Polar Express

Back in 2004, I used to write movie reviews for the USM student newspaper, the "Student Printz". Because I occasionally feel lazy, and it seems a shame that all of five people ever read these, I've decided to repost them here, in the original versions that I emailed to my editor, Noel, all those years ago.

Truly, the unappreciated art in the world of filmmaking is the process of adapting a book to make the big screen. Some books are easy: “Lord of the Rings” had an enormous amount of source material, and with each installment running 3 hours plus, they still had to leave some stuff out. Our most recent arrival “The Polar Express” was much more difficult: try expanding a 32 page children’s book into a whole 96 minutes of holiday entertainment. “Polar Express” does an admirable job, but if you don’t have a tinge of the Christmas spirit, you’ll undoubtedly hate it, from the engine to the caboose.
“Polar Express” is all about renewing the holiday spirit in children who can see through the fake beard the department store Santa is sporting. It follows the story of Hero Boy, a young boy who is losing his faith in Old Saint Nick. On Christmas Eve, a train pulls up outside his house offering him a trip to the North Pole to meet the big man and get a taste of the Christmas spirit.
Tom Hanks definitely earns his paycheck in this movie: he not only does the voice of the main character and the conductor, but also Santa Claus, Hero Boy’s father, the Scrooge, and a friendly train Hobo. He and director Robert Zemeckis obviously put the most energy into the movie, and really try to harvest as much Christmas spirit as is humanly possible a week and a half before Thanksgiving. Surprisingly, they manage to generate a pretty entertaining movie, though its obvious that a lot of sequences were included to just make the minimum length.
Zemeckis’ vision in the movie has strangely dark undertones though, almost like there is some sliver of something sinister hiding behind the warm glow of the Christmas. His vision of Santa Clause is vaguely reminiscent of Big Brother, and worst of all, the only music in the North Pole is the same Christmas songs being played over the loudspeakers down at the mall.
Nonetheless, “Polar Express” is a fun film, just dripping with the joys of Christmas spirit.

Happy Holidays everyone!

The Lowest of the Lows

I haven't felt like a really crappy improviser in a long time; which as much as I promote remembering that improv is a journey and you should be thankful for the distance you've already traveled (and blah, blah, blah all the other stuff), is something that in a way, I've missed. Feeling really crappy is something that I and most of my iO classmates used to feel on a regular basis (generally on the order of every other level), and by feeling crappy, I don't just mean the feeling of “oh, man, that could have gone better”. What I mean is the soul crushing feeling of “oh, man. I absolutely destroy every scene I'm in and can't seem to get anything to work right”. You'd go to class just like any other time, but you'd leave feeling really shitty – like you can't believe you ever thought you could do this thing seriously, and that you should just give up. On top of the every-other-class feeling of being really shitty, I'd also feel little lows here and there. You'd have an O.K. class, but someone else would just rock it, and you'd feel like crap by comparison (thanks, other guy). The tradition of having these dramatic highs and lows is probably the second most practiced of all the unwritten improv traditions in Chicago, just behind the who's-going-to-get-on-a-Harold-team-who-won't-and-who-might game.

So what is my problem? Well, I was at an audition the other week (not auditioning – just observing) when I realized that I have been plateauing for a very long time. Plateaus are natural parts of any learning process: spots where we're just honing one or two techniques before we make the next breakthrough (most of which are probably the cause of the class blues; you're in a plateau, your classmate is in a climb), but I have been languishing for a long time. (Part of the problem is I'm worried my improv knowledge has become more academic than practical.) Basically, it boils down to me having been in this group that was holding auditions for a year and change, and I don't feel like I have moved ahead at all in that group. (That I was sent to this group for the express purpose of getting better doesn't help much.) I usually don't feel like crap after practices or shows for that group, though, so it's not the class blues. In fact, it's quite the opposite, I really enjoy the director and my fellow team mates, I feel like we have a great time, but I don't feel like I'm learning anything.

Class way back when had the (now what I see is) benefit of sometimes making you feel like you suck. Sure, you'd walk to the bar with your class and/or team mates for lunch and a beer and howl misery into the top of your pint glass, but at least you knew where you were. And there were those classes and levels where you would honestly go: 'do I want to spend another three hundred bucks and eight Saturdays feeling like crap?', but there were also those levels and classes, where you had the bug, big time. You were charged, and maybe it's just the manic depressive in me, but the highs and the lows left you at least feeling like your progress had some dynamism. The highs warranted more work and attention to keep you pointed in the right direction, and to encourage you to keep at that high, and the lows said “hey, don't do that, and work harder”.

So there I am, watching auditions, watching a lot of very talented people really putting it out there to try and make the team, and I can't help but think - “why am I still here?”. Or rather, being thankful that for the first time in a year, I feel a sharp, distinct low, one that screams out to me that improv personified thinks “You suck” (of course, it's improv personified, so he's only doing it to be supportive) to which I reply “Yes, and...” (obviously). Now that I'm in this low, there's nowhere to go but up.

A mind is a terrible thing to waste.

The New York Times ran an article this week about a study that found that people were more likely to be happy when they were focused and being in the moment as opposed to allowing their minds to wander and think about the past or future (which actually was more likely to cause unhappiness). Go figure, Team Improv scores another point for clean, happy living.

Here's the link to the article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/16/science/16tier.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=science

American Pie versus Technology, Part 1

The late 90's were an interesting time for the Internet – it was no longer a novelty, but it hadn't yet found its niche; most of the users of the internet found that it was useful for emails and pictures of naked women (remember that back in these days, few, if any, people had anything more than a 56k connection, so anything more than pictures or very short videos was largely out the question) and little else. Back in 1999, if you will remember, was the age before YouTube (not until 2005), Facebook (2004), MySpace (2003), or even Friendster (2002). Even Napster wasn't operational until 1999, so the years prior were a very untested time for the internet. Very little content had yet to be ported onto the web, for example it is estimated that in 2007 YouTube consumed as much bandwith as the entire internet in 2000. Even movies hadn't really decided what to make of the internet – only a handful of films even used the internet: “The Net” (1995) and “Hackers” (1996) being the more notable ones. The former envisioned a world where we were so disconnected by our digital selves that others could substitute themselves in for us, and a powerful computer program allows a well resourced group to control information. The latter promotes the web as a wild west, where information is the weapon, and a few rebellious hackers can use it to help protect the world from a powerful corporation. Both films extol information and the web that harbors it as a powerful tool, but in both cases any attempts to pigeon hole it as whole cloth bad, are countered by the fact that the internet is eventually used to win the day. Indeed, tech up to this point is merely a tool like a gun or a bomb – in the right hands, deadly, but useful when used responsibly.

