I had a great debriefing session the other day after four of my slightly inexperienced improvisers had just finished what turned out to be a really great scene. They did a great job of listening and reacting to each other, and bringing their own flavor to the scene.

In the debrief, however, each of them made comments about where they had planned to go in the scene. I mentioned to them that despite all of their plans, and that the scene didn't really go in any of those directions, they still managed to create a great scene.

That's incredibly challenging for high school improvisers - to go onto a stage with nothing planned. Professional improvisers have trouble doing it, much less insecure teenagers. What's great about Allen's quote is how it tries to get past the preconception that your improv scene will either be a success or a failure. Only rarely have I seen a "bad" improv scene that also failed to entertain the audience - most of the time, improv scenes are bad or good only when judged against our own preconceptions.

Here are a couple of ideas to help improvisers just live in the moment.

• Face your fear and just do it.
  Ignore your own ideas for the scene and just walk on stage and put yourself in that scene. Listen for an opportunity to become a character, solve a problem, cause a problem, or establish a relationship, and just do it.
• There are no mistakes, only opportunities.
  Everything done or mentioned in a scene is now part of the reality of the scene. Instead of ignoring it, or trying to "correct" it, just let it be. Sometimes the best scenes come from things that at first seem contrary, but good improvisers who listen and work together can find a way to make them make sense.
• Be brave and trusting.
  This is one that is important for everyone in the scene to adhere to. Someone's going to have to play the underdog, the problem-maker, the victim - if everyone in the scene is brave, then anyone can play that character. And if everyone trusts their scene partners (and recognizes the trust that everyone else places in him or her), then everyone knows that someone in the scene will get them out of it.
  

My students are always so concerned with sucking.

Especially newer improvisers, they are very timid about getting into a scene with more experienced students, because they feel they can't measure up, or that they won't know what to do, or that they - god forbid - won't be funny.

As a result, they tend to overthink their improvisation. They try too hard to be funny, or they try to fill with too much dialogue, or they throw in huge, outrageous character actions that don't seem to fit the scene.

What they're missing is that the most important part of being in a scene is just that - being in the scene. Listening to and observing what's going on will often present very logical means of entry - mention of another character, the appearance of a problem in need of a solution, one character's action just begging for another's reaction...

Occasionally, your entry into the scene may not even be an active one - a scene taking place in a grocery store can easily have a silent shopper in the background. That player, if they're present in the scene, listening and observing, can find the spot to add their one line, their observation, their insertion into the primary scene unfolding. Even if they don't, they've made the scene that much richer by just being supporting characters adding to the environment.

Some of our games which focus on support can help student learn how to just be present.

Humans naturally have an aversion to risk and danger. At its worst it can be life-threatening; at the very least, it gets us out of our comfort zone. Our instinct is to keep ourselves safe - so the challenge is to choose not to be safe.

The benefit of an improv scene is that we can perceive risk in two different but related ways - risk to the performer and risk to the character. Risk to the character is almost always much more interesting - to the audience and, as most professional improvisers will tell you, to the performer. It creates so many more exciting, active, story-filled options than does "playing it safe."  Character A could be in a scene going into a job interview with Character B; A could get the job, get along with his coworkers C and D, and be a happy little worker. But what if A doesn't get the job, and is out on the street? What if A gets the job, but finds he is extremely underqualified and over his head? What if A finds that C is actually an old girlfriend, they split on bad terms, and she's now his supervisor?

Those three scenes present so many more interesting options, and fortunately none of the risk to the character is actual risk to the performer. The risk to the performer comes in voluntarily choosing to act out those uncomfortable situations. The risk to the performer is not to life and limb, but is still somewhat psychological in nature, and can sometimes be challenging to embrace and accept in a scene. Performing any of those scenes mentioned means Player A has to put himself in a position of acting (and therefore feeling) awkward or uncomfortable.

This is where group mind and supporting our fellow players becomes so important. Recognizing that a player is accepting the role of the character at risk means that everyone else should collectively plot out how to get that character out of that situation. Scenes in which a character is down and never is allowed to get back up, or in which a character keeps getting more and more piled on them without any resolution can often sour an audience - the audience ultimately wants to see the win.

