We need to stay curious. It sounds like a stupid thing to say, but there is no single way to do improv. We need to see, absorb, steal and cross-pollinate. We need to keep seeing shows, and not just the shows you know you love, but also the shows you think you’ll hate. The shows that are weird, or if your show is weird, the show that is normal and conventional. And we need to encourage others to do the same. You don’t have to love everything; in fact, it would be strange if you did. But the more you know, the more you understand and the richer your work becomes. Some techniques and styles work for some shows and not for others, some appeal to some audience members and not to others. Getting too far into a single style can make you blind to another, so we need to watch as much as we can and get as close as we can to the naive eyes of a new audience member.
Links
Improv Rambling: Thing I Love & Love It/Hate It (2 exercises)→
The Openings of Shannon O’Neill→
Improv and the Curious Worm→
Exploratory tags vs Game Tags→
Avoid Mad Libs tags. Those are moves that just swap out a noun, be it a character or a location, for a different character or location, and then just do the same scene. So if its “Weird guy that wants to marry a giraffe in a restaurant”, no it’s “weird guy that wants to marry a giraffe in a movie theater.” That tag doesn’t give us anything new, it’s just the same scene with a different coat of paint. Those are the boring tag runs you describe.
Improv Mid-Life Crisis→
They just need a lesson in the difference between play and game. With play, you can do whatever you want. With game, well, there is a structure with rules.
Harassment and Sexism in Improv→
Mirror, Action, Object: An Exercise in Personal Active Stakes→
My Favourite Improv Advice→
Patrick’s Improv Reflections – 09/30/15 Show→
Generally speaking, what can we do if we’re not having fun in improv? Well, we can examine the reasons. Was it just one bad show? Are we just having a bad streak? If that bad streak continues, then perhaps we need to examine deeper issues. Are we not playing in the right environment, with the right people, with the right format? Do we need to take a break? Due to the nature of improv, there are going to be off nights, shows which aren’t as fun, where we don’t get that high. But if it’s continually happening, then perhaps there is something greater at work that is worth thinking through.