It would therefore seem unlikely to find a powerful anti-technology statement in the film “American Pie” (1999) - but the film is surprisingly, and subtly, a condemnation of the permeation of technology in our lives. (That the film came out in the same year as three movies that all took stabs at the encroachment of technology and the potential for being dominated by it - “The Matrix” (1999), “Existenz” (1999), and “The Thirteenth Floor” (1999) shows that clearly by this point we were prepared to make statements about technology and networks and their power.) Indeed the three entries in the trilogy - “Pie”, “American Pie 2” (2001), and “American Wedding” (2003), take a staunchly anti-technology stance, more so than any other film previous or since. “Pie” and its successors, in fact take a far more Luddist view of technology than even “The Matrix”.

Every instance of technology that appears in the film (and the series as a whole) is associated with embarrassment and humiliation – even from the opening shot: a lone Jim sits in his bedroom, attempting to masturbate to scrambled-cable porn, he is quickly discovered by his parents – as a direct result of his attempts to use technology over bedding a non-digital woman. Indeed, Jim suffers the most as a result of his interactions with technology: during the first montage, where the four friends are organizing to lose their virginity, Jim uses an internet dating profile to get a prom date, and receives no responses. And of course, during the longest sequence in the film, Jim sets up a web feed to catch video of Nadia undressing is his bedroom, which then leads to his eventual embarrassment as he unknowingly sends the link to his entire school (the undressing ultimately becomes a chance sexual encounter with Nadia when Jim enters the room where she is undressed) – exponentially increasing his damage at using technology. The filmmakers make such a statement about how wrong this use of technology is that it is brought up by a high school party-goer in the beginning of the second film; indeed this incident has followed Jim well beyond his first year in college.

Similarly, the centerpiece sequence in the film's sequel is set around an increasing intimacy scene with two (alleged) lesbians, that again becomes broadcast, this time over walkie talkies. Another incident in the second act of the sequel comes as an attack from tech again – while watching a porn VHS, Jim inadvertently super-glues himself to himself while masturbating. In the opening scene of “Wedding”, Jim mishandles a wedding proposal, which leads to him receiving fellatio from Michelle in a crowded restaurant – which while not a direct result of tech, is notable because just before this act, Jim receives a phone call on his cell phone from his father, and now this highly common tech serves as a harbinger, signaling the embarrassment to come. And again in the third entry, he uses an electric shaver to shave his pubic region and peppers most of the wedding planning crew with his discarded pubic hair – becoming increasingly the victim of increasingly simpler technology. In fact, it may be his over-reliance on technology that makes him suffer the most; in an early scene in the original he is explaining to a fellow party-goer that he should be able to talk to women, because he got a “1600 on the SAT's”. Now while the SAT itself is arguably not a technological achievement, it represents a modern advancement into standardized testing and evaluation. He should know better, because in the AP universe, technology may not be mortal or even morbid, but it is the cause of humiliation. Even a startlingly good score does not help him lose his virginity or with his capacity to even talk to women. His excellent score on a modern evaluative method does not equal good social grace.

Soft Skilled

The temperature has started to dip, just enough anyway, to where I can break out a jacket in the evening, and for some reason, it makes me think of improv practice back in college. Thursday nights, 9:00, we'd all come stumbling out of the student union, and the next stop was always the Keg for drinks, all of us still giggling and tittering on our own brilliance. (Why mild weather makes me think of southern Mississippi, where it is rarely something other than blinding hot, is an interesting question unto itself.) What I really miss about that time though, is how familiar we all were with each other, and how much we enjoyed the craft.

This is the rarely discussed “soft skill” of improv – the part about really knowing and enjoying the company of your team mates, and this is the part my group is really struggling through right now. For part of it, I blame just on San Diego in general – this is one of the busiest cities I have ever known: hardly anybody just hangs out around here, instead everybody's always taking trips, going to events, etc. College, and Chicago as well, differ in that everybody generally stays around, in both cases because everyone's generally too broke to travel and do stuff. For example, at the last couple of shows my group has done, it's only been me and one other troupe member going out (even on a Friday night) for some post-show good times, and it's shown: I have a bunch of very talented, knowledgeable improvisers in my group (and dare I say, well taught), who treat each other like strangers on stage, and we are struggling through shows. Scenes are technically good, but are sluggish and uninspired, and the answer is we have no “esprit de corps”. There is no spark in the players, and I sometimes catch actors eying each other with a cautious leer, like wolves circling a kill, but none willing to dive in and get to roughin' each other up. At issue is the “soft skill”, which is under-taught – we spend lots of time talking about scene work, characters, and forms, but little time worrying about camaraderie, fellowship, and morale.

The problem is, how do you make mandatory a thing like “let's all go to the bar after the show”? Jason Chin wrote a great article where he bemoaned the constant drive among some of the Chicago improvisers to make the “bar trip” part of the weekly ritual – just a continuation of practice in a new venue, as an avenue to group mind. (His objection is that this kind of ritual seems to make improvisers seem like alcoholics.) I won't argue that you're not going to get a perfectly jived group just by going to a bar, but you've got to invest some more time in your group than 2-3 hours a week; there are people I work with who I talk to more than that, and most of them I would never even think about stepping on stage and sharing an artistic moment with the hope that they would support me. You don't have to bar trip every week after practice, but you could try a road trip, movie night, game night, go carts – seriously anything. Your group doesn't have to be a boozer group to get soft skilled – you just have to spend some time with your team mates. I still don't know how to make it mandatory and it still be fun (those two concepts are always diametrically opposed to each other). The hope is if you make the effort to get people inspired by each other – to get your fellows soft skilled – that people who are keen to make the group great will also be willing to make the effort.

No one ever said you wouldn't have to make sacrifices to be a good improviser, so why not just try once a week telling your boyfriend/girlfriend that you're going to hang with your team. So you have to work tomorrow? So what – most people do too. You can sleep when you're dead - you can only improvise right now.

Cellular

Back in 2004, I used to write movie reviews for the USM student newspaper, the "Student Printz". Because I occasionally feel lazy, and it seems a shame that all of five people ever read these, I've decided to repost them here, in the original versions that emailed to my editor, Noel, all those years ago.

