Find the Love in Your Improv Scenes
When we watch an improv team or a person on stage who loves improvising, it can be contagious. If we are having fun, the audience is having fun.
But often, I forget to bring the joy and bring the love to what I am doing, both on stage and in life.
In my improv classes and workshops, we will be doing a round of scenes to warm up, and I’ll find that my students will play characters who are argumentative, dark and snarky. I will side coach and say, "Find the love," and something will change.
I cannot explain how it does, but the scenes become lighter, more compelling and, yes, funnier. (Isn't that why you read this blog? That’s why I write it.)
I recently watched a documentary about a famous acting teacher named Roy London who had worked with Sharon Stone, Gina Davis, Gary Shandling and Forest Whitaker and other famous actors. When he was on his death bed dying of AIDS in 1980s, weighing only 70 pounds, he wanted to get out of his bed to teach, because he realized that all scenes are love scenes.
I have heard that all scenes are love scenes before, but what does that really mean?
To me, it doesn't mean all the characters are playing nicey-nice, which would be boring to watch. I still think characters can be sarcastic, afraid or even angry, but they behave that way because they want to be loved or because that’s how the show their love.
As a parent, sometimes I get angry with my 7-year-old daughter if she does something that might put her in danger. One time her friend and her went to the playground without our permission. She had been warned not to go and she went anyway. Both Lauren and I were angry at her when she came home, but our anger was coming from a place of love, and of course, fear.
Improv can feel competitive and scary because going on stage not knowing what you are going to say is unnatural. But when I remember to let go of fear and choose love, things can change. I have seen this over and over as both a teacher and a performer. It's magical. It cannot be explained, but it works.
Practice it. Next time you’re in that seems dark or argumentative, tell yourself to find the love. Your character may get vulnerable and reveal something. For example, the character may say, “I have always been jealous of you, and I feel awful telling you that." Who knows what will come up. All I know is when I play with love, I make different choices. I have more options. Try it in rehearsal, in class or in a show and tell me how it works. I'll be waiting.