience members pat each other on the back and smile for having their suggestion taken, I think "you are retarded. you are literally retarded. you live in a reality different from mine, I'd feel threatened if you didn't work as a metaphorical grocery-bagger." in my head, I take that suggestion, put it on paper, and crumple it up and throw it in the wastecan in my head.

but then I see their big puppydog eyes and smiles and I melt and I want to honor them since they came out to honor me and in my head I find that wastecan and I get mental coffee grinds and banana peels and strange syrups on my mental hands digging for the original suggestion, and I re-present the suggestion with an "aha!!" which has enough head garbage to make it interesting to me but enough original suggestion to tickle the tiny puppydog brains in the audience and get them to wiggle that little puppydog audience tail.

[valetoile]

While watching the tight/coldtowne show Friday, I remembered another thing that's nice about suggestions- It gives the players and the audience shared information that never has to be brought up in the scene, but informs all the actions. The suggestion was Dildo. No one in the scene mentioned dildos, sex shops, or anything else. If you had seen just that scene, it could have been about anything. But knowing it was about dildos, knowing that when Bob McNichol was shaking his fists, a big silicone dong was waving around, made it a beautiful thing.

You can establish similar things with quick tap-outs, audience asides, and other little tricks too of course.