Fiction and Improv: Sisters from a Different Mister
By Sarah Callender | December 13, 2017 |
Last weekend, my husband and I took a quick jaunt to Chicago, the city where we met, dated and became betrothed. Our trip to the Windy City was twofold—an anniversary getaway (romantic!) and a way for my husband to get enough miles on Alaska Airlines to maintain his MVP status (not romantic!).
I had never once gone to improv at Second City, so we bought tickets, took our seats in the old people’s section, and laughed and marveled at the talent and quick-wittedness of the comedic actors. At least we marveled at four of the five comedic actors. While the fifth seemed to suspect that she was bombing, she didn’t embrace the bombing. As a result, highly sensitive and unnecessarily empathetic me felt like I was bombing right alongside her. It was like schadenfreude, only different.
During the show, when I wasn’t blown being away by the courage of the actors, or laughing at their wit, or doing empathetic schadenfreude or calculating that at least we were the youngest members of the old person section, I wondered whether the elements that make improv work (or flop) are the same as those that make fiction sing (or flounder). Here’s what I came up with. (Here’s up with what I came?)
Starting in medias res. I must pause here to confess that I’ve always thought it was “in media res.” I’m going to assume they recently changed the spelling without notifying me.
To return to the point: In improv, the actors drop the audience right into the middle of the action, the conflict, the tension. Improv never front-loads a scene with backstory. But what about fiction? While a fairy tale starts with Once upon a time, there lived a … other fiction writers do what improv actors do: drop the reader right into the middle of the story. Check out the first sentences from a few of the novels I pulled off the bookshelf:
This is Where I Leave You by Jonathan Tropper:
“Dad’s dead,” Wendy says offhandedly, like it’s happened before, like it happens every day.
A Little Life by Tanya Yanagihara:
The eleventh apartment had only one closet, but it did have a sliding glass door that opened onto a small balcony, from which he could see a man sitting across the way, outdoors in only a T-shirt and shorts even though it was October, smoking.
Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins:
I stare down at my shoes, watching as a fine layer of ash settles on the worn leather.
We read the first sentences of these novels, then proceed to the next sentence and then the next, all without knowing much, if anything at all, about these characters. But we know we are right there in the middle of the action, and we are intrigued. Why is Wendy so nonchalant? The eleventh apartment … what about the ten previous ones? Why is there a fine layer of ash settling on someone shoes?
Gifted writers know their top priority is submerging a reader in the story and offering her just a whiff of something that feels just a tad off. Once the reader senses something is not quite right, she will be eager to linger, if only to get her bearings within the story. We all long to be invited into a good story, and once we are there, holding a cocktail in one hand and a mini quiche in the other, our brains won’t let us leave until we make sense of the story that’s swirling around us.
Make Me an Offer
I have a husband who absolutely will not fight. No matter what I do, no matter how much I try to rile him up, he never takes me up on my offer to engage in some kind of emotional sparring. As a result my husband and I have had two fights in twenty years. Two. Our marriage would make a very dull novel and an even worse improv skit. For that I am lucky and grateful.
In improv, one actor must make an offer to a second actor, and the second actor must accept that offer. If actor #1 invites actor #2 into some kind of tomfoolery or shenanigan, and actor #2 refuses, the scene is DOA.
Some improv folks call this the Yes, and … rule.
In our writing, we are supposed to create scenes in which the protagonist’s needs and desires are thwarted and denied at nearly every turn. OK, but if our protagonist is told, Yes, and … doesn’t that grant the protagonist exactly what she wants? How does a story continue if the protagonist gets what she wants–and more–every time she asks? It can seem like Yes, and … is the opposite of what propels a story.
But Yes, and … is not a genie in a bottle. Yes, and … simply demonstrates another character’s willingness to participate in the story (or the fight, drama, tension, desire, goal-seeking).
Plot, remember, is ultimately born from the interactions that take place between characters. Characters must be saying Yes, and … to one another in order to continue co-existing in the story. When a character declines the invitation to stay in the story, the story fizzles.
To clarify, characters may not be cooperating with each other; they may not be helping one another achieve their goals and desires. In fact, they may be making life pretty miserable for each other, but by saying Yes, and … they are agreeing to stay in the story and build a scene. When a character makes on offer and another character accepts that offer, the juicy stuff starts getting juicy.
