By Pam Victor
[“Geeking Out with…” is a series of super improv-geeky interviews
with well-known, highly experienced improvisers.
* * *
If
you’ve ever had the pleasure of watching a friendly, bearded man spin a chair
or two like a stage-bound circus act while giving dead-on feedback on a scene,
then you’ve been lucky enough to be one of Craig Cackowski’s students. I was
one of those lucky ones last summer in Chicago when this three-time Del
Close Award-winner for Teacher of the Year took
the helm of my team during the fifth and final week of the iO Summer
Intensive. My notes from that week are full of quotable Cacky gems, such
as:
“Being an improviser is being your best possible self on
stage.”
“Comedy is a by-product of doing improv
correctly.”
“Specificity begets specificity.”
“Comedy is in the extremes.”
“Improv is a relationship between your inner
actor and your inner writer.”
“Pronouns are the enemy of improv.”
“Scenes are like babies. You need to nurture
them in their earliest moments.”
“When two things are at war, the needs of
your character and the need to action, choose action.”
And
the Cackowski classic, “Choose to know.”
(See?
You’re only one, wavy paragraph into this piece, and you already got your
money’s worth.)
 |
| Craig Cackowski during iO Summer Intensive 2012 |
In
1992, Craig Cackowski began his formal studies in improvisation under Charna
Halpern and Del Close at iO (then ImprovOlympic) in Chicago. It wasn’t long
before he was delighting audiences and teammates alike on the iO stage. Craig
went on perform with the Second City TourCo., BoatCo., e.t.c., and Mainstage, where
he appeared in and co-wrote five revues, including History Repaints Itself, Slaughterhouse 5, Cattle 0, and the Jeff-nominated show The
Revelation Will Not Be Televised. Craig Cackowski has been a cast member
of some of improvisation’s most seminal shows such as Baby Wants Candy, Carl and the Passions, Close Quarters, and The Armando Diaz Experience,Theatrical Movement and Hootenanny as
well as directing J.T.S. Brown. In
Los Angeles, where he has been living and working steadily since 2002, Craig
continues to improvise and teach at iO and Upright Citizen Brigade theaters in addition to appearing most
recently on NBC’s Community, the
movie The Kings of Summer, HBO’s Veep, and the sadly short-lived improv show Trust
Us with Your Life. Craig often can be
seen now in Comedy Central’s new show Drunk History.
In
this, the first part of our geek out, Craig and I talk about his early history
and defining influences in improvisation.
* * *
PAM
VICTOR: It seems like iO really resonated with you from the
start. Tell me about what you experienced there at that beginning that clicked.
 |
| A very dapper Craig Cackowski [Photo from the vaults of Craig Cackowski] |
CRAIG CACKOWSKI: It was
full of cool people my age. There was an automatic social clique that it felt
like I belonged to. And it really felt like we were working toward something
artistically, there was no reason to do improv other than the fact that we
loved it and wanted to be good at it.
PAM: Who were the "upper classman"
who influenced you in the beginning?
CRAIG: The
team The
Family was the group that we all aspired to be, and most of that team
were my coaches as well: Adam McKay, Ian Roberts, Matt Besser, Miles Stroth,
Ali Fahrahnakian, and later, Neil Flynn.
PAM: Those are some pretty big shoes to
fill.
CRAIG: I still
have an intimidation factor with those guys to this day, just because they came
before me at iO and were already great at it before I started. You never really
shake that underclassman feeling.
PAM: I totally get that. Plus, some of those
folks are strong personalities. I'm curious what about The Family
really wowed you. I assume they were playing fast and hard.
CRAIG: Del
described them "six guys falling down the stairs at the same time and all
landing on their feet," which is a pretty apt description. They were
anarchic, experimental, whip-smart, but most of all, really funny. And they
really challenged the Harold form and tried to elevate it. Later, they did the
form The Movie and were really
fantastic at that too.
PAM: Speaking of her colleagues, I just saw Amy Poehler
perform improv in person for the first time at the Del Close
Marathon. I have to say, I was pretty excited just to breathe the same air.
CRAIG: Does
she still have it?
PAM: "It"?
Or air? Because I didn't choke her, if that's what you're implying.
CRAIG: Haha.
The "it" factor.
PAM: Oh gosh. She had me at hello. (And she
didn’t even say hello to me.)
