Warning: this is about improv.
I had an improv show on Monday with one of the teams I regularly perform with. Three people in total, and we had about ten minutes, which generally is not a lot of time (in addition, it was a competition, which meant that we had to move quickly and try to generate laughs). So we started in a pretty standard way (with a two-person scene), and I was on the side, looking for an opening to get in on the fun.
Then one of my scene partners decided to make me an “old Japanese man”, forcing me to come in and play, well, an old Japanese man. It wasn’t a surprise, really (it’s one of the things we do on this particular team a lot), but it’s one of the few accents/voices I know I can do, so it was fun to play around with.
A few scenes later, that same scene partner decided to make me President Obama. Again, I’m not particularly good at impressions, and I’ve never done an impression of the President in a show before, but I was able to glide into a passable version of his speech pattern (truthfully, I have no idea how good it was, but people were laughing at least at the level of recognition of what I was attempting, so I guess it was okay). It helped that I had just watched the debate before heading to the show, so I had just heard the President’s voice earlier that evening.
All of this is just to point out that there are some performers who are great at impressions – people who can really disappear into the voice and mannerisms of the person they’re trying to mimic. People who have worked incredibly hard at what they’re doing.
I am not one of those people.
But! It was yet another reminder of the simplicity of improv. Despite all the rules, all the technique, all the things that we learn. Committing to a fun idea will always lead to laughs.
