Fear Fear Fear

Whether irrelevant or not, the behavior exhibited in bad scenes exists.

Where does this behavior come from? Why do bad scenes always seem to show up with the same observable patterns?

Fear fear confusion confusion fear think think think—fear.

Each day we adult humans walk around just trying to get through the day. How the heck do we do it? We protect ourselves. Our consciousness. Our thinking. We can think, we can choose, and we can act based on that choice. That's what we humans do. Early humans began to remember things and make choices based on what they memorized. It was to their advantage to do so. I can imagine the mind of a human habilis five million years ago, thinking, "Hmmm, every time I go down that path that other guy throws a rock at my head and calls my woman names. Today, having remembered that information, I will go down this other path to get home to the tree."

It was an advantage for this guy to remember this information and act on it. Those that had this selective advantage survived over those that did not. Those that remembered not to go down that path didn't get rocks thrown at their heads and survived better. Those that didn't remember went down that path and, sure enough, got a rock thrown at their head. They eventually died off, so consciousness survived as the natural selective advantage. We humans think, so we survive better. Humans who think well sur­vive better than those who do not. We constantly protect ourselves and advance ourselves with our ability to think. We rely on it for everything.

If, as a child, I break the garage window, I must think of exactly what I'm going to say to Mom so that she will protect me from Dad. If I'm going to ask Mary to the prom, I must think about what I'm going to say in order to protect myself from appearing foolish and to succeed in obtaining the date. If I want to get the job, I must con­sider the interview beforehand and think of every possible question I could be asked and every possible answer I can provide. If I am to present a sales proposal, I must carefully consider all possible objec­tions and think about how to overcome them.

It has been the same thing for millions of years. People fear things so they think of ways to prevent an unwanted outcome.

So what the hell does this have to do with improvisation? I'll surely tell you now.

Improvisers carry seven million years of human consciousness on stage with them every time they improvise a scene. And they do what humans should do, the thing that humans do in every other situation in their lives: They carefully consider all possible scenarios and think about what they will do so that they will remain safe and do and say the appropriate things.

This kind of thinking is what has become known in improv land as "in your head." It's a measured way of thinking that has one con­sider, stop, reconsider, think, look, stop, consider, okay, think, stop, think, consider, wait, stop, think, etc.

Unfortunately, good improvisation has nothing to do with safety or appropriateness. (As a matter of fact, it's quite the opposite.)

When this way of thinking is brought into the improv scene, the audience and the performers alike soon discover that it is boring. The audience didn't pay two dollars to see adult humans think and consider options around them. That's what they watch and partici­pate in all dull-day-long. They want to see people play and play hard. Throw caution (thinking) to the wind (out). Really play.

If improvisers aren't truly playing then they are "thinking about." If fear has them thinking in this way at the beginning of the scene, they are sure to discover that their scene is boring from the audi­ence's perspective. The consequence of that realization is more fear and confusion. That is to say, when the scene starts to go awry, and the performer and audience alike both discover this early on, the improviser gets scared and confused. What do human adults do when they are scared and confused?

Defend and protect.

When in a situation that is scary and confusing, human adults will often ask questions in order to get information to protect themselves. They may seek false power by dictating action to others, or seek man­ufactured status by teaching others how to do something and/or by saying no to another's proposal or idea. One who is scared and con­fused might try to gain control of her situation by justifying who she is, what she's doing, and where she's doing it. One who is frightened to do something right now may recount a past event, or talk about an event that may happen in the future, or negotiate a proposition. One that terrified may even desperately attempt to figure out what's going on so much, he literally starts talking about what he is doing. Fear begets thinking. Thinking begets protective behavior.

Protective behavior is noticed as patterns in bad improvisation. Patterns of behavior become rules. The Rules of improvisation: remember them well.

Дата добавления: 2015-07-08