The "Perfect" Improviser

I rode with a fellow improviser to L.A. a few weeks ago, and we bided our time talking about T.V., movies, and of course, improv. (Put two improvisers in a semi-enclosed space for five minutes, and I guarantee all they’ll talk about is improv after just three of it. Doesn’t help we were also going to see improv.) My friend hasn’t been improvising all that long and we were talking mostly about basics, but I revealed to him my ultimate improv secret: even after doing improv for the better part of a decade, I still feel like I suck.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want people think I’m overly down on myself, pressuring myself unduly (which I do) and being a perfectionist about my own work (which I am). I even know that I am infinitely better than I was just two years ago. What I mean is that even after doing improv this long, every time I step off stage I wish I could have been a little better. (At this point he asked “What have you gotten me into, Chris George?”)

Personally, I feel that this quality makes me a better improviser, by sheer virtue of having it. I’m not happy with what I do at all, and want to be better. I go watch teams like Beer Shark Mice, 3033, or Deep Schwa and hold myself up against that kind of ideal not because I’m a glutton for punishment, but because I see that as a goal that is, in fact, quite reachable. Because whether we want to admit it, we are artists, and we have to take pride in our art. We need to be unsatisfied with everything we do. It is only through our unyielding desire to be better that we improve at all. It is when we get complacent and lazy that what we do starts to suffer.

Now that I’ve successfully terrified a few people into never wanting to improvise again for fear of failure, allow me to share the other quality that makes a good improviser. “Truth in Comedy” has a chapter simply titled “Face the Fear”. At the same time that I’m not happy with what I do (ever), I also respect myself and anyone else willing to step on stage with the absolute potential of falling flat on our faces. The name of the game is improv, which by its very definition means that we don’t know what will happen. The corollary of course, is that while we have the potential to blow people away, we also have the potential to come crashing down just as hard (and boy is it easier to fall). But what makes a good improviser is someone willing to hop right back up there and try again with no hesitation.

These two elements are not entirely disparate, either; it is the fear that continually focuses us to be uncompromising. Give in to the fear, and you are unwilling to take chances. Allow the fear to control you, and you will compromise to almost anything if it means you get some modicum of success.

Be fearless and uncompromising? Sounds like good advice for life. And that’s what I’ve gotten you into.