CRAIG: She's
pretty great. There's someone who absolutely never needs to go on stage and
improvise again...what does she possibly have to prove to anyone? But
she still does it because she loves it. She's a real alpha, too...she dominates
the show (in a good way).
PAM: I saw her perform Gravid Water with Michael Cera. Rachel Dratch, Zach
Woods, Michael Delaney, and Scott Adsit performed too. Oh, and Rebecca
Drysdale, who I don't know personally, but sort of want to have her improv
baby.
CRAIG: Those
are all great people.
 |
| Mr. Blonde '93 Back Row (L to R): Neil McNamara, Craig Cackowski, Rob Mello, Jon Rosenfeld, Ed Herbstman Front Row (L to R): Gwyn Ashley, Doreen Calderon, Pam Gutteridge, Jeff Richmond lurking in the shadows on the left [Photo from the vaults of Craig Cackowski] |
PAM: Totally. Anyway...It
seems like the first team you felt a real kinship with was Mr. Blonde,
coached by Matt Besser. That must have been a huge coup for you. How was he as
a coach?
CRAIG:
Yeah, I kicked around a few different teams my first year. I think Mr. Blonde was my fifth or sixth team? Besser
was tough and demanding. He set the bar high. He didn't have any tolerance for
hacky stuff, but he had a strong idea of what was funny. And he really pushed
experimenting with the form and working together as an ensemble. It was good
for me to have a coach who clearly cared a lot but was never satisfied. He
wasn't there to give you a pat on the back. He was there to dangle the carrot
just out of your reach.
PAM: I'm excited to be having this
conversation with you because you worked with both Matt Besser and Del Close during an
influential time in your life. I'm very curious about the differences between
their two styles and the effect that's had on the improv world. (And continues
to have more and more every year.) How did you find their philosophies
complementary and conflicting in your experience as a student?
CRAIG: You know, I don't know if Matt was necessarily big
on the "game of the scene" back then in the way he is now. At least,
I don't remember that phrase being tossed around a lot. My memory of Matt is
that he was very much in the image of Del. He definitely skewed a little more
toward comedy than toward art, but he pushed us artistically, too.
I
think there are a lot of disciples of Del out there (myself included) that have
all taken his teachings in a different way. They're all valid, and they all
come from him, but they're combined with that person's practical experience
doing improv.
PAM: You’ve said in a great, previous
interview that class with Del Close was like, “the opportunity
to study Quantum Physics with Einstein.” It’s mind-boggling when you consider
that Del created or distilled all the basic components for great improvisation,
and decades later people still are exploring and extrapolating from his core
beliefs and theories. And these people are no intellectual or artistic slouches
either! A lot of smart, immensely talented improvisers, such as yourself,
continue to knit together theories and shows from Del’s ball of yarn. (Please
for the love of all that is good, excuse that metaphor. It got away from me
almost right away, but I couldn’t seem to stop it. It’s abhorrent, but it
exists.) Will there ever been another Del, someone with such huge impact on
upon the art form, do you think?
CRAIG: No, I
don't think so. He was unique, and he was in on the ground floor of modern
improv, so he's always going to be the papa. He also was THE guru for a number
of years at a time when not that many people were doing and teaching improv. So
he was able to get his philosophies and influence out there in a way that no
one else will ever have an opportunity to do again. I
mean, there are literally hundreds of improv teachers in Chicago, LA, and NYC
each, as well as improv communities in every city in the country. So I don't
see anyone having that level of influence again.
PAM: It astounds me that even when someone
feels like they've come up with an original idea about improvisation, it often
can be linked to something Del said or taught.
CRAIG: That's
happened to me many times! My friend Michael Jeffrey Cohen, who was on Mr. Blonde with me, used to have a blog on the IRC site where
he posted his old Del class notes. And I would read them, and be like "Ah,
that's where I got that!" I've stolen from Del many times.
PAM: It's like he thought of and verbalized
the whole gene structure.
CRAIG: Yeah, I
think Del was pushing the Harold for years at a time when not many people
thought longform was a viable form of performance, so he had access to a laboratory
of willing subjects. And he tried out everything he thought of.
PAM: You studied
for about a year with Del. I know that he was different for different people
and at different times in his life. I'd love to hear who he was at that time
for you, and what your experiences were of working with him.
