#iskc

I'm continuing my series "You Should Be Able To Do..." where I explore some improv "rules" that are really just a place holder by teachers saying, "This is a little bit too complicated. Don't worry about it right now."

 This week, I want to talk about a super common note we're told.

 DON'T ARGUE IN SCENES

 This is like being told not to splash water in the pool. Argumentative scenes are going to happen, and to try to avoid them altogether would lead to some really boring scenes. We want our characters to react, and give emotional, honest responses, and it's natural that this may lead to some sort of conflict between our characters. So, instead of avoiding argumentative scenes, let's avoid the pitfalls of argumentative scenes.

 PITFALL# 1) You can argue, just don't argue about what is TRUE in your scene.

 I would say the #1 pitfall in argumentative scenes is that it is so easy to disagree on the facts of the scene. Any good improv scene is built on the principle of "yes, and", and if in our scene we can't even agree on what is true, we're not saying yes. Let me give an example:

  DENISE: "I am going to hang the Christmas lights up, and it's going to be so  beautiful."

 ALISON: "Ugggh. You are the worst decorator I know."

 DENISE: "What? I thought you loved my decorating?"

 ALISON: "I don't. It is ugly, and stupid."

 This is a pretty typical beginning to an argumentative improv scene. If you notice, these improvisers haven't agreed on the fundamental elements of the scene. Are we clear on whether or not Denise is a good decorator? No. No we're not. Denise says she is, but Alison says she is not. We haven't even yes'd the basics of this scene. It's a trap that so many argumentative scenes fall into. If we can't agree on the basics of our scene, how can we ever build on top of them? If one person says the sky is blue, and the other says it's red, and neither of you budge, we live in this wishy washy scene where the audience has no clue what is real, and so they don't know who to side with. Both sides are equally credible, but neither side can agree on what is TRUE.

 Let's try this again, but let's have our improvisers agree on the truth of the scene.

 DENISE: "I am going to hang the Christmas lights up, and it's going to be so beautiful."

 ALISON: "Ugggh. You are the worst decorator I know."

 DENISE: "That's true, but this time will be different."

 ALISON: "Last year it was bad, and the year before that it was bad too."

 DENISE: "Yeah. I got voted worst decorator in the city."

 ALISON: "And how's that working out for you?"

 So, we have at least agreed on the truth of this scene. Alison says Denise is a terrible decorator, and Denise accepts that to be true. This may not seem like much, but it's something I see so often in improv scenes. One character is accused of some behavior, and instead of just accepting that behavior as a gift in our scene, we try to argue that it's not true. It's a very normal human thing to defend yourself against accusations, but in improv, think of any accusation as a character gift. Say yes to it. Agree to it so your scene can move on.

 That said, in this last example, we said "yes", but we did not, "and" it. No new information was added. Denise agreed that she is a terrible decorator, and Alison followed it up with a sentence citing a non-specific example of how in the past she has been bad at it, then Denise says she was voted worst decorator, and then Alison says she doesn't expect her to change. Although we added dialogue, almost no new information was added. If you wanted to argue, you could say that we learned she was voted worst decorator last year, but that's not adding much of anything aside from just restating what we already know. Denise is bad at decorating. This gets us to the next pitfall with argumentative scenes.

   PITFALL# 2) A lack of specifics and new information.

It is so easy in an argumentative scene to stop adding new information. You want to argue about who is right, or wrong, and so we just keep circling around the same information we already have. Or when someone offers a new twinkling bit of information, we skim past it, and just go back to what we already know in the scene.

Let's do this example again, but have each new line adding information, and specifics.

 DENISE: "I am going to hang the Christmas lights up, and it's going to be so beautiful."

 ALISON: "Ugggh. You are the worst decorator I know. You decorated your car and you can't even see through the windshield."

 DENISE: "Yeah. But is it not cute? "

 ALISON: "That's true, I guess. Can you at least decorate the tree so we can still see the tree when it's done this year?"

