So Long Farewell

Un-Scripted: unscripted closed last weekend. I was in all three shows. In fact Tara, Max, Mike, and I were each in every show, with Christian doing 2 and Dave the other to round out the cast.

We had a lot of fun, but it was bittersweet not only for the typical end-of-the-run reasons, but because Tara is moving to Maine, making these her last shows with us for a while if not forever.



Sigh. She will be missed.

That said, the shows themselves were quite fun. Of course, a week later, I can hardly remember what any of the scenes were. I’ve put off writing the last post about this show because I didn’t want it to be over yet. But it is.

Tonight we have our first production meeting for The Great Puppet Bollywood Extravaganza! In addition to being in it, I will also be the show’s producer. I intend to blog about the production process as well as the rehearsal process. We’ll see how successful I am.

Stuck!

Saturday night we stuck the landing.

While I had a great time in all of the shows this last weekend, Saturday’s show was by far the most fun. To be honest I can’t even remember how we ended the show, but every scene in the second half was strong enough to have been the end of the show. The first half was none too shabby either.

Mandy brought an audience member up on stage to read lines from Ibsen for a Playbook scene. Audience member Brian overacted fabulously resulting in probably the best Playbook scene I’ve ever witnessed. Having an audience member do it makes that game so much better. It should always be played that way.

I had a lot of fun singing in the show, which, if you’re a frequent reader, you’ll know isn’t my strong suit. From the “Monster Sex Machine” song as puppets to both songs from “Columbus! The Rock Opera”, I never felt like I was in over my head. Bringing back the chorus from “There’s a New World On the Horizon” during the song “We Were Here First” will go down as one of my fondest improv memories.

That and the subtle feeling of everyone else in the cast and everyone in the audience seeing Christian and I loading our muskets without ever having to say what we were doing. The cast developed a wonderful group mind that grew to include the audience itself. That feeling makes improv so special for performers and audiences alike.

Come this weekend! We’ve got almost the same cast every night this weekend, which should lead to some great ensemble work.

**

More Un-Scripted on the Web: This guy saw our show a couple weeks ago and blogged about it.

Stick Your Landings

I've been somewhat remiss in my blogging about this show, mostly because I went to Japan and missed two weekends. Then I got busy at work this week and didn't have time to blog about rehearsal on Tuesday.

We did genre work on Tuesday. We like to do genre scenes at the Un-Scripted Theater Company. We practiced Genre Switch (which I hadn't played in years) where you switch back and forth between two genres. Genre Slide, where you start in one genre and slowly transition the scene into another genre by the end. Genre Roller Coaster, where you do a scene and keep changing the genres throughout. And Genre Combo, where you take two genres and combine them into one scene. That's probably my favorite.

In the show tonight, we played some genre roller-coaster, using a "magic bell" that would transform the scenes. It was fun.

The show tonight was a lot of fun. It was a very solid, good show. It would have been a spectacular show, but we didn't stick the landing. The damned show just wouldn't end. The last 15 minutes or so were hell, not only because the show wouldn't end, but because it was about a million degrees in the theater by then. The show finally ended with a prolonged whimper at 10:07. Jesus god, shoot me now.

Why wouldn't it end? We couldn't find it. We couldn't find the button. The capper. The tag. What's more, we all had ideas on how to end it and kept fighting each other for control of the scene so we could push our idea. We just needed to let it go and let it end and stop trying to force it.

Had we not performed the third half of the show, it would have been amazing. As it was, it was a good solid show.

Opening Night!

Wow, the show last night was so much fun! I’m not sure if I was wrong and shouldn’t have been worried at all about opening night, or if I was right and being worried kept us all engaged and made for a great show. Either way, we had a really solid show for the first night of a run.

Yes, we learned some things to make the show better. Christian was really single entendre with his transitions last night, but he took that note well. What do I mean by that? Well, instead of taking an element from the previous scene and using it in a different way in the next scene, he was taking an element from the previous scene and using it literally in the next scene, which led to some confusion about whether or not we were in the same world.

I think we also would have been better served doing “second scenes” later in the show rather than immediately after the first scene. We got some feedback from people in the audience that they either wanted us to use the themes we developed more or less (such that they weren’t themes). From inside the show, I really enjoyed that no theme overly dominated the show. I’m not sure I’d like doing it that way. A big part of the success of this show is going to be the cast enjoying themselves, so I’ll have to watch that carefully.