CRAIG: You
know, I didn't grow up in Chicago, and I had very little knowledge of Chicago
improv history when I moved there, so he was never this intimidating figure to
me. Charna definitely did her best in Level 1 to build up his legend.
I
felt like he was really engaged and interested at the time I studied with him. We
had a good class of people, and he enjoyed working with us. We experimented
with form a lot. We would do Deconstruction (in its nascent form), Movie,
different types of Harold, poetry, tribal rituals…you name it.
He
would normally begin class with a lecture that could last up to an hour
sometimes. There would always be someone trying to get him to tell Belushi and
Farley stories, and he would indulge them sometimes. But he mostly was trying
to inspire us by sharing stuff he had been thinking about over the previous
week, things he had been reading, etc.
And
I kind of liked that he could be a scary asshole who kicked people out of
class. The people he kicked out always deserved it.
PAM: NoahGregoropoulos also was a teacher and coach of yours, and I wonder if you remember
the big lessons you learned from him. Unless I get TJ Jagodowski to tie him
down and, even then, hold the interview at the iO bar, I don’t think I’ll ever
land that big fish here in this series. But I’m fascinated by how much he’s
influenced so many people who influence me, and I’m curious about his
particular philosophies and style.
CRAIG: Again,
Noah is someone who very much inspires you to play to the top of your
intelligence, and has very high standards that he wants you to adhere to. But
he also really cares about the art form and you, and wants you to succeed, in a
tough love way.
The
best and longest experience I had working with Noah was on the show Close Quarters. We had a six-month
rehearsal process on that form, and it depended on creating three-dimensional,
real characters. So Noah was always forcing us to think of our characters as
human, and call us on it when we were making choices for the short-term joke.
PAM: I've heard of Close Quarters,
but I'm not familiar with the form.
CRAIG: The basic conceit of it is a bunch of scenes taking
place at more or less the same place and time. So if it's an hour-long show, it
might cover 15 minutes in a bowling alley, jumping around to various sub-locations
within the larger location. We would play around with space-bending and have to
figure out the chronology of the show, i.e. the first scene of the night was
usually the last one chronologically.
There
was also a character-heightening aspect to it...every scene would build to one
character having to juggle a bunch of their two-person relationships at once,
kind of like when you do a bunch of tagouts to heighten a character, but we
wouldn't tag out.
PAM: Since we're talking about influential
teachers, I need to take this opportunity to thank you for being one to me. You
gave me a note, Craig, which I found very helpful. Regular readers (all three
of them!) know that I’m very big on gratitude. So I do need to thank you for
this note. You basically told me that I played like the hostess of a party who is
so busy with her hosting duties that she doesn’t enjoy her own party. You said
I needed to stop taking care of people and the scene so much and have more fun.
Thank you very much for that guidance. I’m pleased as punch to say that I have
taken that note very much to heart, and I think it’s transformed my play and
experience of a show. Now that I have a bit of a good handle on that skill, I
do need to get another chance to work with you to get my next transformative
note!
CRAIG: You're
welcome, Pam, that makes me happy when I can help someone with a note!
PAM: Well, you should be a very happy man.
You have help hundreds and hundreds of people.
CRAIG: I think I was more into improv theory and dogma back
in the day. Now I work more on helping the individual improvisor get better and
more comfortable. What they do with their art is up to them.
PAM: That is interesting. I'm going to ask
you some more questions on that subject of teaching down the line. But popping
back for a moment into your history, I know that in ’95, you got on Second City
TourCo. Who was in the company with you?
CRAIG: My
first TourCo was Tom Greene, John Farley, Laura Kraft, Kara McNamara, Shulie
Cowen. [The second cast of that team
included Horatio Sanz and Jack McBrayer.]
.jpg) |
Baby Wants Candy, 1997 Ali Davis, Peter Gwinn, Don Bardwell, Stuart Ranson, Mary McCain, Al Samuels, Jen Bills, Nick Kanel, Bob Kulhan, Craig Cackowski, Larrance Fingerhut [Photo from the vaults of Craig Cackowski] |
PAM: The ‘90s were some pretty heady times
in the Chicago improv world. Some of the greatest and most powerful comedians
today have roots in that place and time. Was there something going on that
isn’t there today? Or is the power defused from so many different groups and
theaters and players?
CRAIG: It's a
tough question to answer. I'm sure that when someone in 2033 looks back at
Chicago 2013, they'll say, "Can you believe that all those people were
playing there then?" There's talent in any era.