Despite falling into most of the typical snares for an action thriller, like absurd plot twists, lack of message, and plot holes Cellular manages to be entertaining enough so that you don’t notice these problems. Cellular is well acted, uses its gimmick basis well, and provides a successful skewering of the cell phone subculture.

Cellular opens with Jessica Martin (Kim Basinger) being kidnapped by a gang of thugs shortly after sending her son off to school. The thugs led by Greer (Jason Statham) whisk her away to an old house where they lock Jessica in an attic, leaving her only after smashing the wall phone in the attic into little bits. However, Jessica is a high school Biology teacher, and apparently studied at the same college where the professor from Gilligan’s Island went, because in a matter of minutes she does a MacGyver with the phone, and makes a call. But the only phone she gets belongs to Ryan (Chris Evans) who is needless to say a little skeptical about a kidnapping plot on the other end of his phone. Ryan is your typical college student, irresponsible, lazy but after hearing one of the other kidnappers threatening Jessica, decides to try and help her out. His only assistance comes from Sergeant Mooney (William H. Macy) who is on his last day of duty before he opens his own beauty parlor (“It’s a day spa!”).

Director David R. Ellis wastes no time in getting this movie on a roll, as Jessica is kidnapped within the first two scenes of the film. Thankfully, he also manages to keep the pace of the movie all the way to the closing credits (which are done on cell phone screens) which is probably the film’s greatest strength: it may be unbelievable in some places, but it keeps your attention well enough to where you don’t notice it. The acting is plausible (we’ll overlook that our Biology teacher heroine was about to leave for work wearing fishnet stockings), the movie is well executed and the dialogue goes just far enough to keep from being hokey. What is equally amazing is all the different ways that the cell phone is used not only as a prop, but also as a plot device. The hardest part about writing the whole movie was probably in just coming up with a few dozen ways to use a cell phone. Cellular never takes itself to seriously, and ends up just being a fun movie to just sit back and watch.

Should you manage to overlook Cellular’s gimmicky nature and plot holes, you may just find the movie to be surprisingly entertaining.

Top Five!

Let's do an experiment, right now: write down your top five movies of all time. These are what you consider the best movies you've seen, hands down. You know, top notch film-making – great writing, acting, directing, the whole works. Movies that you think everyone should see as a lesson in “great films”. For the sake of the experiment, I'm going to say the best movie I've ever seen is “Requiem for a Dream”. Now I want you write down your top five favorite movies of all time. These are what you consider the kind of movie that if it comes on TV on a Sunday afternoon, or if you're bored, you're gonna watch this movie, beginning to end – the kind of movie that you tell friends “Oh, I've seen that movie a million times”. For the sake of the experiment, I'm going to say my favorite movie is “American Pie”. Now that you have your two lists – compare them. Do you have any cross over between what you consider an example of “great cinema” and what you consider a “great frickin' movie”? My money says you have few, if any movies that have found a home on both of your lists.

This disparity, I think represents the problem that you get with a lot of intermediate improvisers. On one hand, everybody has a thing that they love to do: dinosaurs, mad scientists, pirates, whatever – something that really entertains them. At the same time though, everybody has a list of things that they think that they should be doing. Usually scenes about heartbreak, death, dying – you know, heady, “important” topics. Nine times out of ten, I would wager that when you ask people to list the five best movies of all time, they aren't even listing movies that they even like. 'Oh, “Citizen Kane”, “Casablanca”, “The Bicycle Thief”' they'll say, listing off a whole slew of movies that AFI or Roger Ebert or someone else listed at some point, that they think they should like. I've seen “Citizen Kane”, and it's a tad long and overwrought, and I'd wager to say that it's a bit over-rated (there, I said it – and by the way, no one was even in the room when he said “Rosebud” - deal with it). But we do improv the same way – we think we're supposed to be doing serious, dramatic scenes where we tackle the great mysteries and problems of the universe (especially longform, this is our biggest weak point). In fact, even though I think “Requiem” is an unbelievably good movie, I don't think I could ever watch it again – it's just too freaking intense. But we worry that if we don't like these cinematic masterpieces, we'll be seen as uncultured, uneducated, and worse, not interesting. Or as Keith Johnstone said: “'culture' is a minefield in which an unfashionable opinion can explode your self-esteem.”

I , however, could (and would, and have) watch “American Pie” or “Ghostbusters” a near infinite number of times and not get bored. Now are these the great examples of movie-making, the kind that changed the art of the cinema forever? Not even close, but they are fun and enjoyable, so isn't that what we should be striving for every time? We definitely shouldn't steer away from something important when we get there naturally, but isn't striving for that at full sprint the opposite of an organic discovery, even if it is in pursuit of some universal truth? We are, at our most basic, entertainers, but our first audience is ourselves.

This all runs back to that same basic lesson of improv: being honest on stage. These attempts to make deeper and emotional (and in our heads by extension, more interesting and enlightening) scenes are just another try at keeping our own internal truth from shining forth. We're afraid that if we do an improvised “American Pie”, that won't be seen as good or unique or clever compared to an improvised “Requiem for a Dream”. But that very move makes our improv not good because it's not real and honest. We should never try to guess what an audience wants to see, we should always try and do what interests and entertains us and do that to the best of our ability. Besides, which would you rather watch over and over again?

Better yet, which would you rather perform over and over again?

Improvised X

I took in a workshop a couple of weeks ago on improvised story-telling, which got me immediately intrigued, because it's the one type of improv that I've done very little of. The improvised movie workshop I took focused partly on “linear, improvised story-telling”, but was light on stringent “this is how you tell improvised stories” info. Improv (longform especially) is largely the way it is by the sheer nature of improvising with a bunch of people: the strange, disjointed sequence of scenes tumbled together (like we see in a montage, Harold, etc.) wasn't done because we are as an artistic collective consciousness challenging artists who are interested taking the juxtapositional approach to thematic presentation. We don't want to be weird, elusive and challenging showmen, it's just that improvised story-telling is hard. Keeping a story on track, and having it make sense and be logical is difficult when you have a bunch of players all pulling it in different directions.

