Title Impro
Author Keith Johnstone
Year Published 1979
Kind of Book Acting/Humor/Teaching/Fear
How strongly I recommend it 9/10
My Impressions Though technically a book about improvisatory acting, it is worth reading for anyone interested in creativity, fear, social interactions, or teaching.
Date Read November 2019
What question is the author trying to answer?
[How can we] encourage the rediscovery of the imaginative response in the adult?
Practical Takeaways
Don't believe anything because it is convenient
Reverse every statement you hear to see if the opposite is true
Learn how to send your soup back to the waiter when it is cold without making them want to spit in it
Value people for their actions rather than their thoughts
Focus on the relationships (not the characters)
Blame yourself as the teacher if your students are bored and uninterested and not in a good state
When you first meet a group of new students sit on the floor (play low status)
Explain to your new students that if they fail they are to blame you
When teaching a group make sure you give all students equal eye contact
Make positive comments to your students
Be as direct as possible to your students
Instead of seeing people as untalented see them as phobic (to something)
Don't sit on the end of the row (sit in the middle of the group)
Smile easily (in the street)
Look upright (in the street)
Raise and lower your status with great skill
Don't deflect compliments
Don't look back at a person after breaking eye contact with them (high status)
Either make the other person break eye contact first or just ignore them and don't look at them again if you break it first (high status)
Wear dark glasses to raise your status
Don't submit your gaze if someone is staring at you (high status)
If you say "er" or "um" at the beginning of a sentence make it a long one (high status)
Keep a still head and neck while talking or giving commands
When you say "my belief" write or say "(at this moment) is…
Move very smoothly, don't jerk around (high status)
Don't point your toes inwards (high status)
Don't touch your face when you speak (high status)
Speak in complete sentences (high status)
Slow your movements down (high status)
Accept being insulted (ie. Take an insult like the verbal equivalent of a custard pie. Not seriously) Laugh at it
Accept your 'disabilities" and allow yourself to be insulted
Don't step aside for people to walk by (high status)
Do acting experiments on strangers in the streets (eg. Hand out flyers, pretend to know them, see if they will step out of the way first etc.)
Exercise: Watch groups of people in cafes or bars and notice how everyone's attitude and posture changes when someone leaves or joins a group
Have the status of the characters swap or change during a scene or longer play/set
Think of adults as atrophied children. Don’t think of children as immature adults
Stop striving for originality in your work
(improv)Say whatever occurs to you. It doesn’t have to be original
Accept what your imagination gives you when making art
Try writing a story while counting backwards from 100 to override your censor
Try drawing a picture with two hands at once. Keep your attention evenly divided between the two without looking from one hand to the other. Don’t decide what to draw. Just let your hands go.
Imagine someone hands you a book and turns to a random page. Get yourself to see what the book is called and tell them what is written in it.
Keep the action of the scene onstage
Believe that content of the scene isn’t important
(improv) Don’t talk about people who aren’t in the scene
Tell students that they are not their imaginations and they are not responsible for what their imaginations produce.
Big Ideas
Every sound a person makes tells you something about their status
Every move a person makes tells you something about their status
To actually create something new requires you to go against your education
When a person improvises in front of an audience their innermost self will be revealed
We remember scenes that go badly
We forget scenes that go well
Similarly
We remember orgasms that go badly
We forget orgasms that go well
When the Queen of England placed the crown on her head she became the Queen ie. it transported her into taking on the Queen persona
The attention span of a kid who is bored is shorter than the attention span of kid who is engaged
Drama is about relationships
The audience feels pleasure when a high-status character gets wiped out
Because
Everyone feels like they are moving up a step in status
Breaking eye contact can be high status so long as the person looks away and doesn't immediately glance back at the person
Everyone has a preferred status (high or low)
We are not good about playing the status we are not when we act
High status people imply to others 'don't come near me I bite'
Low status people imply to others 'don't hurt me I'll stay out of your way'
When two people are walking towards one another the more submissive person steps aside
When one person is staring at another the way the person being stared at reacts to the starer reveals a good deal about the persons status
If the person being stared at looks away when making eye contact with the starer he shows lower status
If the person being stared at causes the person staring to look away he shows higher status
The tribe tends to reject individuals whose behavior is seen to be unpredictable
We deeply fear being seen as being insane by the group/tribe
Modern people do not repress sexual feelings and violent feelings like they did in olden days
Modern people today repress feelings of benevolence and tenderness
Surprising Facts
When asked where the self lives in our body Europeans place themselves in the head.
When asked where the self lives in our body Greeks and Romans places themselves in the chest.
When asked where the self lives in our body Japanese placed themselves beneath the naval.