Finding Fun in Others (aka. Happy Birthday, Kory!)

Kory improvising with an audience member at Rapid Fire’s BONFIRE Festival. Photograph by Billy Wong.

My friend Kory Mathewson made a simple request for this 29th birthday; reflections on “finding fun in others”.

I would like to start this birthday message by telling you about Kory. He is a top tier improvisor with Rapid Fire Theatre in Edmonton, where he tours with a rad show called TedxRFT. He is one of my favourite people in the world to be on stage with because no idea is too ‘out there’, no game is too experimental. His response to my ideas is always, “Let’s do it, Amer!”. Whether it’s an improvised parliamentary-style debate, a musical, or a show full of challenging pulse-edits, Kory is always up for taking a risk on stage.

Kory is a truly gifted improvisor, I think in part because of his broad experience of the world.  He’s not the type of performer who exists in a echo chamber, spending 6 days a week workshopping in a theatre; he’s constantly trying new things, traveling, and learning. He studies computing science, and biomedical engineering. He builds websites, and software, and ROBOTS(!!). He likes rock climbing, cycling, “schvitzing”, making up nasty slang words, and seeking out the best food in the city. He chases weird experiences, and it makes you want to do the same.

Once he invited me to the university for a CT Scan, and a researcher complimented me the symmetry of my brain!
Once we were bike riding and we quietly watched a family of beavers screeching on the riverbank!
Once, in Austin, we stopped at every bar on the way to a party and did 98 whiskey shots!

So, how does this all relate to “Finding Fun in Others”?

Kory and I having a laugh riot at BONFIRE 2014. Photograph by Billy Wong.

Kory is a master at making you feel like a million bucks. When you’re in a conversation with Kory, he immediately digs deeper than “How are you?” or “What’s new?”.  He makes the whole conversation about you by asking so many questions. He says “yeah!” and “absolutely!” non-stop. He wants to talk about you rather than himself. He takes any kernel of information and expands upon it. He can talk to anyone about anything for EVER.

Kory consistently strikes up conversations with strangers in elevators. When I first met him, I wondered, “Why? Why would he do this?” At first, I assumed it wasn’t genuine; he was just teasing the person he was talking to, or he had some other agenda. But I now know that Kory is just that curious. He is legitimately interested in what a random teen is eating for lunch, or where a bartender first tasted a certain liqueur, or why you like the dress you are wearing.

There are so many days in our lives where we feel insignificant, like the little things we do are inconsequential or routine. Kory is a great example of someone who shines a spotlight on little details, and makes you feel like you are the most interesting person in the room.

Kory has taught me to find the fun in others by helping them find the fun in themselves.

Happy birthday, Kor!

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Kory and I wearing matching “BUTT” shirts. Photograph by Marc-Julien Objois. http://marcjulienobjois.com/

Photographs by Billy Wong (http://www.semigravity.com/) and Marc-Julien Objois (http://marcjulienobjois.com).

Curious Monkey

Has a gif ever made you cry?

If you asked me last week if people ever cried while watching gifs, I would have said likely not. Yet, I now understand the contrary, because this silly one made me burst into tears the moment I watched it.

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The shock and amazement on the monkey’s face is so genuine that it brought me to tears. Such innocent wonder is something that we see children experience, but as adults, it is rare. I guess it’s hard to truly buy into a magic trick once you understand the definition of a “trick”.

A lot of our training in improvisation is focused on undoing the behaviours that were piled onto us as we grew up. These behaviours are valuable in the outside world; they keep us safe and allow us to be accepted socially. But on stage, we want to be vulnerable, impulsive, and open to any possibility. Pretty much the opposite of how we are supposed to act day to day.

The joy of improvisation is that we can play with unapologetic curiosity. We can react hugely to any offer our partner gives us. We can be boldly gullible, insanely innocent, and so sweet its stubborn. We can be voraciously curious about where the scene will take us next. We can be dazzled by the wonder of our imagination.

Sometimes you just need to weep about a monkey gif to be reminded of this.

The Improvisor is Present

www.hipbang.ca

Improvisors Tom Hill & Devin Mackenize of Hip.Bang! Photograph by Marc-Julien Objois. http://marcjulienobjois.com/

Eye contact. It’s scary with loved ones. It’s impossibly scary with strangers. It’s imperative for improvisors.

I remember the first day I was introduced to the work of Marina Abramović. I was a university student taking a survey course of 20th century art. As a woman of Slavic decent, with a flair for the dramatic, who also loved walking for long periods of time, I felt we had a lot in common. I was shocked by the brutality and gore of her Rhythm series, and moved by the romantic qualities of her work with her lover-collaborator Ulay.