What I've noticed though, is that the improvised stories that really seem to work well are ones where there is a mutually agreed upon theme or genre being improvised. This is commonly known as an improvised X, where x equals the genre being done up, be it “Star Trek”, “Zombies”, “Shakespeare”, or whatever. These are the ones that appear to work the best, because there is mutually agreed upon framework that makes the whole process easier, and because everyone is essentially using the same palette. You know walking into an improvised X show what types of stories, characters, and motifs are likely to be seen. When we learned the improvised movie, one of the first things we learned was genre recognition so that we could rapidly identify the genre we were working in. Even the guy teaching our story-telling class has been having success with his show, which he describes as being the in style of Alfred Hitchcock/Twilight Zone. The shows I've seen where the improvised story doesn't work are ones where there is no agreed upon palette, and as a result the audience gets a strange hodgepodge of stories, none of which seem to jive, and then there's a clumsy rushing together of all the plot (a shoehorning, if you will) at the end, seemingly just so the players can say “See? We did it! It was all the same story all along!”.

You could make the argument that this is the same reason why just basic scenework doesn't seem to work. I'm a big advocate of specifics and details giving scenework it's definition and easy-to-follow-itude. Or rather, scenes that are strange and non-definitive are hard to follow. At the same time though, I also promote the idea of “following your obvious”; an obvious being a piece of information that can easily be deduced from previous information. What the obvious is can differ from person to person, based roughly on how his or her brain works. For example, a couple of years ago I was hanging with a friend of mine and his brother, and we were all taking about this story my friend was trying to write. Based on the simple idea he had, I proposed a spy twist and his brother wanted a vampire edge. Neither of us was wrong, but the difference is in what our go-to's or obviouses were. I knew spy stories and his brother knew vampires, so that was where we felt the most comfortable. (Possibly an extension of write what you know?)

Thought of in this framework then, where two people are in a scene together building the scene from the ground up, providing information, the scene converging on being defined (essentially becoming “this scene is about X”) can be thought of as a coalescing obvious. Or: what I think of as obvious based on the known information is now the same as what you think is obvious. We now know we are in the scene where X happens. When the obviouses have not coalesced (which is to say one or more players is confused about the current scene facts) is when moves are made which don't seem to make sense. Looked at from the opposite end, bad scenes arise from two players who have not agreed upon what they are doing. (If my friend's brother and I were doing a scene and were both being either obstinate or non-specific, the bad scene would be because I think we're in a spy scene and he thinks we're in a vampire scene. Possibly very interesting provided we are providing definition like crazy, but a bit complex and confusing to nail down in three minutes.)

The only real problem is everyone has a different obvious, and you need to find a common ground of interest for everyone to do an improvised X. If you're going to be pursuing the same story for 30 minutes to an hour, you want all your players to be invested in the genre. My group toyed with a number of concepts last year, and we never could find a common ground among six people. “What about improvised 'Lost'?” “I've never seen it, but I'll give a shot”. I appreciate the flexibility, but unfortunately, not good enough. If you're going to be picking apart a genre well enough to put it back together on the fly in new ways, everyone has to love and know the style.

No conscientious objectors, only invested and involved people, playing to the obvious.

Expert or Fun?

I recently lost two players in my improv team for identical reasons: both people told me that they felt that were now so good that playing with the rest of the team was a waste of time for them. They indicated that they were now too talented to be working with their team-mates. This of course is disappointing: no one ever wants to hear that their fellow improvisers no longer want to spend time playing with them, especially when someone tells you you're not good enough – what a blow to the ego. This of course is one of the ultimate dichotomies of improv – talent versus playability. Or rather: is it better to find team-mates that are in equal or greater talent than ourselves, or work with who we're with?

I would never begrudge someone the desire to push their talents and improv limits in pursuit of better, more challenging work – I haven't had many, but I've had enough of those moments, the ones where everything goes right and all the disparate elements seem to run together into a critical mass, and step off stage charged by that feeling of, for lack of a better word, magic. Those moments remind us why we do this in the first place, and that rush is improviser's equivalent to heroin – it's what keeps pushing us to achieve more challenging and interesting pieces, and its my hope that every improviser will feel at least one of those just once. But the question is, should we be so hard up to play with other talented folks that we treat ones we consider under-talented with such callousness? One thing I've noticed is that everybody wants to be on a Trophy Wife, or a Beer Shark Mice, or a Cook County, or a Deep Schwa, but no one wants to actually exert the effort required to reach those points. Those teams I just named have been playing for five plus years together, with few, if any, cast changes. Just those guys and gals, every week, stepping on stage together, everyone yearning for the same thing. You, unfortunately, can't just walk on to teams like those. I'm reminded of a statistic I've seen quoted at least four times in as many weeks that it requires 10,000 hours of dedicated practice to master a craft. We often tend to forget that, and blame other people for “holding us back”. The problem is, if everyone only played with people that were already “good”, then there would be no new improvisers, because we all suck in the beginning.

Let us not forget that improv is not just about being the talented, funny independent proprietor of the craft, and that easily half of the entire craft of improv is about learning how to work with others. Improv is, and always will be, a team sport – one where a group of people work together to create a product greater than the sum of the parts. Sure, there are one-man shows of improv that exist, but nothing will ever match up to watching a group of people playing together to create a mutual art piece. It's this half of the craft that is often under-taught, because you can't really teach how to be a good troupe member. But make no mistake about it's unending importance in everything you do in improv, we love to watch these teams perform not just because they are funny people as individuals (as they often are) but also to see how funny they are together.

Now that having been said, you should never stay in a group you don't enjoy being a part of. As I and others have said, look for people to play with who you wouldn't mind being stuck in an elevator with. If your team passes that litmus test, then stay with them; the most talented person in the world who is an insufferable prick will always be remembered as a talented prick, but there is no replacement for a good attitude and someone you enjoy being with. It's only when we value talent over personality that we run into trouble. You certainly don't want to be known as the “guy who only plays with people who he finds talented”, sure people may be flattered at first with your seeming honor, but deep down everyone knows that your loyalty is skin deep and you will be the first to run when the going gets rough. And if your team members can't trust you and be open with you, you'll only ever do the kind of shallow, vapid improv you were hoping to avoid in the first place.

Remember that talent is only half the game, and the other half is learning to love the people you're on stage with. They were willing to risk their selves with you, the least we can do is offer the same in return.

Lessons Learned

Next week, I will have been teaching and coaching my first group for exactly one year – exciting times. I thought it might be a good idea to go back and share what I feel I have learned from teaching these new improvisers. These are my lessons learned, and maybe if I had read this article this time last year, things would have been easier, but there's no reason others can't learn from this – experience comes cheaper second hand. Coaching, directing, and teaching are all peculiar skills for the improviser, in that there isn't a class to learn it from, and even most improv books only dedicate a single chapter or part of a chapter to the subject. Even Spolin's fantastic book is more concerned with learning the craft with the end game being putting on a scripted play of some sort. (And teaching children. Are improvisers like children? Discuss.) Instead, I feel like this sub-artform is a melange of what we have seen other people do and sheer terror, or to paraphrase Astronaut Jon McBride: a director who doesn't have any fear probably isn't operating his troupe to its maximum.

