The History of Improv The History of improv is hard to pin down. Like folk music, improv is often passed down through generations by oral tradition rather than through written or recorded formats. Games in particular can vary wildly between how they are played and what they are…
How to Prepare for your first improv class People often ask us what they need to do to prepare for their first improv class. The genuine truth is nothing. You just turn up, as you, and experience it. This should be a reassuring thing but I…
How improv makes you attractive That certain ‘je ne sais quoi.’ Effortless Charisma. Radiant Charm. That feeling that certain people give off that just makes you want to be around them. What is the thing that makes someone smoking hot (or not)? According to clinical…
“All our words from loose using have lost their edge” – Hemmingway Bullshit is an easy word to throw around. Being foul mouthed, in the past week I have used it to refer to slow traffic, my daughter’s inability to sleep, a narrative turn in a…
How to be creative? The answer is obvious How to be creative? We all want to know the answer. And so, what a funny word obvious is. It can mean clarity, but is often used with criticism. I certainly have associations with being on the wrong…
Compare and Contrast Contrast is the theme of our classes this week over at AndAlso. Contrast may seem like an odd choice of theme in an artform that is all about agreement and building, but this is precisely the reason that…
How to Smash the Patriarchy with Improv It’s International Women’s Day on the 8th of March, and the theme of our classes this week. I’m a woman, and a feminist but I somehow still feel I’m not allowed to celebrate – what is…
New Year’s resolutions always come with a lingering feeling of dread. Lovely they may be in theory, but we know they will soon be broken. It’s just a matter of time until we are, again, the abject failure that we were last year. Like meeting a character in…
Meditate for the first time and your brain might well go something like this: “OK, just do nothing. This should be easy. Try a harder one, Mr. meditation teacher! I’m always wanting to do nothing. Here we go: nothing! I’m doing so well at doing nothing!…
I am a big believer in the idea of abundance. I don’t want to go all Tony Robbins or anything but having an abundance mindset has always served me well. At the very least, it has certainly served me as an improviser. Or…
I don’t travel to improv festivals very much anymore, mostly cos of having two very energetic kids. That and setting up a new company with some pretty ambitious goals. I never did as much as Heather, but whenever I did, regular as clockwork, I would have a crisis…
One of the first questions people ask when they find out I am an improviser is ‘What happens if you can’t think of anything to say?’ As if saying things is the most important part. And it’s true: some improvisers tend to conflate how much dialogue…