I did some fun characters that I’ve never really done before. I played one to introduce a scene that even while I was doing it I was thinking “This is someone new. I really like him though.” Unfortunately, as soon as the show was over, I could not remember the character at all. I’m not sure I could recreate him. D’oh.

Dress Rehearsal!!

Wow, now we've got the added pressure of being the Best Theater Company in the Bay Area on top of opening Thursday. In many ways it's unfortunate that we win Best Theater Company right before opening the most traditional improv show we've done in years. The timing would have been so much better to win it right before Three or Theater: The Musical.

I was suffering from generalized nausea inducing stomach bug which left me extremely low energy because I hadn't really eaten much all day. So I didn't really do much. The dress rehearsal section I was in... well... Let' just hope this is a moment of "in like a lion out like a lamb." The second dress rehearsal section that I watched was much better.

I think this show will come together, but it might take a show or two for it to find it's legs. Come! Definitely come! Just realize we're still working out the kinks. Or maybe that's just the nerves talking. When I used to direct shows, I never wanted my cast feeling perfectly comfortable going into opening night. I always wanted them a little worried. That kept them engaged.

Finding the Game, Literally

You’ll often hear improvisors talking about “finding the game” of a scene. We took that concept a little further last night by actually playing improv games within scenes without setting them up or even agreeing amongst ourselves before the scene what game we were playing.

This made for some interesting scenes and some funny moments. People would go out on stage with the intent of playing one game, only to have it morph into another. Max, for instance, wanted to start a silent scene, which Tara then turned into Standing, Sitting, Kneeling, and Laying Down. Unfortunately Max never really caught on to the fact that that was the game.

The scene was funny on its own, but anyone in the audience familiar with the game would have enjoyed it on a second level as well. I wouldn’t want to do a whole show this way. I’m a big believer in not hiding anything from the audience, but doing it this way allows for some wonderfully playful discovery leading to scenes you would get no other way.

I knew as soon as we started the exercise that I wanted to start a spit-take scene internally. I kept my water bottle with me at all times, slipping it my pocket when I’d go onstage, not only so that it would be handy, but so that my fellow improvisors wouldn’t suspect anything like they would if I suddenly grabbed a water bottle before heading out. I casually took a drink of water every time I was about to out and start a scene, just in case. The first several times I did that, the scene moved off immediately in another direction so I just swallowed my water and played whatever game had come up, but one time…

I went out with Christian and sat for a long time with out speaking, while he stood for a long time without speaking. When he finally said something, I spit in shock and surprise and then pulled my water bottle out of my pocket. Ah, the effect was beautiful and launched us into a fun spit-take scene.

My other highlight of the night was Mandy and I playing “The Feables”. I’m sure Dave intended for us to sing (did I mention we had David Norfleet at rehearsal and sang a bunch?) when he went out onstage and said “Ladies and Gentlemen, I now present to you The Feables”. Instead we played really old people telling an inane joke as if we were on a seventies variety show. So fun.

Only one more rehearsal left and then we open! Woohoo!

Rehearsal #5: Acting

Last night we worked on our acting skills by doing some scenes in the style of playwrights. Actually that’s not entirely true. We started by practicing scenes wherein the characters follow along their own trains of thought rather than reacting specifically to what someone just said. This is hard to do, but produces scenes that feel like they’ve come from a play rather than improvised. We’re taught to Yes And so much and listen so attentively that scenes are way more linear than real life. To do it well though, following your train of thought requires a lot of Yes And-ing and listening.

Then we moved on to scenes in the style of Woody Allen and then onto Neil Simon. I did a really fun Neil Simon scene with Tara, Christian, and Dave as bumbling bank robbers.

Next, we practiced scenes that let into duets. We’ve been singing in rehearsal to a guitar, and it’s really interesting the difference between improvising to a guitar and improvising to a keyboard. I think I like the guitar better, but I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s that the chord progressions are more predictable. Maybe it just fits my range better. Not sure.

Finally, in the remaining time, we practiced the format, doing a series of short scenes and games. Not sure what we’re doing tonight, but I’m sure it will be fun!