But
I will say that because it was so much smaller back then, and the path to
success was so much more obscure, that I do really think people from that era
put a huge emphasis on doing the work and getting better, and not on getting
ahead. Maybe I'm naive and everyone back then was super-ambitious and I never
knew it!
But
it's weird to think that upstairs at a shitty bar or a shitty stage, playing to
houses of next to no one, were Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Adam McKay, Jon Glaser...
PAM: Exactly!
CRAIG: Those
were our years to fail and experiment and just get better. And we got tons of
stage time to do it.
PAM: Are you suggesting that the mindset is
different now? (Though maybe now I'm being naive...you live in LA, after all.)
CRAIG: The
path is clear now. Everyone knows what improv can get you. You can see its
influence on pop culture and the media.
PAM: What?! Improv can get me something??? Oh
crap. I'm doing it wrong.
CRAIG: I don't
mean to suggest that everyone moves to a big improv community to get famous,
but a lot of people do. And you're competing with more and more people all the
time for stage time. I'm happy I started when I did.
PAM: As far as I can glean, the best way to
get famous through the path of improv is to do the work for the joy of it and
don't be a dick. Do you have anything to add?
CRAIG:
Absolutely. I think it's about finding your voice and discovering what
you have to offer that no one else does. The
more confident and the more comfortable with yourself that you appear to be,
the more people will want to work with you.
PAM: One more question about your early
days. I think I need to hear a little more about “Dance Music for Italian Rabbis.”
CRAIG: Dear
god! How did you find out about that?
PAM: ::smiling::
CRAIG: My best
friend Toby and I recorded songs together all throughout our teenage years. We used a Casio keyboard for most of
them.
PAM: LOL. What was the name of your big hit?
And do you still have a recording?
CRAIG: Some of
our hits were "I Like Slugs," "It Makes Me Barf," "The
Flying Yak Of Romania," "Dance Your Buns Off," and "Big
Banana."
PAM:
LOL. Those sound very funny.
CRAIG: Most of
them, I think, are lost to history
PAM: The 14-year-old boy in me is laughing
her ass off.
CRAIG: I have “It
Makes Me Barf” on my iTunes.
No,
I will not be posting a copy.
PAM: Must have it.
CRAIG: Some
things are best left private.
PAM: I don't understand that concept, but
fine.
CRAIG:
Particularly when they're that embarrassing. My friends did sing it at
my wedding however.
PAM: Awwww! That is beautiful. I'm getting
teary. Also now I know to ask Carla [Craig's wife] for a link to it.
CRAIG: Haha!
PAM: Hey, I saw 2 Square a couple
nights ago at DCM! [2 Square is a show featuring John Lutz and Peter Grosz
which is inspired by their time with J.T.S.
Brown, which Craig directed.]
CRAIG: Good
stuff?
PAM: Naturally. The transitions! Which leads
me into my J.T.S. Brown line of questions...
CRAIG: Cool.
[Readers: At this point, we need to take a break in
the interview to address those of you who are bona fide cape-wearing,
improv supergeeks. For them (us), I include a little tutorial about J.T.S.
Brown. The rest of you can skip down a
ways.
Founded by Jason Sudeikis and Ike Barinholtz, J.T.S. Brown rehearsals
began in late-1998 and lasted over a year, leading to a six-month run at iO. Once
you have seen a J.T.S. Brown show,
you’ll understand why such a lengthy rehearsal process is so necessary. Described
as “not a form so much as a philosophy of play” by Craig in the article below,
the structure is complicated and requires
an especially tight cast with excellent communication skills. Craig provided
the detailed list of show elements – or “wrinkles” as they were called - outlined below, which I gleaned/stole from the IRC Wiki, (though it
potentially was originally posted in the Chicago Improv Network wiki):
“It was designed for a large
cast (10-14 people), to involve as many players as possible at a time, to have
a higher level of theatricality and polish than a typical improv show, and to
encourage any move to be made at any time, with the idea that anything that
happened was the perfect thing to happen. We didn't have a set structure, but
we had a few rules to abide by:
No sweep edits. Every edit
was a transformation. Transformations could come from within or without. Even
in a 2-person scene, an improvisor could abruptly change character, initiating
a new scene with the same partner.
