Back at it.
Once again, we got into things with some freeze tag. But before we began, Gellman shared a story about a classic Laurel & Hardy scene where they have to deliver a piano to a house in the Hollywood Hills and they have to go up 250 steps from Sunset Blvd. to get to the house. His lesson from that story was that adding the stairs to that scene was the source of the comedy, and we need to add stairs (in a metaphorical sense) to our scenes to create comedy.
After our freeze tag warm-up, we had a review of last week's ground rules for dialogue and Gellman's personal rules for his class. He expanded on one of the reasons for his no gender-bending rule: in some improv circles men play women because there are no women in the troupe, and there are often no women in the troupe because of the bullshit notion that "women aren't funny." That shit don't fly in Gellman's class. And rightfully so. During this part of class, he also shared a vitally important life lesson: "Junkies can't be trusted, especially when they are speedballing."
One of the drills that we did, which we also did last week, was sixty second relationship scenes. Two people are on the stage, and the audience gives them a setting for their scene. What the actors have to do during that scene is to stick to the dialogue guidelines (yes, and; statements; and stay in the present) and establish a relationship between their two characters. It sounds easier than you'd think. You can't just be obvious about the relationship (Hello, mom, I am your son, and I am going to come out as gay in this scene...). It actually gets easier if you just look at your scene partner and react honestly to his or her cues, statements, and body language.
Some highlights of this exercise were Kris and [fuckican'trememberwhowasinthescenewithher] as sisters at a campground. Sister A accused sister B of hating her soul because it was so beautiful and that's why people like her. Another highlight was Dan and Kristen. Dan was hitting on Kristin after she had told him not to do it. He thought that restriction only applied for the previous shift as opposed to a blanket prohibition. It was then revealed that she was particularly opposed to his advances because they are co-workers -- and cousins.
Gellman's tip during this exercise was that the scene works better when the characters are fighting for something or someone -- such as a couple fighting to keep their relationship going (even if they want different things out of the relationship, they still want to be together). This idea of a clear exposition in the scene at the beginning is also usual for sketches because if a scene isn't working, a good place to start in trying to fix it is to go back to the beginning --the first sixty seconds -- and see if the characters relationships and objectives (what they are fighting for) are well defined.
Our next exercise was a wrinkle on the sixty second drill. We each had to write down a line that we said to somebody during the previous week or that somebody said to us. The line had to be person A saying something personal about themselves or the recipient of the line; it could not be about some third person. So, we got on stage with our scene partner and the audience gave us a relationship and a setting. Whoever went first said their line as the first line of the sixty-second scene. During that sixty seconds, a scenario had to develop. For the next scene, you and your scene partner have the same relationship, but you're given a new location, and it was the other person's turn to deliver their line first.
This was quite fun. My personal favorite was Mario and Siera as husband and wife. In scene one, they were in the yard of their home in Boise, ID. Mario's first line was "you're a prick." (Something a husband usually says to his wife.) In sixty seconds, they had the beginnings of a marital misunderstanding that was nuanced by a desire to make things work. In the second scene, they were on a balcony at a resort in Puerto Vallarta. Siera began with "you really are a selfish person." This couple had this funny scene where they both found common ground in that they are both selfish and put themselves before their spouse. But hey, it's just peachy because even though I put myself first, honey, you're number two above all others.
The idea of using a line as the spark for a scene is a good one. Gellman told us that one of his friends would keep a list of "overheards" that he'd use to begin scenes. I'm going to steal that idea.
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