The Element of Surprise
During the Second City improv show, the skit that I found most hysterical was one that involved Jesus doing some awkward dance moves. Lots of high kicks and gymnastical splits. Remember the Ministry of Silly Walks? The Son of God’s dancing was a lot like that but much more so. Best of all, He was able to do such impressive moves because, as we learned, He was clad in Lululemon yoga pants.
In Story Genius, Lisa Cron shares this fact: our brains crave certainty, familiarity and patterns. But we don’t watch improv because we crave certainty, familiarity and patterns. Jesus wearing an off-white linen robe? Snore. But put Jesus in Lululemons, something we’ve never seen in books, paintings, or churches, and our brains light up. It’s these silly and unfamiliar images that tickle our brains. How delightful!
We want fiction to tickle our brains as well. Thinking about some of my all-time favorite novels, The Book Thief comes to mind. There are three hundred reasons why I love that book; one of them is that the story is narrated by Death. Never before have I read a story about WWII-era Germany, told from the tender-hearted, resigned, melancholy-yet-resolute perspective of Death personified. Everything I felt and believed about death was upended, and that was delightful. Not quite as delightful as Jesus in Lululemons, but definitely in the same ballpark.
It’s your turn to improvise a bit. What other similarities do you see between performing improv and writing fiction? Have you been brave enough to do improv? If so, how has it helped you with your writing? Will you share how a favorite novel has surprised (and therefore delighted) your brain? Thank you, dear WU’ers, for reading and responding.
Photograph compliments of Flickr’s Daniel Hartwig.
A Middle Grade novelist (and Middle School English teacher), Sarah Callender lives in Seattle with her family. Because Sarah dislikes cleaning anything that will just get messy again, she tidies the house and weeds the yard only when absolutely necessary. This allows her time to focus on her true–and somewhat fraught–passions: writing, Abe Lincoln, and Tony’s Chocolonely chocolate bars. Equally passionate about mental health advocacy, Sarah is a member of The Stability Network. Sarah’s first novel, LUCY IN BETWEEN, will be published by Margaret Ferguson Books/Holiday House in 2026.
There is a “long form” improv developed by Del Close. I saw this astonishing feat of unplanned storytelling performed by Upright Citizens Brigade (with founding member Amy Poehler), right after the company moved to NYC.
Called the “Harold”, this form weaves together improved sketches in a way that makes what is highly structured look entirely spontaneous.
Underneath what the audience sees are many improv games and techniques. Rotating monologues. “Clover leaf” word association. Beat scenes. Flocking. Time dash. Reincorporation.
Which is to say, what looks easy is achieved with training and is founded on underlying and unseen techniques. Like fiction.
Most significant, to me, is that improv actors learn to trust their unconscious storytellers. They don’t over-think. They flow. They know the story is already written. They don’t force it out, they welcome it in.
I wish all novelists had that surety.
Hi Sarah and Don:
I studied improv as an actor and I must admit I’m unaware of: Rotating monologues. “Clover leaf” word association. Beat scenes. Flocking. Time dash. Reincorporation.
Clearly, I should have paid better attention.
I wholeheartedly agree that this willingness to let go and trust is at the heart of good even great fiction. (I also humbly maintain that “writing is rewriting,” and revision is perhaps the antithesis of improv.)
But this is a real shot in the arm for the onset of my own writing day, which was engendering no small amount of misgiving (read: dread).
Don, I particularly love this: “Most significant, to me, is that improv actors learn to trust their unconscious storytellers. They don’t over-think. They flow. They know the story is already written. They don’t force it out, they welcome it in.”
And Sarah, this: “Gifted writers know their top priority is submerging a reader in the story and offering her just a whiff of something that feels just a tad off.”
Suspense/tension is created by posing a question (implicitly), and delaying the answer. (I love the ashes on the shoes as well.)
Thanks! Happy Holidays!
Thanks, David, as always. I hope your early morning dread took a long walk off a short pier.
This is totally unrelated, but you may appreciate it. In my WIP, the child narrator is obsessed with Antarctica and all things related to Antarctica. Arctic terns, for example, which every year, migrate from Greenland to Antarctica, then back again. Without stopping. Every year. They live roughly thirty years so in the course of their life, they will have made the equivalent of three round trip flights to the moon.
But (and I am getting to my reason for mentioning this) before the terns leave to head south or north, there’s a silence that falls over the entire flock. It’s called “the dread.” Isn’t that beautiful? Maybe that’s why you felt your own version of the dread: it’s no small feat to fly from the top of the world to the bottom without stopping, and it’s no small feat to write sentences, scenes and stories that others will want to read.