No walk-ons. As soon as
someone joined the scene, it became a new scene. Anyone in the previous scene
should instantly choose to either exit, become a new character, or become some
inanimate or expressionistic element in the new scene. If someone knocked at
the door to enter a scene, it became a new scene the second the door was
opened.
No sidelines. Anyone not in
the scene was watching from backstage. Anyone the audience could see was in the
scene.
The playing area was not
limited to the stage...the whole space was used.
Any scene could recur at any
time, so the players were fine with a scene being edited after 10 seconds,
knowing they could bring it back whenever they wanted.
There were "worlds
within worlds". If, for instance, Scene I transformed into Scene II into
Scene III, it was fun to spiral back out and have III become II and then I
again (similar to the shortform game "Spacejump" or "5 to
1" or "7 to 1" or whatever).
We had a number of
"gimmicks"--devices that we had rehearsed that could be pulled out at
any time. They included:
Hemingway: The players
narrate their own scene as well as playing it.
EdTV: A scene can return to
a pivotal moment at any time, presenting an alternative outcome. Usually done
in threes. (This was named after Ed Goodman, not the Ron Howard film).
The Third Degree: The
players could come out and ask 3 rapid-fire questions of a character at any
time. These were the sort of questions that you might ask while sidecoaching a
scene ("How long have you known this person?", etc.)
Shadows: A character was
sometimes "shadowed" by a another improvisor playing their essence,
or id, or subtext. The 2 characters' shadows would then have a scene of sorts
in the background, presenting a more representational version of the original
scene.
Shapeshifting: Any
improvisor could play anyone's character at any time. Particularly effective in
cross-gender scenes. This fostered the idea of group ownership...every
character is owned by the group, not necessarily the improvisor who created it.
The show began with a shapeshifted character monologue, which allowed the
audience to meet the cast members one at a time.
There was an emphasis on
physicality, sound, and environment. The players were encouraged to be
architecture, inanimate objects, animals, weird shit, etc. All this probably
sounds crazier than it actually played. We tried to eliminate weirdness for
weirdness' sake. The idea was that the form was crazy, but the content was
solid. It was an interesting package for good scenework. We worked hard to
emphasize gift-giving and relationships in the scenework. In fact, we tried to,
at some point in the middle of the show, have a "spotlight scene", a
6 or 7-minute 2-person scene that was not fucked with in any way. In the middle
of a fast-moving, constantly evolving show, it was a nice to have a little
scene oasis and to take a deep breath."
Now back to the interview…]
PAM: You directed and assisted the
cooperative creation of J.T.S. Brown. My first real introduction to that
structure was during my live
interview with John Lutz and Scott Adsit at CIF. Lutz was
explaining the pretty complicated structure and rehearsal process, and Adsit’s
face during the explanation was hysterical. He was…I guess the best word might
be “agog.” I am completely fascinated by it. (I mean the show, not Adsit’s face
– though Scott has an exceedingly pleasing face, worthy of fascination.) I hope
to learn it some day if only to get my wee mind blown to smithereens. Can you
tell me about your history with your show and the J.T.S. Brown
philosophy?
CRAIG: J.T.S.
started as a rehearsal group founded by Jason Sudeikis and Ike Barinholtz. They
got a bunch of young players together who were hungry and wanted to rehearse
and experiment. There was no immediate goal of doing any shows. At first, they
rehearsed with Mick Napier, but then they brought me in when Mick got busy with
Second City.
After
one rehearsal, I was like, "You have to let me direct you in a show. You
could be the next Jazz Freddy!' I
encouraged them to do a rehearsal process similar to what we'd done with Close Quarters, three 3-hour rehearsals
a week for 6 months.
Everyone
was on board. We tried a lot of different things during the process, but the
end result was basically a show that followed dream logic - no hard edits, all
transformations. Scenes bleed into one another and come back at random times. They
also were a big ensemble, 12-14 people, so I wanted to design a form that
allowed all of them to play balls-out at all times, rather than being polite. The
philosophy was that anyone could try any move at any times, and the group would
instantly support it.
PAM: For those readers who didn't get to see
Jazz Freddy - or at least
read my recent piece of the group - tell me what you meant by "the
next Jazz Freddy"?
CRAIG: Jazz Freddy was the other group that
influenced me the most, along with The
Family. They were another big ensemble of 12 people and they played in a
theater as opposed to a bar or cabaret. They focused on character and
relationship. Some of those people were Noah, Pete Gardner, Dave Koechner,
Brian Stack, Jimmy Carrane, Rachel Dratch, Theresa Mulligan, Carlos Jacott, Pat
Finn, and Kevin Dorff.
