Musings
an Online Journal of Sorts

By Alyce Wilson

Despite having stayed up late the night before, we got up fairly early on Sunday so that we could get checked out and get on the road before noon. We wanted to be back in time for me to attend my improv class.

We had breakfast at Bob Evans. If you're on a diet, don't have the biscuits. When I looked them up later in my Weight Watchers books, I found one Bob Evans biscuit is equivalent to two dinner rolls.

We got back in plenty of time to pick up my dog, Una, from the pet sitter's. I took a short nap before heading for the class but was still dragging and feeling out of it. On the way, I got myself a coffee and managed to spill some on my winter coat. Needless to say, the coffee didn't help much, especially as I was wearing it.

At first I thought it was just me, but the energy was definitely different than it had been the week before. For one thing, A.J., who had been really energetic, had transferred into the intermediate class because, as it turns out, he'd had prior improv experience and had already covered beginning material. Lindsay was absent, and we had one new member, Marlene, who was in her 60s with dyed red hair, sort of quiet.

We did the name game again so everybody could learn the new names, and then our instructor, Dave, gave someone a chance to try to remember them all. They got many of them wrong, which surprised me. But I guess not everybody tried to memorize them so they could write it down later in their online journal.

We started out by repeating some games we'd done the previous week, including Firing Line. This is the one where you go down the line and people say a word to you, to which you have to say a word back. I felt better this time around, but I noticed that I always seemed to flub it in front of certain people. When I mentioned it to Dave, he said that chances are they don't even remember so I shouldn't psyche myself out.

Then we did some trust exercises. In the first one, I was paired with Ricardo. We had to take turns leading the other one around blind. I felt that was pretty easy, the sort of thing I'd done at camp before.

After that, we did another exercise where a partner guides us around by their hand. I was paired with Colleen for that. We had fun with it, even getting down on the ground at one point.

He had us do Spelling Bee and Mr. Know-It-All again, so Marlene could try it. But everyone seemed sort of out of it that week and weren't doing as well as they had the week before. We didn't come up with nearly as many funny results as we had the first week. Maybe I wasn't the only one who was tired.

We broke up into pairs to learn a new game. I was optimistic, against all reason. This was a game they do all the time at ComedySportz, What Are You Doing? In this game, the first person starts doing an activity. The other person asks them what they're doing. They can answer anything but what they're actually doing. Then the other person has to start doing that activity. You go back and forth until someone flubs up.

I knew that this was difficult but didn't know just how difficult until I started doing it. The game was fairly easy when everyone was doing it at once and nobody was watching, but it became infinitely harder on stage.

Ciara and I were the first volunteers. Our topic was hockey, and everything had to relate. Dave had told us to try to make the activities interesting or silly, so I was concentrating on that, coming up with things like "Scoring a goal with a sausage" or "Making a hockey net out of pudding."

I found it harder, though, to act out actions in an entertaining way, especially because I was so busy thinking of my next activity to say. Ciara won that round because I hesitated, but when another partner was brought up for her, she flubbed right away.

Although I was disappointed with my performance, some people were having an even harder time with it. They were having difficulty coming up with anything other than dry, uninteresting activities.

On our second round of attempts, we had a bright moment. Steve was paired with Lori and did a great job, making big motions and adding noise to his acting. He actually had us all laughing. They were coming up with activities that started with "t." For "tea time," he adopted a snooty British accent and walked around with a cup, spouting small talk. For "trashing a play" he actually picked up a table and made as if to throw it, play and all. For "traipsing through the woods" he ran around in ridiculously large movements, a huge smile on his face.

Dave pointed out that he'd done well because he was making big movements and using noise. I have a feeling he was also concentrating on acting the movement out, rather than trying to split his attention with coming up with a new action to say. I found it inspiring, giving me ideas for how to do better next time.

It was just a rough week for everyone, I felt. When we gathered in a circle at the end, Dave told us that we should feel good because every group has a tough time with that game and that he's seen other classes do even worse.

Gerry, who was standing next to me, turned to me and asked, "How is that possible?" Then I knew for sure I wasn't the only one disappointed with my performance.

Afterwards, I went up to Steve to ask him where he's been doing stand-up lately, since he mentioned last week that he was just starting. Turns out he doesn't have a regular venue yet, so I told him I'd get him information about the open mic where I went with Attila the Pun a couple of times.

Dave mentioned another club, Helium, where he thought they had a good audience. He pointed out that an audience can make a difference, telling us about a sketch comedy show he did where the audience was just dead one night.

As we walked outside, I told Steve he did a good job with What Are You Doing? I told him how tired I was from staying up late for the sake tasting. He admitted that he'd shown up tired, too, from helping a friend move. I bet there were several other stories like ours, as well.

As Dave warned us, there will be off nights, but you have to just get back up there and do your best next time.

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Copyright 2005 by Alyce Wilson

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