RESOURCES

Improvised Comedy. See, I just came up with that title.

By: Katy Schutte

I teach comedy.  That probably sounds a bit arrogant.  Hey!  I’m hilarious, come learn with me.  The truth, the absolute truth is that anyone can be funny.  You can also be funny with no prior material or acting skills. 

Improvisation was made popular in this country by The Comedy Store Players and the TV show, Whose Line is it Anyway, both of which are competitive and male-dominated.  Our line of improvised comedy is more interested in working as a team and having an awful lot of fun.  If you want accolades then we’ve won a big award, I’ve been on TV and Rolf Harris once told me to shut up.  If you want to learn how to free yourself up and be creative then you’re already in the right state of mind. 

Our basic principles are for you to say ‘yes’ to anything that’s offered to you.  Unlike life, none of the constraints of money, time, talent and possibility will get in the way.  If someone comes on and tells you you’re an astronaut then you are.  Brilliant.  We also teach our students to ‘listen’.  How the hell are you going to know that you’re now an astronaut if you didn’t listen?  If you didn’t listen then you won’t be an astronaut and that’s a big career to miss out on.  Our third major rule is to ‘commit’.  You may have just done the worst spacewalk in the Universe – and there’s a lot of Universe – but we only know that if you show us it in your face.  If you do your terrible spacewalk with enough conviction, everyone in the room is going to get you doing it again and again in the bar because they think it’s so damn good. 

This stuff is for shy people because comfortable rules like these to allow them to be free and interact – and there is no possibility of going wrong.  This stuff is for very confident people – because for the first time there is room in their world for listening and adapting to the ideas of the little people.  And this stuff is for anyone who seeks to be totally present.  You can’t worry about anything while you’re improvising, it’s just not possible.  If your mind goes blank – congratulations – you’ve just reached Nirvana.  This whole article was improvised.  I bet you're still wondering why Rolf told me to shut it...

If you’d like to learn more about improvised comedy and how you can use it in training and entertainment, please contact The Maydays through their website www.themaydays.co.uk.  If you want a real person, try me on this website.  Katy Schutte.