PAM: Who were some of the players in that
original group of J.T.S. Brown?
 |
| JTS Brown, 2000 Front Row (L to R) Rob Janas, Gillian Vigman, Ed Goodman, Case Clay Back Row (L to R) Jason Sudeikis, TJ Jagodowski, Sarah Gee, John Lutz, Jed Resnik, Peter Grosz, Christina Gausas [Photo from the vaults of Craig Cackowski] |
CRAIG: Ike
founded the group, but left to do Boom Chicago and never did a show with us.
Jack McBrayer and TJ [Jagodowski] also started with us, but dropped out when
they got cast in shows at Second City. (TJ later came back to do shows.) The
rest of the ensemble was Sudeikis, Pete Grosz, Rob Janas, John Lutz, Jed
Resnik, Ed Goodman, Case Clay, Bumper Carroll, Jen Bills, Christina Gausas,
Sarah Gee, and Gillian Vigman.
PAM: Umm....yum.
Jay-sus. I just registered the idea of three
three-hour rehearsals a week for six months! First of all, in diction stolen
from ee cummings via Susan Messing, ohmygodyespleasemorepleasehorny. Second of
all, I want to do that so badly. I would even trade in my copy of “The Flying
Yak of Romania” for the chance to rehearse a show like that with such a
talent-pack cast and director. Oooh, baby.
Having seen 2
Square, I can see why that much rehearsal
would be necessary.
CRAIG: It took
a while to get that groupmind going, where everyone could anticipate and
recognize the transitions when they occurred.
PAM: In the show
I saw last week, John Lutz and Peter Grosz were doing some fast and subtle stuff.
I couldn't figure out how they knew what was coming. Tell me how you helped the
group prepare for the fluidity of transitions. It seems like mind reading.
CRAIG: It
helped to know that there were NO walk-ons, so any move coming from outside
would be recognized as a transformation. But you can also transform from
within, so you're looking to be perceptive in ANY change in the scene, like someone
using a different voice, a different physicality, etc. When a transformation
happens, you must immediately decide whether to a.) exit, b.) stay as a new
character, or c.) stay as environment.
PAM: Were there exercises that you used that
seemed to help most to strengthen that level of listening and attention?
CRAIG: A lot
of give-and-taking focus. First, we did a sound and movement exercise where
everyone is frozen around the space, except one person who has the focus. Then
anyone can take it at any point. Get to the point where the focus is being
handed off every two seconds without anyone stepping on each other. Then, do a
two-person version, with ten people frozen and two people who have the focus.
They could do the same thing or two opposite things. Then, when a third person
grabs focus, one or both of those people have to defer.
But
spending that much time together as an ensemble working on ANYTHING is helpful
and is going to promote awareness and groupmind. And familiarity with how
everybody plays.
PAM: It seems like the players would have to
be trained to make strong choices reflexively. (I mean, of course we all are
supposed to be like that; but in that structure, those moves had to be popped
into on a dime. Or smaller. Like one of those really teeny tiny, foreign
coins.)
CRAIG:
Absolutely. Politeness and vagueness don't help anyone in that situation.
PAM: You seem to enjoy complicated and
strong improvisation.
CRAIG: The two
main types of improv that I love are big, group clusterfucks that are chaotic
and dreamlike, and slow small group shows that are simple and elegant, so I'm
kind of pulled in two directions there.
PAM: That's a great dichotomy.
It seems to me that a show like J.T.S. Brown
would risk getting players stuck in their heads at a time when they most need
to be improvising from their nerve endings. Let’s talk more about that stage an
evolving improviser goes through when they’ve learned so many rules that
they’re stranded in their heads. Is there an exercise or a mindset to help them
get out of their heads?
CRAIG: The
group support was the thing that prevented people from being in their head. And
the thing I say to any group working on J.T.S.
today is that I don't want you to be worried about "doing the form
right." I want you to play free and take risks.
For
getting out of your head, I encourage people to think character-thoughts rather
than improvisor-thoughts (Improvisor-thoughts being: “What's the game?” “How do
I heighten this?” “Why aren't people laughing?”) Anything that's going to get
them to trust their energy and follow emotion rather than headiness.