But you have done it many times before and you will do it again.
Happy day and happy holidays to you! Oh, and I thought of you (and other 49ers fans) last weekend when we were in Chicago. The Niners were playing the Bears, and the Niners were staying in our hotel! I told one of them, “Hey, good luck!” when he and I were riding the same elevator. I’m pretty sure that’s why they squeaked out the W. ;)
Gosh, I love this comment, Donald. Thank you!
Your point about how good improv (and great fiction) seems so effortless is such a good point. The fifth improv actor who wasn’t faring as well as the other four was, quite simply, trying too hard. It’s an uncomfortable thing to witness anyone, in any situation, who is trying too hard.
I love that you had the chance to see UCB. I am going to Google “the Harold” and see what funny things pop up. One of my best friends in high school named her stomach, “Harold.”
Happy holidays to you and your family!
Sarah, what a wonderful anniversary!
Like you, I’ve always been amazed at improv. How do they think on their feet? How do they come up with all that stuff off the top of their heads? If I tried it, I would be the poor comic, bombing, knowing I was bombing, and unable to find the comedy in it. It would be like my first job in television as a weekend anchor, when the teleprompter got stuck and I said, uh, uh, uh and like a deer in the headlights hysterically looked for my place on the scripts in front of me. The”highly sensitive and unnecessarily empathetic me” (to use your words) finds it uncomfortable at concerts, live shows, etc. because I fear someone is going to goof up – uh, uh, uh.
But I think Donald Maass may have provided the magic answer (see above). Yes, it’s learning to trust their unconscious storytellers (and this holds for musicians, actors, and anyone performing live). They don’t over-think. They flow. They know the story is already written. They don’t force it out, they welcome it in.
This is an amazing recipe for success in writing: prepare to the nth degree, go out confidently, trust in your unconscious, and welcome the flow. I would add one more thing: when you bomb, have fun with it, learn from it, then move on.
Thank you, Sarah and Donald.
Thank you for this, Lorraine! Fabulous.
I am so glad you brought up this essential fact: in order to internalize story and allow it to flow, we must “prepare to the nth degree.” So true. I have been practicing in earnest since 1999, and I still have so far to go. Preparation is the key!
As for the bombing actor, yes! I so wanted her to make fun of herself. That would have put all of us at ease. My daughter (age 13) could not come to hear me speak at church a few months back because she was so terrified that I’d mess up. Seeing me mess up would have put her over the edge. It’s wonderful and terrible to be so sensitive to others.
I wish for you happy holidays a productive writing in 2018.
Many, many years ago – 1970 – when I was in high school, I had a brilliant drama teacher who introduced us to the use of improvs – or “theater games” as a way of training actors and as a way of developing character relationships as we rehearsed plays. She also taught a creative writing class using those same techniques. Forty-plus years later, I still use a lot of those techniques when I write.
Here’s one example: Suppose I am having trouble figuring out why an adult daughter has issues with her mother. I will pinpoint a time in their history, say when the daughter was a teenager, and take her and the problematic mother and devise a scene to explore their relationship. I give them something to do, say shopping. I give them a want. (We called them “points of concentration.”) Daughter: wants to ask her mother if she can go out with an older boy. Mother: wants to tell her daughter that she is going to divorce the girl’s father. (It could also be as simple as the girl wants those designer jeans, and her mother wants to get home to watch a television show (or call her lover, or, or ….)
I write the scene. It’s amazing what comes out, what I learn about my characters. The scene never appears in my WIP, or if it does, it’s distilled to one sentence, but the emotion and insight it generates helps me as the writer understand the nuances of their relationship in the present context of my story in a way that just thinking about it could never do.
Heidi. This comment is invaluable. HEY, EVERYONE! READ THIS COMMENT. (Sorry to yell, but it’s important.)
I am going to copy and paste this exercise to my bulletin board. It’s brilliant and so very helpful. Story comes alive in the nuances or relationships, don’t you think?
Thanks a bunch.
Love this technique. Thanks for mentioning it. Because it doesn’t necessarily have to do with the work in progress, but does something to a stuck character relationship.
My problem when things get a bit stuck is tht I try to stay completely in the scene, but this looks like a clot-buster.
Clot buster. Yes, indeed! That’s fabulous.
