Austin Improv

Generally to add to this discussion, experience is a good thing. Being put in new situations and with new people can be good for your personal growth and development, but I find that the best consistent performances come from long-term committed groups/troupes/teams. I also find that picking your fellow cast-mates is desirable for more long-term projects. Show runs are nice for working with new people because it has an end point. End points are nice. To wit...

hujhax wrote:I know gnap! casts troupes periodically out of the mixers.  How do y'all feel about that?

What I like about the Gnap! model is the built in time-line. That is, it's a set commitment. If after set commitment some or all of the players want to continue, they can, and the onus is on them. (TNM is starting to do this somewhat similarly; and maybe ColdTowne is now doing this too?). I think one of the things that can feel scary is the commitment to this thing indefinitely, at least to me and what I've heard/seen from others. Strangely, knowing that it will end in 3 months or 6 months can make the decision to continue on more likely than if you were in something that didn't have a set end-goal or a date to re-assess.

There was a Formspring (remember that?) question that Asaf answered a long time ago I found very enlightening and it's particularly relevant to this discussion. I'd like to go back and find that, maybe I can find the link.

Bam:

http://www.formspring.me/AsafRonen/q/337758708

I like playing with people I don't normally play with, but I think it's because I choose to and it's not the only way I get to play. I share the general distaste for groups assembled by fiat, in part because I think experienced improvisers overestimate their ability to predict how different people will play together. I agree completely that trust should be the goal no matter what the situation, but in my opinion the chemistry of a group that really cooks together is not something that can be engineered from the outside.