Thoughts, Mine & Borrowed, on Make 'Em Ups - an improv blog

i'm a lady and an improviser and a teaching artist for children

[harrypotterhousequotes]

HUFFLEPUFF: “As actors, you become an expert at starting over. Every single role brings with it an ignorance and an insecurity, and so you have to approach it with the same curiosity and humility.” –Lupita Nyong’o

[letstalkimprov]

the secret of improv

is 

that every single rule you’ve been taught

can be broken

and yet still has so much value and so much to teach you

the trick is

knowing the lesson the rule imparts

and knowing the time to let it go.

[witchtwists]

If you were to attempt to shake my hand, but missed and punched me in the stomach, you would still owe me an apology. So if you make a joke but it’s not funny and you actually offend me, you still have to apologize, even if it was a joke.

Travis McElroy (via gay-yoshi)

[improv-is-easy]

Seriously, don’t respond to your partner’s idea with “Eh, I don’t like this.” Even just saying “Meow meow meow” would be better.

[improv-is-easy]

Years later, I think it would be hilarious if the second line of an improv scene was “Meow meow meow.”

[cerdita-perezosa]

Episodes in every American cartoon

- We got in a fight? Let’s split up the room/house with a line. That’s my half and that’s your half. - Two characters accidentally swap bodies - The musical episode - It’s time to shrink really tiny and go into (other character) to solve their sickness! - Character 1 and Character 2 are fighting for the affections of Character 3 (who probably does not like either of them) - The background character-oriented episode - Oh no! (Character) has made a bunch of clones of themself! We need to kill them all. - The episode where a character gets successful/powerful/rich, becomes an asshole, then proceeds to ruin it all - The birthday episode - An episode that turns out to just be a dream - A character dislikes a newly-introduced “adorable” character but nobody believes them until they eventually prove that the cute character is actually evil - The “you saved my life”/lifedebt episode - Holiday episodes - The “how did the censors let them get away with this?” episode

[e-mprov]

Okay everyone, get in here.

Ancient Improv Proverb (via e-mprov)

[suggestionofa]

You have to walk toward the things that make you alive.

Leslie Odom Jr., via A ‘Hamilton’ Star’s Story: How Leslie Odom Jr. Became Aaron Burr, Sir (New York Times, May 2016)

[anunperfectactor-blog]

but imagine seeing the Capulet kids as happy as we see the Montague kids…

Juliet and Tybalt, rough housing in the courtyard;

Juliet telling Tybalt how her mum wants to marry her off to Paris, how gross, and Tybalt swearing he’ll break his shins;

Tybalt coming home with black eyes and bloody noses, and Juliet patching him up before any of the grown ups notice;

Juliet listing reasons to tell Tybalt that really, he’d get along swimmingly with Romeo, so please won’t he give him a chance?

[anunperfectactor-blog]

Mr. Nunn believes in doing whatever he can to get a story across. His style seeks out the immediate, the accessible, the real in any text. […] He works closely and collaboratively with his actors, but his first duty is always to the story.

Trevor Nunn, British Shakespeare Master, Tries Something New: Directing Americans, by Alexis Soloski (New York Times, Feb. 2016)

[anunperfectactor-blog]

And as long as we wrestle with what it means to be human, Mr. Shakespeare will be our companion and our lodestar.

William Shakespeare, Playwright and Poet, Is Dead at 52, by Louis Bayard

(via anunperfectactor)

[improv-philosophy]

Improv is the art of instant creative collaboration using agreement and whatever is available in the moment.

Heard at Curious Comedy Theater in Portland, OR.  (via improv-philosophy)

[improvartvice]

- Del Close (art prints available) 

[salvadordollyparton]

rules of improv that apply to life

1.  Play to the top of your intelligence, always.

2.  Treat your friends like geniuses, and you become a genius.

3.  Don’t go for the cheap jokes.

4.  Stop sitting around and talking.  Move.

5.  Make your environment unique and beautiful and interesting.  Interact with it constantly.

6.  Focus on here and now.  Make whatever you’re doing at that moment the only thing that matters.

7.  Never stop changing.  Go on journeys, react with emotional truth, take action, be affected by everything and everyone in some way.

8.  Stop arguing.  It’s boring.

9.  Listen like an animal in the forest.  Listen like your life depends on it.

10.  Commit and take whatever you’re doing to the next level.  Grow, evolve, take risks.

[hayleyterris]

The Rules of Improv/The Rules of Life

11 Lessons of Improv/Life from Mr. Del Close himself...

1. You are all supporting actors. 2. Always check your impulses. 3. Never enter a scene unless you are NEEDED. 4. Save your fellow actor, don’t worry about the piece. 5. Your prime responsibility is to support. 6. Work at the top of your brains at all times. 7. Never underestimate or condescend to your audience. 8. No jokes (unless it is tipped in front that it is a joke.) 9. Trust… trust your fellow actors to support you; trust them to come through if you lay something heavy on them; trust yourself. 10. Avoid judging what is going down except in terms of whether it needs help (either by entering or cutting), what can best follow, or how you can support it imaginatively if your support is called for. 11. LISTEN

[hard-on-for-hiddleston]

[mpregcraig]

[popses-deactivated20160331]

you used to call me on my hands-free talking glove

[fromthemindofatwentyorotherlycan]

wait back the fuck up where do they get off selling a glove as “hands free”

[suggestionofa]

yo this is going to change the improv game

[improv-philosophy]

You don’t always have to justify things immediately. Sometimes it’s best to let the scene breathe; leave some space for exploration.

Heard at The Peoples Improv Theater, NYC (via improv-philosophy)