My, My, Maestro

Comedy improvisation is easy. Comedy improv, my friends, is a piece of cake. You know: the way that juggling three whirring chain saws while changing your newborn’s diaper during a blackout caused by a Richter-rocking earthquake is easy.

Which is to say: Comedy improv is, most often, a tricky proposition.

Each Saturday night at the Hideout, these tricky propositions get an Olympic-style airing, as seasoned veterans and hopeful newbies alike compete onstage, improvising their hearts and forebrains out, engaging in any number of director-mandated games, vying for personal excellence and audience approval. The question is: Which improviser will, having clawed his or her way through the battling ranks for an hour and a half, emerge triumphant and be crowned, as the battle is called, Maestro?

A clue: It ain’t me, babe.

I tried it for the first time a couple of weeks ago, thanks to Hideout manager Andy Crouch’s stealthy “Hey, Whatever Gets Us More Media Exposure” policy. And, OK, I’ve been onstage a time or two, I’ve assayed my share of off-the-cuff badinage in the Rock & Roll Rental spotlights. Which is probably why I didn’t fail, exactly, in this initial attempt at competitive improv. And what I gained, if not the title of Maestro – won, that evening, by the charming and stupendously talented Shana Merlin – was a newfound respect for my fellow combatants, for the very act of improv itself.

It’s like this: If you don’t know how to play guitar and you watch videos of Jimi Hendrix, you’re impressed. If you do play guitar and watch those videos, you’re blown away.

I’ve watched four or five Maestro shows over the past year, and I’ve been impressed; but it wasn’t until I tried it myself that I realized what it takes to improvise. Quick thinking, yes. Timing, yes. The ability to instantly imagine a whole bunch of stuff that’s not actually happening, yes. But especially: a history of previous improvisations, an inventory of successful gambits in given situations, a natural willingness or developed proficiency to respond without hesitation to directorial command and the machinations of your fellow players. A talent for going with the flow, regardless of how often that flow resembles the business end of a white-water rafting trip.

There were about a dozen of us waiting in the wings, being called onstage in twos and threes by director Dav Wallace. And Wallace or Andy Crouch would sometimes instruct us in midperformance, even after the parameters had been decided. “No, focus on the eggplant,” one would say as we soldiered on, or “Now she’s a werewolf!” And we’d respond smoothly.

Or, at least, the others would respond smoothly. Your reporter was having trouble. Especially when, near the end of the night, singled out for a solo improv scene by the goateed and cunning Crouch, your reporter had his Fuck Authority button pushed and railed against the man’s seemingly random directions.

The situation had already been set, goddammit. The audience suggestions had been incorporated, for chrissakes. I already knew where I was going with the scene, to hell with these detours, to hell with these arrogant impositions on my creation! Damn you and your clever little beard, Crouch!

Which is, of course, rather the opposite of what improv’s all about. Which is, at least partially, why I didn’t win.

What improv is all about, ultimately, beyond the sharpening of skills and the creative (if sometimes chaotic) expression of its participants, is fun. As Hallmark as that may sound, it’s true: fun. And as the cheers rising from the packed-house crowd at Maestro attest, that goes double for the audience.

This article appears in August 5 • 2005.