Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/63981
Jenny Fiore: I think improv boils down to being accepting of and in the moment. Is that a good assessment? Jennifer Salas: [And] learning to build on it. When my 4-year- old plays, she's got the whole story arc figured out and knows ex- actly how she wants it to end. If you come at her with a change of plot, she freaks out. But that's what improv is, and that's what life is: You're going along. You make a choice. But you're not alone, someone else is going to contribute. You've got to let go of what you were thinking, accept what they said, and the ultimate accep- tance is building on what they gave you. Fiore: It sounds like improv requires an open mind, which is not how most of us are hardwired, as you just described with your daughter. This leads me to your corporate trainings. What's the objective of improv there: teaching people to be funny or just more pliable in their thinking? Sheila Robertson: We speak to their objective. I ask what they want from this. Sometimes it's ice-breaking. Sometimes it's team- building. Sometimes it's thinking outside the box. Everything we do has a fun element … but every single activity also has a teaching point. It's not designed to teach people how to be funny. It's to teach people how to listen—how to be present, accept somebody's idea, work together, maybe not look at the world from a perfec- tionist standpoint. Fiore: So, improv isn't just about comedy? Sarah Rogers: When we're funny on stage, it's because we're good at those skills, not because we step on stage and say, 'I have a zinger.' Similarly, people who come to our workshops end up having fun and finding that they're funny because humor is just born of people collaborating in that way. that fearlessness that you're unable to fall." "Improv gives you that spirit, Sarah Rogers 46 BRAVA Magazine March 2012 Fiore: Your motto of approaching improv with a "Yes, and…" attitude makes sense. What does "Yes, and…" look like in life off stage? Vanessa Tortolano: It's helped me as a mom. I used to think 'This is how it's going to be. You're going to be that kind of child, and this is how we're going to structure our day.' Now I have more humor in my parenting because I 'Yes, and…' which says, 'OK, let's do whatever wacky thing is happening here.' Robertson: It also gives you the opportunity to play. Maybe I'm trying to get the dishes done. I've got to get out the door in a half hour. I have a lot to do, and my son's like, 'I wanna do a dance party.' Yeeeee-es! We're going to do that. Because when you're 16, you're not going to ask me to have a dance party in our living room. That moment's precious. If you're caught in the dishes, you lose it. Fiore: From all you've said about staying in and being open to the moment, there seems to be an almost Buddhist quality to improv, a life philosophy of sorts. Would you agree? Linda Hedenband: I always call improv 'meditation for people who can't sit still.' Now we're using it on a more personal level and developing a workshop called 'Yes, and…Improvising Life.' It's going to be for people in the community, blending positive psychology and improv. Fiore: How is positive psychology part of improv? Hedenband: That's something I'm bringing from the outside, be- cause I work on the university level teaching courses such as that. I think positive psychology really fits with "Yes, and…" I lost both my parents after I came into improv, and had some really traumatic things happen in my life. Being able to say, 'My mom died, yes, and…I'm going to honor her in this way,' gave me power.