Lants wrote:mpbrockman wrote:
I'd strongly agree with Val's first bullet. When I think about what makes Austin troupes stand out at many festivals it's the seeming ease with which they do longform narrative. Not a series of loosely related scenes but a real story with character arcs and a satisfying ending.
Considering there are so many students of Coldtowne, I wouldn't put this in the "definition" of Austin Style Improv.
Yeah, I almost added a qualifier to that, but I try to get through life with as few qualifiers as possible. But the qualifier that I would have added would have been:
While narrative and genre do not apply across the board, and are completely absent in a large portion of Austin troupes, I think it is something you see a lot of in Austin that you do not see as much of in other cities, and it therefore makes Austin unique.
In light of other comments, I would like to further add that I think the acceptance and openmindedness of Austin allows some really great things to happen- people who are doing a genre narrative are also finding the games in their scenes. People who are doing Harolds are picking up status and platform/tilt stuff. We're realizing that the schools are more arbitrary than exclusive, and we're all making better stronger improv with hybrid vigor because of it.
Hybrid Vigor- that's Austin improv.