One of the ways I try to differentiate my personal branding workshop from other workshops is that most other workshops try to get you to expand your artist’s palette or artisan’s utility belt or whatever metaphor you want to use, whereas I suggest specialization and narrowing down of a particular skill that is unique to you.
Yes it is good to be well rounded, and yes there is most assuredly a world of benefit to be gained from strengthening your inherent weaknesses. Maybe it’s my own ADHD-gifted-kid-perfectionism talking. Sometimes wouldn’t you rather work at getting even better at something you already naturally excel at?
I vaguely remember the first time I did something akin to improv. I was 6 or 7? First or second grade. We had a small theater project happening concurrently with our regular class and I remember that feeling of “holy shit this is something new and amazing that I’ve never experienced before and I want to experience a lot more of it.” The part that stuck out was a single day of improvised theater where we were taught something like the Game of the Scene, or an early 90s version of it. My mind already had a built-in “wouldn’t it be funny if” filter even at that tender age. And here they were saying I could take that “wouldn’t it be funny if” and I could be the funny if! I remember doing a scene where my scene partner was a girl who hated loud noises. I came in on a motorcycle, holding a chainsaw. I asked if she wanted to watch an action movie about a lot of things exploding. Now I’m not going to say that I was naturally good at improv at a young age, but I picked up how it was supposed to work very quickly, the way some people can naturally build IKEA furniture without instructions.
Over these last 30 years (fifteen of which included focused practice which cost me money,) I feel as though I’ve developed a unique sensibility. Like everyone else in the world, I have a rough list of things that I find funny. And I’ve figured out how to manifest those things onstage through repeated trial and error. Mostly error.
I like exploring the space. I like involving people from the audience beyond getting the suggestion. I like deconstructing things on a granular scale. I like saying I’ll do it and then not doing it, or doing it in an unexpected way. I like sustained silences and long-winded speeches. I like playing in different time periods. I like incorporating music. I like scene painting and walk-ons that don’t steal focus. I like jumping on the god mic. I like gratuitous specificity. I like latching onto a weird piece of trivia early in the day and letting that inform my whole set (did you know that Nintendo was founded in 1889?) I like a good, strong edit.
The variables may change but this is the core of who I am as an improviser. My solo show allows me to showcase my best and worst tendencies. When I perform with a group or jam, the edges get sanded off a little bit but the core is still there. The muscle memory is there, and this frees up space in my brain to search for themes and narrative through-lines. I at least make an attempt, every show, to do something that is new to me.
Where is that same ethic when I watch other groups perform? I feel like not a lot of improv appeals to my improviser brain. Maybe I’m jaded and maybe I’m not watching the most well-rehearsed groups. If you’ve been improvising for at least five years let’s say, you owe it to yourself to determine your own personal brand as an improviser, and to push yourself to bring your unique sensibilities to the stage. I’m not saying that my personal branding workshop is the only way to discover this, but it is certainly one way to discover this. I’m at the point where you can say someone else is a “Bryan Fernando style improviser” and you know their play style, for better or worse. Like how Brad Pitt realized he’d made it when he started going out for auditions for “Brad Pitt types.” How do you make yourself stand out enough to become your own type? And how do highlight your own strengths to make your group uniquely interesting?
Take stock of the things you like to do, and the things you’re great at, and then devise some exercises to strengthen those muscles that are already strong. Don’t neglect your weaknesses or blind spots, but make a point to work on the things that only you can bring to the stage. Because that’s one of the major stepping stones to truly great improv.
If you and your group are undeniably great and you’re basically handed blank checks every time you step up into a theater, you can ignore this whole post.