DENISE: "To truly decorate something is to obscure it completely." ALISON: "Yeah, I guess that's true." See how much clearer of a scene we have now after adding more specifics? Now we know more of what makes Denise a bad decorator. She is the type of person who just adds tons of crap on top of something and calls it decorating. She believes to truly decorate something, you need to cover it completely in something new. This is a very specific point of view for her character. I said it in a previous blog, but as a scene goes on, we need to know what THIS scene is. It's like the genus, phylum chart in science. We have broad vertebrates, then mammal, then ape, then human. As our scene goes on, we need to know what exactly THIS scene is. It may start as something we've seen a million times, like a couple making dinner, but as we go on, and add specifics to the scene, we narrow it down so we know exactly what separates this scene of a couple making dinner from all the other ones you've seen before. There is only one real pitfall I have left with the last scene about decorating. PITFALL# 3) Giving into the unusual character beliefs. For an argumentative scene to be good, there needs to be this healthy back and forth of allllmmmooooosssttt being convinced by the other person's logic, but defending your side. If you are the character with the unusual point of view, you want to argue for it in the most rational way this irrational behavior could be argued for. If you are the non-unusual character, you want to find the holes in the other person's logic, and point them out. You want to be a scanner for BS in your scene. This is how the scene can sustain arguing for long periods of time, and not just seem stagnant. If you don't call them out on their BS, you make their unusual behavior normal, and your scene has to find something new to be about.   In the previous iteration of this scene, Alison says, "Yeah, I guess that's true.", when Denise said, "To truly decorate something is to obscure it completely." No. That's not true. That's not true at all. Now, maybe Alison didn't call it out because she realized she was arguing in the scene, and a coach told her not to argue so much. Maybe she did it because she wanted to move onto something else in the scene. Maybe she just wasn't listening well enough, and thought that Denise's logic wasn't flawed.  No matter what, Alison needs to poke holes at Denise's logic. It gives Denise a chance to defend her rationale, most likely in some equally unusual way, and then Alison can call BS on that too. When we are doing this scrutiny of the other person's unusual behavior, and adding specifics, and agreeing to the base reality, there is so much kindling for the fire, that it doesn't matter if these characters are arguing or not. Let me give one last example where they are doing all three things at once. It'll start just like the last round, but here Alison will push back on Denise's logic. DENISE: "I am going to hang the Christmas lights up, and it's going to be so beautiful."

 ALISON: "Ugggh. You are the worst decorator I know. You decorated your car and you can't even see through the windshield."

 DENISE: "Yeah. But is it not cute? "

 ALISON: "Who cares if something is cute if it's a hazard to their health?"

 DENISE: "Fashion over function."

ALISON: "You're telling me that if you were scuba diving, you'd rather have a cute tank with no air than an ugly tank with air?" DENISE: "I would rather die than to be tasteless."

ALISON: "You WOULD die! You would definitely die from that!"

DENISE: "Then at least I'd die gorgeous."

This scene could continue this little repartee for a surprisingly long amount of time. Of course, at some point in argumentative scenes, say we're in a monoscene, you may want to find something else to discuss, and get away from this whole subject. That is totally fine. Let's just make sure we don't let these unusual points of view, and opinions go by in our scenes. Let's make sure we are constantly adding specific details about everything to our scene, especially specific emotions we are feeling, and thoughts we have when we hear BS. Let's agree to the base reality of the scene while still disagreeing on the behavior or logic of our scene partner.

"Just react to the last thing said." It sounds like the easiest improv note in the world, but is actually more difficult to do than you would imagine. In fact, I run a simple exercise(That I stole from Cook County Social Club. Don't know who they stole it from.) where I just have two people sit down, face each other, and do a two person scene where each line is reacting to the previous line, and the first line is an accusation, but nothing big like, "You murdered my cat!", and more like, "Did you leave the toilet seat up?". As the coach, I just stand on the outside, and try to stop the scene anytime they are not reacting to that last thing said. You'd be surprised how often I hear this is one of the hardest exercises to do. That's because we tend to think the "yes" part of "yes, and" is reacting to the last thing said, but it's not. It's only acknowledging that you agree with the premise of the line they said, but you haven't added the "and". In the ping pong match of an improv scene, you didn't hit the ball back, you only acknowledged that there was a ball.