Be prepared for disappointment – unless you are fortunate enough to operate a group that is sponsored by a theater, you won't have a regular practice or performance space. Despite all attempts to secure said space, it will always fall through. Practices will be inconsistent in the beginning, schedules will get in the way, practice spaces will be lost and replaced with who knows what, so just be prepared to face the inevitable that things will never go as planned, or even an approximation of that.

Set goals and objectives – this is for two reasons: one, without anything to measure against, you can't know how you're doing. Attempting to compare your group to any other group is tragically misguided, because no two groups are alike, and those variables can never be accounted for. Second, as the director, you need to have good solid answers to questions. “I don't know” is acceptable (provided you can come up with an answer after a little research), but the director is the steady hand that guides the group in a single direction. Instead, decide what you want to see, and keep nudging the group to that destination. Give options, and you might as well not even be there. Also, if you don't set goals, how will you be disappointed when you don't make them? (see #1)

Try and find a few people you like – improv is a team sport, and a social activity, and you're going to have to hang around these people at least once a week for a few hours. This is the great thing about starting your own group outside of any sponsorship – you don't have to keep people you don't like, and you shouldn't.

Let the reins out a little bit – so much of improv is figuring these things out for yourself; there are a whole bunch of things that you just can't teach, and you just have to work the puzzle out on your own so that you can see how it fits together. The director should never be “mom”, and hopefully one day they'll be able to run off on their own.

You are responsible – I don't mean this in the sense of “show up on time, prepared”; (you should be doing that anyway). What I more mean is that you are Dr. Frankenstein, and this is your monster – be prepared to deal with your creation. After you've set your goals, given your objectives, and let out the reins, don't be surprised to find that you've created exactly what you wanted, and maybe you wanted things a little different than what you ended up with. Ah, the hubris. Sadly, the director is responsible, and you get what you ask for.

Some people can't be saved – Hi, Hubris again. Remember me? We like to come in thinking that we'll be cowboys and astronauts, taming the wild frontiers, breaking new ground, and making every person in the group an integral and talented member of a well oiled and imminently watchable team. Sadly, you can only help the people who want to be helped. Focus on the people asking you for help, and hope the other ones will come around.

And would I do it again? Oh, hell yeah.

The Harold Theory: Part 2

The twelve questionnaires for the first show revealed the following data: six subjects had seen some form of improvisation prior to the show, six answered that they definitively had not (one sheet put it simply: “No.”), had not seen any live, or did not answer the question. Of those that had seen some form of improv previously, there were three instances of 'Whose Line', three of NCT, and four I defined as “other” (meaning any reference to a group not explicitly named in the question which did include one instance of iO West). Note that this adds up to more than the number in the “yes” group – multiple named groups on a single sheet were each counted. One individual noted four different group instances as well as noting that he was an “improv junkie” (glad we could provide a fix). One individual in the “non” group stated that he had only seen primarily stand up. As this was not improv, this was not counted into the six affirmative improv watchers group.

The four questionnaires from the second show, one instance of Second City was mentioned, the other three mentioned no other groups or organizations.

A number of subjects used the questionnaire to air grievances (“Music is too loud”), or to single out specific players or scenes. This occurred both in positive and negative lights. Most took the sheets to provide constructive criticism on scenework technique for the group as a whole. From the first show, ten individuals responded yes to whether they enjoyed the piece, the other two did not answer the question (hope we did, guys). In the second show, all four responded positively that they did enjoy the Harold. In the second set, half (n=2) replied that they enjoyed how the different “plots” interweaved – one individual even stating that he thought the beginning was confusing, but then he “caught on.” Only two people answering the sheets in the first show explicitly stated that they would like an explanation of what the Harold is (17%). No one explicitly made that request in the second show. Of those two, one stated “Maybe an explanation of what the Harold is?”, so the author is not sure if this is trepidation about asking the question or perhaps not being sure if he needed a reply. A few in show one (n=3) replied with some variation on wishing for more structure, or being a little confused, but none of these sheets said they couldn't understand the piece. Instead, it seems that there was only difficulty in understanding the show (which may be related to us, in my objective opinion, no where near our best work in the past). Three people also replied that the piece was either “slow”, “too long”, or should have been “shorter”. Clearly, longer, meandering and confusing scenework may contribute to some difficulty in understanding the piece. If the players are struggling and the piece becomes amorphous as a result, then it will be difficult to follow for even experienced and informed players.

These results are comforting; they seem to indicate that a minimalist approach to explaining the Harold is sufficient to ensure an audience's enjoyment. I have on more than one occasion witnessed an audience glaze over during an explanation of a game or piece, so my recommendation would be to skip explanations of games and forms entirely (I'm looking at you “What are you doing!”) whenever possible. Certainly, the fewer hard rules in a particular section, the less needs to be explained. Games like “Fresh Choice” rely on the rules in order for the scene to function, but contrast to the Harold, which really has no rules, and can function with only a minor amount of structure.

The current study instrument is sufficient as a questionnaire, but the questions will need to be reworded for future work, as they don't currently assess the proposed theory sufficiently – instead, most subjects focused on answering whether parts of the show were confusing, instead of whether knowing the “rules” was instrumental to understanding. The difficulty is in designing questions that keep the focus on this area of research without leading audience members to a particular conclusion. This study is being expanded, so if you have a group that would be interested in joining the study, please contact me for instructions. All improv, short and long, is currently being investigated.

The Harold Theory: Part 1

A couple of months ago, I talked about a theory that the Harold does not have to be explained for audiences to enjoy it and appreciate it. Basically, the way I see it is that if an average individual who has never had a music or painting class can sit down and enjoy Bach or Van Gogh, respectively, then why do we feel the need to try to over explain improv to people? Most improv teams outside of the Big 3 improv hotspots that I've seen always try to give the audience a “crash course” in Harold theory before jumping into it: “First, we'll do an opening, then three scenes, then a game, then three scenes that are somehow related to their respective scenes, etc.” Why do we do that? The audience doesn't care, and I believe they don't need a road map to enjoy the journey. Mostly, it's a knee jerk reaction because we explain games in shortform, so surely we must explain structure in longform then too, right? I believe that is not so, provided the players are competent enough to make strong choices, and stick to them. Lead strong, and the audience will follow. Bill Arnett wrote in a blog post that because he was an artist that he didn't have to subject his “research” to peer review, but I've always been more of a scientist anyway, so I will; I am testing this theory. For those of you who didn't really pay attention in science class – a theory is only good until it is tested, and proven over and over again.