Intros and Transitions

Dave’s vision for this show is for it to be seamless in such a way that it doesn’t seem like an “improv show.” To accomplish that, we had to develop ways to get suggestions and set up scenes without just coming out on stage as an imporvisor to do them.

So, last night, we worked on ways that characters can interact with the audience organically in order to get their suggestions or participation and set up scenes. I’ll admit, when Dave first said were just going to spend some time just doing scene intros, I had a hard time envisioning how this would be helpful, but once we started I dove right it. We had such a fun time coming up with new and inventive ways to seamlessly interact with the audience. I can’t wait to try it out in a show.

Then we worked on transitions, or really, we worked on running little chunks of the show to see how each scene could flow from the next, using what we’d just done with intros. It worked really well. The show is shaping up quite nicely.

Rehearsals #2 and #3

Rehearsal #3 was last night, but I wasn’t there.

Rehearsal #2 was last week, and I can’t really remember anything specific about what happened. That’s me falling down on the job. I remember doing scenes and singing and having a really good time.

Rehearsal #4 is next week and I will be there. I’ll also blog about it! Crazy, I know.

Rehearsal #1: Getting to know you

We had our first rehearsal for Un-Scripted Un-Scripted last night. The exact punctuation of the title is still up in the air, so until it gets set, I’ll refer to it that way. I like the title. It reminds me of “pizza pizza” from the old Little Caesars ads, or the Circus Circus casino.

It’s a short form show, which we as a company haven’t done in over a year and I personally haven’t done in almost 2 years. I’m really looking forward to stretching those muscles again, especially with the cast Dave’s assembled. Unfortunately it looks like Derek might not be able to do the show after all, but even without him I think it’s a strong group.

Last night we worked mostly on basic exercises, word-at-a-time stories, I am a tree and genre freeze tag. Then we moved on to playing some moving bodies. That game really does show you all the different physical things you could be doing in any scene if you weren’t so focused on the words.

Many improvisors don’t realize this, but most games where developed to help build skills for regular scene work, but they were so enjoyable in their own right, they became used in performance. Moving bodies lets one person focus entirely on talking and another focus entirely on movement. The result is very eye opening for both. One thing we noticed, for instance, was the scenes had more head petting than we’ve ever seen in a regular scene, but there’s no reason not to do that in regular scenes.

Then we moved on to 4-way dubbing, which builds your listening skills as well as teaches you to have reactions to things. Since you can’t speak for yourself, you have to react and hope the person doing your voice gets it. Or, you have to react to justify what they just had you say.

Rehearsal #2 is tonight. I think we had a solid beginning.

Auditions!

The Un-Scripted Theater Company is looking for experienced improvisors for our upcoming improvised show: Un-Scripted: unscripted.

Show Description:
To heck with formats! This August, Un-Scripted breaks down the walls between us and the audience, bringing you . . . whatever we want! Short scenes, songs, musical instruments, things we did long ago and want to bring back, things we've never ever tried before and always wanted to. It's a shortform show that will seamlessly flow along without breaks for introduction, sweeping the improvisors and the audience on a ride of improvised possibility. Fun, huh?

Auditions will be Monday and Tuesday, June 16 & 17, 2008. They're group auditions, so you should plan to be there from about 7pm to 9:30pm. To sign up, email the producer Mandy (rhymes with Gandhi) and let us know whether you prefer Monday or Tuesday. Mandy will send you a confirmation with your date, the location (still TBA), and your handy-dandy audition paperwork.

In order to give you the best opportunity to show us your improv skills, we try to keep our auditions as light and low-pressure as possible (more like a workout or improv jam than a normal theater audition). We'll even email you the audition paperwork ahead of time, so you can fill it out in the comfort of your own home and bring it with you. We want our auditions to be fun and stress-free, so you can just come and play with other improvisors who love improvising as much as you do.

If you'd like more information about the audition and rehearsal process, and what we might be looking for when casting, you can visit the auditions page of our website. We offer a stipend of $50 for the run of the show.

Rehearsals will begin around June 24th and continue on Tuesdays until the show is over. The show performs Thursday-Saturday, August 2 - 30 at 8pm, at the SF Playhouse Stage 2, 533 Sutter St. in San Francisco.