My irreverent brain is throwing up that ‘media res’ is half a cow in my almost-native Spanish.
I hope I would have the sense to look up the Latin before I used it, but I confess I probably haven’t thought about it deeply enough to get it right by default.
The idea of improv rests on at least minimal props (Whose Line is it Anyway had some really impressive creativity based on them), and thus the props are the structure around which the improv can form, like artificial reefs around old refrigerator skeletons off the New Jersey shore.
I’m a structuralist. I have to have the structure before I can write a scene: who is in the scene, where it goes, where it comes from, what happens, a sense of how many beats it will take… I use Maass’ The Fire in Fiction, chapters 3 and 8, to provide myself with all the necessary anchors/props/plot marks to hit, and then I let my right brain range free. And that part comes out of nowhere. I am constantly amazed.
I’m slow, so I too often think that these exercises outside the current writing can’t be worth the time and lack of focus, but you’ve made me think they might, instead, be almost a critical part of busting up logjams. Thanks!
There is so much great stuff to digest in your comment Alicia. Thank you. I’m with you in that I often hate to take the time to do writing exercises, Because I sometimes skip that part, I know I actually add time to my process. Sigh.
Thank you for pointing us to those two chapters in The Fire in Fiction. That’s an incredibly helpful book from an incredibly generous fellow.
Thanks for sharing these ideas today!
Sarah,
As you live in Seattle and love improv, I do hope you go see ComedySportz Seattle or CSz Seattle on Fremont Ave.
Thank you so much! I haven’t been there, but I put it on my list for something fun to do over the holidays. We used to live in Fremont so I’m quite familiar with the hood. Have you been a Seattleite at some point in your life?
Happy holidays to you, Jennifer.
:)
Sarah, happy anniversary!!! Hey, my husband will also not be goaded into a fight and in 30+ yrs I think we’ve had 2 fights too, one that the kids remember because my daughter drew a picture of it for a class assignment. Oy. It was about cleaning out the cat box. We both wanted to do it to prove some silly point which I can’t even remember.
I’ve never taken drama and I’d be terrified to do improv but I recently watched a movie–The Big Sick– where the MC does improv but his family wants him to be a lawyer. True story of a Pakistani guy who falls in love with a white girl. I could read in between the lines because this is something that many immigrant families face. The scenes with the family were the funniest because there’s an inherent tragedy in them. There were so many great lines. I loved that this movie was autobiographical with the MC playing himself. He and his wife together wrote the screenplay.
I’m rambling … but not before I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!
Oh thank you, Vijaya! I LOVE that your daughter made art from your cat litter fight. That’s precious. I hope you have framed it.
I am definitely going to watch The Big Sick this weekend. It will be my treat for surviving the week with a particular teenager (not my husband) who is, as it turns out, a reluctant student. I’d like your daughter to draw a picture of my interactions with this particular teenager.
Merry Christmas right back at you! I know all will be peaceful in your marriage this season. :)
The pilot for Rick & Morty. Not a novel, but brilliant improv storytelling nonetheless. In fact, TV shows in general (well-written ones) have taught me a great deal about those spaces we often miss when we are mired in the numerous challenges of a manuscript. I spot this especially in the novels of writers who have TV writing background, like George R.R. Martin—the succinct narration that always builds what comes next in the story, and not just what comes next for the writer at the keyboard.
Now, as writer at the keyboard, I can appreciate why we often get bogged down. When you write a novel you are juggling more balls than any sane two-armed creature can handle. The expression about rewriting being 90% of writing exists for a reason. Rewriting can be a dead end too, if one does not focus on improvising still as one ruthlessly searches for those spaces in between, those “and then” moments that are buried in, say, needless exposition or puddy that we put in place in previous drafts to let us see forward. I’m learning to harness this power, but even so it’s daunting. Every day there is one more little touch, a small nugget that might be 50-300 words that transforms the story a little better. It is a constant act of improv. There are notes from my editor, notes to myself to make sure I don’t wander off course, and those are all wonderful, but when I’m staring at the issue and looking into the space that exists between the text and the still-uncooked story, the answer is seldom ever found in my notes.
John. This is such a beautiful and insightful comment. Thank you. I know I was certainly nodding my head as I read your words, and I know we aren’t the only two who struggle to improv, then improve the improv, then improv some more … and on and on and on.
All of this hard work. That must be why we get paid the big bucks. Happy writing, friend!
Loved all the comments, stories and analogies.