Here is my testing instrument: at two recent improv shows of a group that I direct but do not perform in (and hopefully will continue to do so in the future), theater staff passed out an anonymous questionnaire to the audience immediately following our presentation of the Harold (the first of which followed an opening of a “Shotgun!”) during a brief ten minute intermission (for the second show, the Harold was preceded by two stand up performers). Audience members, who had paid to attend the show, were encouraged to fill out a sheet, but not required. 26 copies of the questionnaire were prepared, and twelve and four, respectively, were returned to me at the conclusion of the evenings. No inquiries were made as to where the missing questionnaires went. The sheet consisted of three questions:

1.Did you enjoy the piece? What did you or didn't you like about it?
2.Was there anything confusing about the piece? If so, what do you think would have made the piece easier to understand?
3.If you've seen any other improvisation before (National Comedy Theatre, 'Whose Line is it Anyway?', etc.) how would you compare the Harold to that?

The National Comedy Theatre (NCT) is a local shortform-only improv house well known in San Diego. The selection of these two examples of shortform were selected as what I felt was an obvious and well known counterpoint to traditional longform improvisation. The entire questionnaire was designed with the intention of not leading potential subjects one way or the other in regards to my theory, while also evaluating audience's perception of whether or not an outright explanation was needed to enjoy the piece.

The testing instrument does have some fault in that according to the sheets, some individuals were not sure which piece (Harold v Shotgun!) was the questioned piece, and some people only answered questions about Shotgun! Additionally there were four practicing improvisers from the San Diego scene in the audience at both shows, two of which (at the first show) did fill out sheets. The author is not aware if any of the others also filled out sheets.

Next week: the results!

Sean and I

So, can I prove that the group dynamics exist the way I claim they do? Well, the difficulty with any theory is proving that it exists absolutely (making it a law) but I can provide supporting documentation to support my theory. The first improv group I was in, I was a member of for a long time – four years nearly, with the last three spent acting as second in command of the group (officially: “Minister of Misinformation and Propaganda”). The president of the group was my good friend, Sean, so right off the bat, using the information I presented last week, one of us was the hero (or leader, chief, etc.) and the other was the second banana (“Lancer” to use the TVTropes parlance). As he was officially above me, there's no reason to believe that he wasn't the hero, and I the lancer (no complaints here, cooler title anyway).

Sean and I couldn't be a better case in point for the “five and up” man dynamic; Sean was fun, charismatic, creative, optimistic, energetic, easy going, and level headed. I, on the other hand, was strict, cold, a stickler for details and rules, pessimistic, cynical, angry, and volatile. Together, we filled out the dynamic at the top of the group, whether we knew it or not. (Of course we didn't, but I do remember talking with him at one point about our dichotomy.) Despite these facts, we were still friends, and our interplay allowed our group to work: we had two of the jobs filled in the group, the conflicting points of view, giving the group balance. Everyone else filled in the rest of the roles: logic, heart, etc. No one told us to behave like that: we just did, it was who we were, and the resulting self organization allowed the group to operated. I personally think that was some of the best times I've had in regards to a group of people I like to just hang out with.

On a side note, Sean may have realized the balance, because he occasionally called on me to be the enforcer. Sean knew he didn't want to be “that guy” who forces people to do things (even if they needed to be done), and that I had no qualms about it. The result would be that he was the inspired dreamer, and I was the hard authoritarian. Sometimes we may not like the job we have and would like to be the fun guy – alas that's not the way the world works. We sometimes have to play our strengths, regardless of the consequences.

My last thought – groups need not understand or even recognize the details of these circumstances for it to work (they if you do, you have greater freedom in playing with concepts and roles). These dynamics arise on their own, reorganizing if necessary. The most important trait is to just love the people you're on stage with. They're really the only ones that matter, anyway.

What's in a group?

If we take the presumption that I have made and assume that small groups are capable of self organization, but also that each person will divine their own place, then what do these groups look like? Nobody tells these groups how to organize or what jobs they each will hold, but invariably each person will eventually find their own niche. Successful group dynamics do not arrive where everyone is doing the same job and eschewing other jobs. Somebody has to dig the ditch just as someone has to wear the suit. Even ant hills have workers, guards, caretakers, builders, etc. I did some research and have found what I believe are the classic group dynamics. Its important to remember that there is no dynamic hierarchy or status in these groups – they transcend status (or rather they have to, otherwise its not a lateral communication). So even though someone may play “leader” they're not actually a “boss”.

Two people.

Undoubtedly the simplest group structure. This is the bare minimum required to achieve a group mind, but each person has a lot to do in order for the group to function. At this level groups self organize into opposites: straight and absurd, extrovert and introvert, etc.. This basic “versus” interplay of two different points of view is central to the entire group organization from this point on, but it this level it is its most bare. Classically you've got Laurel & Hardy, Abbot & Costello, but more recently I point to Sheldon and Leonard from the “Big Bang Theory” or Michael & Michael from the web series “Black 20”. The straight man never points out the absurdity; they understand they can't change their friend, they just try to put the fires out.

Three people.

This level has the greatest difficulty in self organization, because the tendency is for it to devolve into a two on one situation – that is to say a pair and an other. The pair teams up and attacks the other, who has no chance, because he's outnumbered. This is an unestablished swarm. A group at this size now actually has options, but at minimum will organize into emotive, reason, and mediator figures. The driving figure is typically represented by the mediator; their role is to act as an inbetween for the two opposing view points in the rest of the trio (this is usually portrayed in fiction as an actual leader role, but it doesn't have to be). Think Alvin from the Chipmunks, Athos from the Three Musketeers, Moe from the Three Stooges. Reason is still playing the straight man, roughly, and is responsible for being the voice of reason, they look at the world in hard, clinical terms – objective and absolute. Reason is typically represented by an individual with high intelligence or unique skills, think Simon, Aramis, and Larry. Emotive is lead by his heart, easily swayed, gullible, and outgoing; think Theodore, Curly, and Porthos, respectively. The emotive is the humanist one – subjective, thinking about the moment at hand. Together, you have emotion, reason, and practical or in Freudian terms: id, superego, and ego, respectively.