Abramović’s art is definitely not for everyone. She’s violent, and inward-gazing, and what some people say is the problem with the contemporary art world. But for me, she is a woman who lives in a world defined by her personal mythology, and values being in the moment above all else. I think my favourite work is 1977’s, Breathing In Breathing Out, when her Ulay, shoved tampons up their noses, locked mouths and breathed in each other’s air until one of them asphyxiated.

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So what does this wild stuff have to do with improv? Besides the fact that some of her performances are pretty funny, there are plenty of other parallels. Abramović speaks about the importance of risk taking, failure, and process over product, but more than anything Abramović, to me, embodies to me what it means to be in the moment.

You’re probably familiar with her 2010 work The Artist is Present. Clips of it were circulating around Facebook, and it ran at the MoMA for 3 months. In this work, we see the transformational affect that eye contact can have.

When we relax, let go of our social masks (smiling, cracking jokes, aka. the ticks we have that keep us safe), and breathe, there is so much there.

I recently had students start scenes this way. With only eye contact, breath and physical proximity as a starting point, once students really connected through the gaze, they started to feel genuine emotion, and connect feelings to implied relationships with their scene partner.

“I felt like we were going to fight.”
“I know I disappointed him.”
“With every breath the relationship changed.”

All this information, from just seeing and being seen. By the time class was over, everyone in the room had glassy, shiny eyes. We were all more emotionally engaged than when we’d arrived.

When in doubt, breathe, and look at your partner. Trust that the rest is already there. So much of improv is about building up structure, but there is value in simplifying too, in stripping away.

As Abramović says, “In the gaze… everything happens.”

Photograph of Hip.Bang! by Marc-Julien Objois. http://marcjulienobjois.com/

Leading like an Improvisor

Photograph by the super-awesome Mat Simpson. http://matsimpson.co

One of my favourite improv exercises is Dolphin Training. I learned it years ago in a workshop led by Patti Stiles, who is with Impro Melbourne. It’s a partnered exercise that I use in almost all of the workshops I lead. It really allows me to get a sense of a group, and assess their ability to take risks.

It’s simple to play. Everyone pairs up. Partner A looks around the room and decides something that they would like Partner B to do. At first it should be simple: sit in a chair, flick the light switch off, close the curtains. Partner B moves silently around the space and tries to figure it out. The only way they know they are on the right track is that Partner A gives them a bell sound, a “ding”. When Partner B does the precise action that Partner A thought of, then they have succeeded, and the partners switch. It’s like a game of “Warmer or Cooler” you may have played as a child, except without the cool.

I love the game for many reasons:
-It trains the feeling of failure. The whole time you are guessing in silence, you feel the panic of not getting it right. You might feel lost or frustrated. Once you sit in this feeling for long enough, you start to get used to it, and slowly you learn to stay calm and keep playing.
-It forces participants to physicalize their ideas. They aren’t able to say “Do you want me to sit in the chair?”, they need to physicalize it. This becomes really important in scene work – showing not telling.
-It reminds us that we aren’t mind readers. Improv is about a give and take, about reactions. There isn’t a road map we’re following, and there are no wrong choices.
-PLUS! – it’s how they actually train dolphins, through positive reinforcement.

In recent years, I’ve been thinking about positive reinforcement, and how to approach my teaching from this perspective. I felt something was broken about how I was leading my students, when I saw many of them obsessed about the “rules” of improv, stressed about doing it “right”, and so in their heads.

When I first started learning improv, we’d do exercises around “blocking”, to demonstrate the difference between accepting an offer and shutting one down. I think that was, frankly, a waste of time. Blocking will happen, why practise bad habits? Nowadays I don’t even talk about blocking in a class, unless a student brings it up. I also don’t talk about “pimping”, or “shelving”.

(Sidenote: Sally Smallwood from People & Chairs wrote a great post about the term “pimping” and how it might be time for a new term.)

I’ve started trying to make a change in the way I lead workshops. I’ve been rewarding improvisors who make bold, risky choices even when they fall flat. The freedom to take risks is what I hope to foster in them. When we debrief about the best moments of a performance, I’ve been focused on not only pointing out big successes, but congratulating people for choosing difficult games, hosting for the first time, or trying on an accent.

I’ve tried to stop saying “never” or “always”, and I’ve been saying “I don’t know” and “Let’s try it!” more.

My goal is to approach my workshops with the same curiosity I bring to a round of Dolphin Training. Sometimes the only way to figure something out is by doing it.

Photograph by Mat Simpson. http://matsimpson.co