 As a fan of alliteration, I've come up with a pretty good summary of the three major ways that we don't react to the previous line of our scene.

 DENYING, DEFLECTING, AND DEFUSING

 1) DENYING- This is probably the most egregious violation of the three. Denying is when you argue or dispute the previous thing said by your scene partner. It is basically saying "no" in a scene. Denying is something most commonly done by new improvisers as a way to control a scene, or make sure their character is "right" in argumentative scenes. It is hearing an invitation for something fun in our scene, and clouding the audiences perspective on which character is telling the truth.

 Sasha: "Hey, did you put a pan in the dishwasher that still had an entire burger on it?"

Dave:  "No! I would never do something like that."

 I've said it before, but the sooner you own up to an accusation in a scene, the sooner we can move the fuck along. If someone asks you, "did you put a pan with a whole burger in the dishwasher?", they are offering you a gift. A gift of being this weirdo/dumb ass who for some reason does things like this. It's unusual, and if you'd just agree to it, we can move along in the scene to follow the fun of this character, and explore that behavior. Instead, when you deny it, our scene is starting off with two improvisers not even being able to agree on the basic facts of the scene.

 2) DEFLECTING- This is actually the most common way I see people avoid reacting to the previous line of a scene. It is when someone offers you a line of dialogue, and you already have your next line of dialogue kind of planned, or you aren't really listening well, and so you don't actually take in what they said. Although it's not as egregious as denying, it is equally as problematic, and trickier because there is a bit of nuance to this one. I think a lot of it comes from the common misconception that we're building this scene together, so you say something, then I add something, and that's how good scenes are made, but that's not true. A good scene is when you say something, I react to that thing said, then you react to what I just said, etc.  

 Sasha: "Hey, did you put a pan in the dishwasher that still had an entire burger on it?"

Dave:  "Man, I got so drunk last night, anything could have happened." On the surface, this line from Dave SEEMS like they are reacting to what you just said, but think about it, are they really addressing what you brought to the scene, or are they adding information that deflects from the line that was given to them? If you heard only Dave's line, would you have an idea of what Sasha's line was? Almost certainly not. "Man, I got so drunk last night, anything could happen.", is a fun premise. It is a fun choice to maybe see all the things that happened because Dave got drunk, BUT it is a deflection from what Sasha said. So, although it may be a fun choice, it is not building off the last thing said. I've used the burger example on previous bogs, but let me remind you. Each scene is like making a burger. Someone lays down a bun(first line/premise), someone else adds the meat(yes ands it), then we add the toppings(more yes and-ing/heightening), and a perfect scene ends with a bun on top(a button/callback) that completes the scene. However, we often start one burger, and then we set down a separate bun(completely new information/new premises), and another bun, and another, but we never fully make a burger. Our scene ends, and we have like 3 half finished burgers, but nothing to really eat. This is because we deflect in our scenes. We add useless information, and history, and plot that distracts from the heart of the scene that we have. 3) DEFUSING- The last way we tend to not react to the previous line is when we defuse what they said. Defusing is when we take an unusual line of a scene, or an invitation for a game, and we make it normal. This is sometimes called "justifying away the game." Again, it is tricky because we may be listening, and repeating information from our partner's previous line, but we take away all the stakes, and the fun of it. We defuse an invitation for exploring something unusual by making it usual(remember all comedy comes from the unexpected/the unusual). Sasha: "Hey, did you put a pan in the dishwasher that still had an entire burger on it?"

Dave: "Yeah, these new dishwashers are great."

Sasha's first line is obviously an invitation to explore a weird choice made by Dave. It is unusual for someone to put giant pieces of food in a dishwasher. Dave's response defuses that unusual thing into a normal thing. He defused his unusual behavior into normal behavior by making putting whole pieces of food in a dishwasher normal. 