Four people.

Logic would dictate that at this point any disagreements would result in stalemate, but in a 2006 study done by the University of Michigan, both three and four person groups reached unanimous decisions roughly the same amount of the time (about 75%). This means that four person hierarchy must develop so that all input is arranged in a way that the correct choice is the only logical one. Self organization yields the following roles: head, hands, heart, and feet. Hands is now the driving force: the leader, ambitious, passionate. Feet is now the voice of reason, he keeps the group grounded, and is calm, rational, and reliable. Heart is the group's cheerleader, responsible for being optimistic, extroverted, and enthusiastic. Head is kind, thoughtful, and creative – the think it through first and look at the angles kind of person. The Ghostbusters are undoubtedly the group to beat; Peter is the hand, Ray the heart (Peter even says “Ray Stanz, the heart of the Ghostbusters”), Egon the head, and Winston the feet. In American Pie, Kevin, Finch, Oz, and Jim are the hand, feet, heart, and head, respectively.

Five People and Up.

Five person dynamics are difficult, and from this point a definite focal point of leadership is almost required if only to act as a funnel for the group's energy to run through. Typically it's a leader, his right hand (who usually serves as an opposite to the leader, but is his friend, so notice again that we have the basic two man dynamic again), the strong, silent one, the smart one, and the heart. Best example is “The Goonies” - Mikey the leader, Mouth as his guy Friday, Brand as the strong big guy, Data as the smart one, and two people pulling the roll of the heart – Andy and Stef. Even better, “Star Wars”: Luke is the leader, Han his right hand (Luke is honorable to the cause, Han to the money – opposites), Chewie as the big guy, two robots as the smart ones, and Leia as the heart. Often the female – especially if there's only one – will be the heart of the group.

From this point on, jobs get more complex – generally the larger the group, the more complicated the dynamic, and the more doubling up of roles.

Special thanks to TVTropes.org for invaluable research and also for providing yet another avenue to burn hours upon hours of time that should have been spent actually writing this thing.

The Swarm versus Eigen

So we've now made the presumption that improv groups need at least a degree of group mind in order to function, the question is how do we describe that organization? And more importantly, as I mentioned last week, true group mind is a sort of telepathic communication where all members think the same thing, all the time, and most definitely improv groups are not filled with cookie-cutter automatons, but individuals; each doing their own thing for the group. So what gives?

That concept of group mind that tends to get people all antsy is described by what is known as swarm theory. Swarm theory is based around a group of separate individuals that make up a decentralized, self-organized unit. Essentially, what would normally be a hot mess (say, a group of improvisers all trying to be funny), turns a single force, all bound under a common goal. One person doesn't pull the entire work on their own – responsibility is split evenly among all members, because there is no functional difference between different members of a group. Imagine an ant hill – individually, members are generally incapable of doing significant work, but together they can do all sorts of things. For the survival of the collective, each member must work together. (Alternatively, imagine “Ex Machina” from the end of “Matrix: Revolutions”: a bunch of little machines coming together to make the whole creature.) Each tiny piece plays a part in the entire machine that results in a singularly focused force. One of the keys to swarm function is that all communication is lateral, egalitarian – no single person is in charge. This basically describes the seed of what most people seem to think of as group mind in improv: a group of people working together for a common goal (ants build hives, we build scenes). In essence, this is what group mind all boils down to, in that we don't have a script and we need to be able to achieve a common goal in an efficient way.

My theory regarding group mind is a lot less swarm theory, and a lot more of hive dynamism.

The problem with using a paradigm of only swarm theory to describe an improv group is that we are not selfless, non-unique members of a hive, mostly due to the stochastic sampling effects of group size. Groups are limited by time (show length) and space (stage size) constraints, so for the group mind to emerge in your typically sized group, each member must understand what role they play in the big picture. (The corollary to my theory is that if it were theoretically possible to have a large enough improv group with most of the players on stage at once, swarm function would start to emerge again.) Part of why group mind still works is that everyone has a different role, but the group figures out what each person succeeds at, and everyone works together in a way that utilizes everybody's unique talents. Because we can't disperse the responsibility in a singular piece over a million improvisers, each member has to specialize in order to fill in the gaps. This explains the gap that allows group mind to form in typical organizations; the dynamism approach is a shorthand for reaching unification that isn't possible otherwise, and also not only uses, but takes advantage of, the differences between each other. Groups full of cookie-cutter improvisers aren't interesting to watch for the same reason that a tapestry of only one color isn't interesting to look at: you need the different colored threads - otherwise it's just a carpet.

One of my instructors said that of one of his teams that he always knew who would start each scene, and with what, because everyone kind of settled in the knowledge that, e.g. “John always initiates the first scene with a strong character”. His revelation was that one of his jobs was to find everybody's job, and break them out of it, which encourages the other members to fill in. I had a writing class one time, and in story-telling, you can't just eliminate an archetype from a story, they have to be replaced by someone. For example, in Star Wars, Obi-Wan is the mentor, but even though he is struck down, he hangs around making Luke feel like a schizophrenic, and then is replaced by Yoda. Essentially, you take one element out of the motif, and the motif changes to meet the new criteria. My point here is that you definitely don't want to get so settled into ruts within your group that people quit growing.

At the same time, there is a fair amount of joy to be found in a group where everybody knows their job, and does it. (The point of breaking people out their jobs is to ideally get them to improvise on a wholly different level – not just improvising dialogue, but literally improvising the art of improv every time, as in, let's improvise what our group jobs are. Just because a swarm member has a job doesn't mean that they have to do the same job all the time, just so long as someone does that job.) These roles we have (which also change from group too, pay attention between how you are from one group of friends to the next – you may find, as I have, that I'm essentially the same person, but a slightly different version, then again, maybe it's all relative) are essential to the group dynamic; how each person fits into the group. Groups are flexible to additions as well – you just have to figure out how your threads fit into the tapestry.

The X-Men Factor Part II

How groups fit together is a weird thing, and often the difference between an “OK” group and an “Awesome!” group comes down to how the members play together. The group I assembled keeps beaming about the fact that the team just kind of gelled perfectly, and that everyone gets along real well. (I have also been commended for my ability to pick a group that right out of the gate worked out, but I'm not one to brag. As a better improviser than I once said, “Don’t pick the funniest or the cutest or the coolest...pick the people you wouldn’t mind getting stuck in an elevator with.”)

