Posted: April 5th, 2006, 9:34 pm
i just thought of two important memories.
we were booked to do a show at a college in connecticut. two weeks before the show the guy called and said that he wasn't expecting much of a crowd because they had accidentally booked us opposite a very popular annual show on campus called fairfield idol. yes, the college's version of american idol. i painfully suggested that we combine the two shows in some way. he agreed and i hung up the phone regretting it immediately. over the next two weeks we loosely planned for the cupholders to act as randy, paula, and simon. even though there was a panel of actual judges who were making actual decisions about the talent and who would win the title of fairfield idol. it wasn't decided how our improv would fit into that. we were dreading the show leading up to it. we decided we would do a longform in three sections interspersed with the talent performances. i was going into this expecting the worst.
but the show was really great. they were receptive to our improv (the suggestion was beauty pagent which fit nicely.) they liked our impressions of the american idol judges and laughed consistently at our comments. it turned out to be really great and i'm guessing only a handful of the audience was there to see us.
the other memory is of a show at the hideout. it was gorilla theatre for one of those iron improviser things and part way through the show i noticed that the audience was composed of all improvisers. around 20 or so people. the show was going really well and as is sometimes the case in gorilla you run short of your allotted directing time toward the end of the show (each person gets a cumulative total for their directing.) i was short on time so i brought up the entire audience and we did a conducted song about how great improv is. for no audience. we were our own audience. i love things like that.
alright, i just thought of another one...
a long time ago for a well hung jury show we only had about 7 people show up so we gave them back their money and took it to the streets out in front of the hideout. we improvised with strangers on the sidewalk and played improvised instruments and sang songs. i jogged taking extremely small steps for about 30 minutes all around congress between 6th and 7th streets, following those horse-drawn carriages, or cars, or whatever. it was a lot of fun and we never would have done it if a bunch of people showed up.
you guys are absolutely right. sometimes it can be just for the group. improv is already somewhat just about the personal challenge it presents us as individuals and as troupes. sometimes you'll do your best work when your just doing it for yourself and no one else, audience or not. sometimes, pleasing the audience is the most important thing at that moment. that's what is so great about improv. there's never only one governing principle as there are literally zillions of choices any improviser can make at any moment. it's all subjective and you never how great a show is going to be until the lights go down.
jerome
we were booked to do a show at a college in connecticut. two weeks before the show the guy called and said that he wasn't expecting much of a crowd because they had accidentally booked us opposite a very popular annual show on campus called fairfield idol. yes, the college's version of american idol. i painfully suggested that we combine the two shows in some way. he agreed and i hung up the phone regretting it immediately. over the next two weeks we loosely planned for the cupholders to act as randy, paula, and simon. even though there was a panel of actual judges who were making actual decisions about the talent and who would win the title of fairfield idol. it wasn't decided how our improv would fit into that. we were dreading the show leading up to it. we decided we would do a longform in three sections interspersed with the talent performances. i was going into this expecting the worst.
but the show was really great. they were receptive to our improv (the suggestion was beauty pagent which fit nicely.) they liked our impressions of the american idol judges and laughed consistently at our comments. it turned out to be really great and i'm guessing only a handful of the audience was there to see us.
the other memory is of a show at the hideout. it was gorilla theatre for one of those iron improviser things and part way through the show i noticed that the audience was composed of all improvisers. around 20 or so people. the show was going really well and as is sometimes the case in gorilla you run short of your allotted directing time toward the end of the show (each person gets a cumulative total for their directing.) i was short on time so i brought up the entire audience and we did a conducted song about how great improv is. for no audience. we were our own audience. i love things like that.
alright, i just thought of another one...
a long time ago for a well hung jury show we only had about 7 people show up so we gave them back their money and took it to the streets out in front of the hideout. we improvised with strangers on the sidewalk and played improvised instruments and sang songs. i jogged taking extremely small steps for about 30 minutes all around congress between 6th and 7th streets, following those horse-drawn carriages, or cars, or whatever. it was a lot of fun and we never would have done it if a bunch of people showed up.
you guys are absolutely right. sometimes it can be just for the group. improv is already somewhat just about the personal challenge it presents us as individuals and as troupes. sometimes you'll do your best work when your just doing it for yourself and no one else, audience or not. sometimes, pleasing the audience is the most important thing at that moment. that's what is so great about improv. there's never only one governing principle as there are literally zillions of choices any improviser can make at any moment. it's all subjective and you never how great a show is going to be until the lights go down.
jerome