Yes, we could from there go on to see how dishwashers in this world clean up dead bodies, or something unusual, but for right now, we took an invitation to explore an unusual character's POV, and we made it normal. This is very close to a denial, in that improvisers normally do it because they don't want to come across as unusual. Instead of owning that you put an entire burger in a dishwasher, you made the behavior normal, and so now we have to start a brand new burger. This one is done.

No one wants to see a problem solved in a scene, they want to see it exacerbated. If your scene starts with someone putting a burger in a dishwasher, we want to see what else this person puts in there, and where else they have been being gross around the home by misusing appliances. When we defuse that behavior, we have solved the problem of these characters, but created an improv problem of having nothing unusual to play with.

When we do short form line games in Kansas City, we always add this little caveat to the audience of, "if you like the jokes, laugh along, but if you don't, boo us. It's the only way we learn." It's a fun little way of relieving that tension in the room when someone says the worst pun you ever heard. It's done in good jest, and audiences seem to always like it, and they will definitely let us know when we fail.

 Well, lately I have seen some audiences that have warmed up my heart(even though the situations they found themselves in sort of stopped my heart)by using this idea of letting us know when we failed you. Over the last month, on three separate occasions, I have seen people on stage(some improvisers, some not, some new, some old) that have made what I would call sexist or racist jokes on stage. Each time it happened, the audience turned on them, and made audible noises to let the people on stage know they weren't going along with their antics. THIS IS FUCKING AWESOME.

Before someone reads that, and goes, "Bobby, you want audience members to tell me what I can, and can't say? PC Police. Humor pushes boundaries. BLAH BLAH BLAH.", let me say this. I don't want audiences stopping your show, or walking out just because you said something offensive, or that can be construed as such, though they 100% have the right to. You're correct that humor can tow a line sometimes, and with improv, we sometimes get cast as a person with an ugly POV, and we have to accept it. If you're a good enough improviser, you can figure out how to do this without punching down, or being an absolute piece of shit, or at least making the piece of shit character the butt of all the jokes. With enough experience, and practice, you can show us this characters flaws, and we can explore "if this is true, what else is true?" You CAN course correct, it just takes a little practice. In fact, you should be thankful an audience did boo you, because what would be even worse is to think they don’t care about the choices you made, and so you just keep making them.

  Let me just use an example I saw recently. I went to a student show, and in the 101 class's performance, there was a male student who was having an argumentative scene with a female improviser. They were playing a couple, and the scene was actually going pretty well for just being two people arguing over a thing that didn't matter to their characters or the audience, but then this man called his scene partner a bitch. The audience IMMEDIATELY boo'd, and you could feel the tension in the room.

THIS IS FUCKING AWESOME.

You might say, "It's a 101 student, and they don't know any better.", and I'll agree with you, but you know what? They now know. They should understand that the audience has a right to react to their choices however they want, and so if an audience deems you calling someone a distasteful name, well, distasteful, they can let you know it. I hope that shame this man felt hops right back to the front of his mind the next time he thinks about calling a female that on stage. Again, you have the right to make whatever choices you want on stage, but the audience has a right to react to that choice however they want, so if you want to be Mr. Towsthelineofgoodtaste, go for it, but expect to constantly get this sort of ire from  audiences.

The audience may do this with political things too. Your style of humor bashing conservatives, or theists, may get you laughs in a certain audience, and boos at another venue. So, although you may think your character who shits on religion is "right", don't be shocked if that upsets some people, because, well, you are offending them.

With either example, I think the audience is booing partially because they don't condone the choice, but also, it's often a lazy joke, and they are upset about that too. "Oh, you find the Bible to be not factually accurate, and you're commenting on it? Woooow. Never heard anyone criticize religion before." Or, "Wow, a male treating a woman with disrespect? Real original comedic idea." You can touch on taboos if you are being smart about it, or subverting what was expected, or not poking fun at people for things they can't control, but if you aren't doing these things, don't be surprised if your entire set the audience is not in your corner. You "killed the cat" to borrow a phrase from screenwriting. You have made yourself unlikeable to the audience, and odds are, you won't easily be forgiven for it. And guess what?

THIS IS FUCKING AWESOME.