The title of this essay (and the last one, for those of you paying attention) pays homage to the X-Men, and for good reason, the most important of which is that when discussing team dynamics, you can't invoke any member of the DC universe. When you have Superman, who is essentially a god on this planet, fighting next to the Green Lantern, who once destroyed and remade the universe, standing next to the Flash who can run through matter and time, all being glowered over by the Batman, who can defeat all of them, you're not really looking at people who really need to fight side by side as a team. The DCU probably better describes stand-up comedians, as that's an art form that really shows off how awesome a person is by themselves, whereas improv is all about teamwork.

The X-Men, even though Nightcrawler could take on an entire battalion, Iceman I once saw get a hole blown through his stomach, and Wolverine can, apparently, do anything, is much more about teamwork. They're not invincible (except Wolverine), they're not all powerful (except Wolverine), and they do appear to actually need each other (except Wolverine). Because they each can't do everything all alone, they rely on each other to work together to see their way around obstacles. They figure out ways that their powers complement each other to solve problems. But you see these kind of dynamics in all aspects of story-telling, across all mediums and times where a group of people work together: members of a team aren't all about being cookie-cutter carbon copies with no discerning features. (A great example of this is “Porky's”, which has about a dozen friends, but only three of them really stand out from each other.) A good improv group has group mind, and the power of five minds working in concert is way stronger than any of them as individuals – a much better match to the X-Men.

The concept of “group mind” gets thrown around a lot, and its the idea that the members of a group are all plugged in to some common consciousness that informs their individual decisions. If everyone is trying to do their own thing to get from “A” to “B”, the group as a whole will never get there. The zero sum effect of everyone pulling in their own direction results in nothing getting accomplished. Imagine a Viking Ship where all the oarsmen could row their oars in any direction. Without a big Viking to come in and command them to all row in time and direction with each other, that poor knarr would never go anywhere and some little English hamlets would go unplundered. Of course in improv, the idea of someone coming in and taking control is against the concept. Instead an improv group is supposed to work like a headless swarm. The big Viking in this case is group mind, a voice followed by all the members of the team that keeps the ship on course. The idea of group mind is usually met by either fear or skepticism for seeming a little new agey. The big reason in my mind as to why group mind terrifies people is the same reason that “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” terrifies people: the idea of an army with no discernable features or individuality is the exact opposite to the celebration of the individual that is so common in western cultures. Drones strip away free thought, making the individuals unimportant compared to the group, but more importantly, they dissolve love and sorrow, which we feel makes us human.

(As a particularly interesting demonstration of some kind of group mind in the real world, my research into this topic coincided with an article by Bill Arnett on the subject and the concept coming up in a recent “Dollhouse” episode I watched.)

The Winner is...

Well, there was only one person playing, but the winner of SMSD's "Guess the Archtype" game is Jessica in Chicago! Over here (->) is me presenting you with your prize: a free SMSD t-shirt (we'll work on getting it to you later)!

Generally very close all around: Andy is very leading man, but not Hispanic. Maddy and Marc were spot on (in my opinion). Alex never plays gay characters - very much the typical straight man (meant in both definitions). Jason I don't think has ever made a joke about Batman.

New essay to be posted later this week, but until then, feel free to comment or ask questions below.

The X-Men Factor

Last month, I was in Bloomington, IN for an alcohol toxicology course, and shortly after I arrived, the program director gave a brief orientation, where it was revealed that the local college, Indiana University (A campus I would describe as “Harry Potter” meets Gap commercial – old, very English castle-like buildings, and not an ugly person on campus. I seriously believe you have to submit a head shot when you apply.) was home to over 50,000 students. As I realized that colleges are one of the biggest breeding grounds for improv groups, a quick search yielded IU's premier improv group: Awkward Silences. I was pretty excited about getting to see a new group that quite frankly I would probably never get to see ever again, but my second discovery was that it was the week before finals, so sadly no show the week I was there.

I did check out their website though, and I found a cast page where I discovered what I believe is an exciting new improv game: Guess the Archetype. An archetype is a system in writing where characters are essentially filled in by generalizations. For example, in “Star Wars”, Luke is the hero, the Emperor the villain, Obi-Wan the mentor, etc. An archetype is essentially a job in a story: someone may be a unique character, but when it comes down to it, he is the “comic relief” (or whatever) to the story. One of my theories regarding improv groups is that each member is a unique element, a specialized cog even, in the greater machine. Each one, though they may play different characters on stage – from goofy to heart-wrenching – in the tapestry of the group they each have a different role. Think about your group of friends (or maybe even the cast of a TV show or movie that is an ensemble piece) and you can figure out which one is the horn dog, the jester, the wallflower, etc. My point is that once an improv group hits its stride, that blessed Group Mind running in full, six-cylindered harmony – you can figure out what each person brings to the group, i.e. what role they play. This often carries over into scenes, where you can usually guess what each person is going to do for a scene or piece. Part of it is just the shorthand way we deal with the world – our own personal comfort zone.

So I found myself looking at the cast page, and tried to figure out, based just on a minimal amount of bio information and a head shot, what each person was in the group machine. (I encourage you to check it out too: http://www.awkwardsilencecomedy.com/) Here's my guesses, and if anyone from IU, or better yet the Awkward Silences ever reads this, tell me how I did:

Sean Liston – Leading man. Probably plays bosses, cops, presidents, teachers a lot. Classic straight man/hero.
Anthony Smith – The smart one. High reference level, puns, big words. Dry, yet goofy sense of humor.
Ben Gagnon – The horn dog. Lots of dirty humor, sex jokes, curse words. Every character he plays is normal, just dirty.
Layne Dixon – Leading lady. Plays a lot of sweet, nice characters; wives, girlfriends, mothers. Very cute.
Ryan Brown – Party animal. Plays his scenes the most physical of the male members.
Dan Haddad – The lovable oaf. Funny, easy-going sense of humor, sprinkled with a fair amount of nerdy, probably superhero, references.
Blair Dietrick – The quirky girl. Plays a lot of strange, quirky characters with accents and physicality – the whole works.

As an added bonus, I'm providing Guess the Archetype: Home Edition. Recently added to the Stage Monkeys San Diego Facebook page are five head shots of the current members, so to everyone reading, I want you to go on, take a look, and see if you can guess what each person brings to the group (what their archetype is), and leave it in the comments section here. Winner is the person I feel has correctly identified the most correct roles. Check back here in two weeks to see who the winner is, and thanks for playing!