At ComedySportz Milwaukee (CSz) We have done a scenework workshop for writers. They take their characters and put them in situations to see how they would react, so you get deeper into the character, and what he she or it is like outside the lines of the plot and dialogue. Example: One of your characters has murdered someone. How would she act at a party in her honor? How would she act at a restaurant with a character not in the book, or one that was, but was taken out, etc. It’s called “Going Beyond” , and it seemed to help the writers (any kind of writer, novel, teleplay, screen play, or situation comedy, ) who took the workshop. A successful situation comedy, like
Seinfeld becomes easy to write, easy to put the characters into any situation, because the characters are so well defined. That’s what the workshop tries to accomplish. And like Paul Sills, the king of the improvisation workshop: “‘No'”, is an offer too, everything is an offer, in workshop, or life.”
Richard! I am so glad you shared these fabulous ideas. You’re right about Seinfeld–we’d know how any of those characters would perform in any situation. Kramer at a department store perfume counter? Newman at a grocery store, standing near the Free Samples table. Thanks for making me think in this way … and thanks for reminding me that my son would Seinfeld. Better than video games, for sure!
I’m also grateful for the reminder that “no” is also an offer. You have added a ton to this conversation. Thank you! And I hear there’s a CSz in Seattle? Going to check that out for sure.
Happy writing to you. Happy holidays too!
Late, as usual, trying to put up my Christmas tree. But HEY, Chicago is my town, born and raised, love it so much and Happy Anniversary. I would have been like you, worried about the fourth person who seemed unable to RELAX into the improv. When raising our children, we had a game in some ways similar, where one person would start a story line and then PASS IT ON to the next. My children were good at this. The story took many curves and twists, but as I aged and began to really think of myself as a writer, I didn’t enjoy the game. I felt like I needed to be offering something special. I was that fourth person you mentioned.
Being able to free oneself in writing is often a task. Lately I awake in the middle of the night with ideas and I write them down (trying not to wake my husband). But I’ll take inspiration any way I can get it–and fight off reluctance to just plow ahead. Wishing you a wonderful holiday season, Sarah–and thanks.
I love this comment so much, Beth. Chicago is my most favorite city, and even after living in Seattle for twenty years (a city I also love) Chicago has my heart. Do you live there now?
I also loved your story-telling game issues. I have those exact issues! Every summer we do a camping trip with four other families, and when we start playing that game around the campfire, I have to go hide in the tent. It drives me nuts because it’s always such a not-story but most of all, I can’t stand it because of the PRESSURE! By now, everyone knows that I am never a part of that game. Phew. Thanks so much for the empathy.
xoxox!
We certainly have much in common and I love that Sarah. No, we left Chicago for a job change 20 years ago. Lived in Des Moines, Iowa for a while and now are in Southern California. A bit closer to you!! Have a splendid holiday and here’s hoping the game of “story making” will not come up.
Sarah, your mention of the Ministry of Silly Walks (I am a member emeritus) shot a memory into my noggin on the matter of improvisation—and forced improvisation it was. I was in an acting class hoary centuries ago, and the teacher had instructed us to memorize a short speech by some known character, and try to deliver it in that character’s manner.
I choose a short sketch by Mark Twain, speaking of his love of cheap cigars. The man who had declared “If I cannot smoke in heaven, then I shall not go” often wrote of his love of foul cheroots and his loathing of expensive imports.
However, the instructor upended all of us: the moment we were to begin, he changed the messenger of delivery. For me, I had to deliver Twain’s speech in the tones of the dreaded Nights That Say “Ni!” from Monty Python and the Holy Grail.
This was Twain at the top of his shrill register; I think I sounded like I swallowed a lit cigar. I can’t say I was charismatic, but I was loud. The instructor later explained that he wanted us to be able to act on our feet, to stretch boundaries and have fluidity in putting forth a set piece.
All I can say is “I want a shrubbery!”
Thanks for some fun thoughts on the shape-shifting that can happen in fiction.
Dear Tom. I wish I could have been there to witness this. And I wish I had 1/8 of your wonderful vocabulary. I’ll see if I can order it on Amazon. I hear they have everything.
Sometimes when my son is in a foul mood, like he was this morning as I drove him to 6:30 swim practice, I launch into a walk from the Sinistry of Willy Malks, and that pulls him from his adolescent mood. Other times, it does not, but it always makes me giggle!
Happy holidays to you, funny fella!