So it falls to the other players not only to heighten that risk, but also ultimately to lift the player/character out of it. How might it play out if Player A doesn't get the job? He leaves the interview and gets his wallet stolen, spends the night in an alley, gets bitten by a raccoon, loses his house and his wife, finds a rusty old park bench to call his new home, on which sits a business man with a crazy new idea and looking for a business partner who happens to have the same qualities as Character A, the idea takes off, the company goes global, and perhaps finally takes over the original company that A interviewed for at the beginning of the scene. If everyone involved in the scene is on board that things will get gradually worse for A but that ultimately by the end of the scene A will end up on top, that foreknowledge can help mitigate Player A's fear of accepting the initial risk.

As improvisers, our challenge is 1) to be willing to jump of the ledge and accept the risk of the scene, and 2) ensure that we are all on the same page in supporting that player that accepted the risk in the first place. A great exercise for troupes to try this out is What Happens Next? The suggestions for next actions can be in the vein of creating risk for the player, or heightening the risk already present. This exercise can give students a chance to work through what a logical scene order might be.

In my experience in high school improv, walk-ons - players entering/adding to a scene already in progress, sometimes known as secondary support - can either go really well or really poorly. They tend to have a very different purpose than do the players/characters who begin a scene, but often that purpose is lost in the need for the walk-on players to add to their stage time.

On his Improv Nerd blog, Jimmy Carrane posted an article about how to decide if you need to walk-on into a scene. I'm going to use it as a starting point for my students, and so I thought I'd share his tips with you here in their entirety (bold-italic emphasis is my own). Additional commentary, however, is shared below the tips, so keep reading.

1. Do the players need an environment?
This is usually easy to determine and can be of maximum service to the players in the scene. If two players come out and have no idea where they are after a few minutes, it is the perfect opportunity for a walk-on. Come in and place them in a specific environment, such as in a restaurant, in a hotel room, on an airplane – anywhere but “vagueland.” Then quietly leave the scene, because your job is done.

2. Is a character being called for?
Sometimes, two players will start a scene and they’ll reference another character, such as, “Your mother and I are really upset you didn’t come home last night.” We don’t have a mother in the scene, so this is your opportunity to be the mother. It doesn’t matter if a woman or a man plays the mother, we need a mother. You want to avoid where the players are desperately calling out for another character to join them three or four times before some one is brave enough to step up. I have also seen the opposite where players are trigger happy and think every time a character’s name is mentioned is an opportunity for a walk on. Be aware that is some cases they will be referring to character and a walk on is not necessary.

3. Does something need to be heightened?
This is by far the trickiest one to do. Ask yourself if there is a game, premise or emotion in a scene that needs to be heightened. Can you do it gracefully, by adding a piece of information that will up the stakes? If so, it might be time for a walk-on. However, remember that you don’t have to jump into every scene. Sometimes a scene may not need heightening by you; they may be able to handle it themselves.

4. What is my motive?
I am guilty of this. Sometimes my confidence is low and I feel safe walking into a scene than initiating one myself. If you feel you are doing this, instead of looking for an opportunity to walk into a scene, how about following the fear and starting a scene yourself?

5. Does the scene need an edit?
I wish I could take credit for this advice: “Sometimes your best walk-ons are edits.” This is true, especially if the scene has been going on for a while. If the scene feels like it’s dragging and you have an instinct to walk on to change the energy, probably it would work better as an edit.

One thing that makes these tips tricky to employ is that they have a lot of "sometimes." These are not definite or universal rules for walking on - often a situation in one scene is desperate for a walk-on, and the same(-ish) situation in another scene is being totally handled by the on-stage players and needs no walk-on. Here are some factors to consider:

1. Group Mind
How well does your troupe play together? Do they (or the players currently involved) sync well together on stage - and if so, does that make it more likely that they'll be able to get themselves out of a bind? Are the players that are planning to walk-on naturally in tune with what's going on in the scene, and in tune with the other players?

2. Experience
Are the players currently in the scene newbies or vets? If they're vets, it's more likely that they'll be able pull themselves out of a jam - or make it more apparent when they're explicitly calling for a walk-on. Watch and listen carefully for cues they're giving to their offstage scene partners.

3. Habits
Certain players will tend towards certain types of behaviors in scenes - use those tendencies to govern where you think the scene will go. Does a scene player always refer to a third character with the expectation of them suddenly walking-on? If so, there's your cue - let them endow you with that character, and walk-on when needed. Does a scene player start out really strong scenes, but tends to forget to clearly define their environment? Walk-on quickly, give them a bit of definition, and then move on your merry way.

Walk-ons can add so much to a scene - or seriously derail it, if not treated with care and respect. Work on it with your troupe - it can become a great tool in your improv arsenal.