PAM: Lately, I’ve been thinking about the
evolution of an improvisor. For me at least, there is that long stage when
you’re learning, learning, learning, and you get so many rules and edicts and
theories that you’re working through. But then there seems to come a point where
you let all that go and just…improvise. These days, for better or worse, the
mantra I think about most before a show is “Listen, and react.” That’s all I
try to do.
I wonder if an improviser needs to learn all those
rules if it is just bound to come back to those simple guidelines. Do you think
there is another, rule-free model to follow to develop improvisers equally
adept?
CRAIG: Funny,
I was just having this conversation with my wife this morning and she's a big
advocate of people knowing rules first and newer improvisors finding them
helpful. I think the key for a teacher if you're imposing rules is to a.) Phrase
them as positives (e.g. “Choose to know.”) rather than negatives (“Don't ask
questions,”) and b.) Make it clear that in any good scene, you're probably
going to have to break a rule in order for this particular scene to work.
PAM: As far as the usefulness of the rules
go, I side with your wife. New improvisers tend to be constricted by
inactivity, to which the most common rules apply. However, I'm starting to
wonder if there is another rule-free path...
CRAIG: My
experience is that rules begin to set red flags off in improvisors’ heads, and
they're so worried about negative behavior. I try to get them to trust in and
rely on their instincts. The vast majority of the time when I give a note, the improvisor
felt like they should have done the thing I'm telling them they should have
done, but second-guessed it due to some previous improv rule or guideline. That
can't be a good thing.
It
doesn't get much more simple and helpful than, "Listen and react." I
also tend to think of a scene kind of like Quantum
Leap, i.e. you get zapped into the body of another person and you have to
figure out who you are via clues and context, but you can't betray at any point
that you're NOT really that person or the jig is up. So I encourage reacting to
everything with familiarity. It may be new to the improvisor, but the character
knows everything already. “Listen and react” isn't enough if it's just the improvisor treating everything as if it's new to
them.
PAM: One of my mentors, Piero
Procaccini, often uses the Quantum
Leap metaphor!
CRAIG: Ha! Piero is a brilliant man.
PAM: Yes, he is. And just last
night at rehearsal, I was talking about “Choose to Know,” which is a phrase
that I have scrawled all over notes from our week together last summer...
*
Stay tuned for Geeking Out with…Craig Cackowski (Part Two) to hear more about the idea of “Choose to
know”
as well as many more insightful theories
and quotes.
If you are
in Los Angeles, and you’d like to see Craig Cackowski’s work yourself (you
lucky dog, you), once a month he plays in Dasariski (with Bob Dassie and Rich Talerico) at
UCB and in The Thrilling
Adventure Hour at Largo, which you
also can hear every week via podcast.
At iO - West Theatre, his popular, talent-packed shows Quartet (with Bob Dassie, Tami Sagher, Jean Villepique,
Stephnie Weir, and Jack McBrayer) and The Better Half (with Lucas Neff) are on hiatus right now,
but coming back to soon. If you’re on the improv festival circuit, you’ll
probably run into Craig sooner or later, and I recommend you take his workshop
and see his show! Whether or not you’re in LA or on the road, you can see Craig
as a regular in Drunk
History on Comedy Central every
Tuesday at 10!
* * *
Read Geeking Out with...TJ Jagodowski (Part Two) in which he says,
"I used to try to fall in love one time with whatever -
a person, a thing, a moment, a place.
It gives you a positive area to call your base."
Catch up on past improv geek-a-thons:
Geeking Out with…Dave Pasquesi of TJ and Dave
...David Razowsky of iO West
…with Joe Bill of BASSPROV
...Charna Halpern, co-founder of iO Theatre
...Jimmy Carrane of The Improv Nerd podcast
Pam Victor is an improv comedian, author, teacher, consultant, and nice person. She is the founder and Head of Happiness of Happier Valley Comedy, the epicenter of improv in Western Mass, where Pam teaches The Zen of Improv to the best students in the world as well as bringing the power of improvisation to the workplace in her "Through Laughter" program. TJ Jagodowski, David Pasquesi, and Pam are the co-authors of "Improvisation at the Speed of Life: The TJ and Dave Book." She lives online at www.pamvictor.com.
Unless you're a meanie, Pam would probably like you.
Unless you're a meanie, Pam would probably like you.
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