IV - An intense bank holiday
After a busy bank holiday, I'm exhausted but thrilled from performing improv and teaching Playback Theatre.
We’ve just had a bank holiday weekend in the UK, and it’s been the busiest days I had in a while. I barely had time to write this newsletter, so I’m just going to say that I’m tired but happy.
During these past four days I was juggling performing at the Brighton Fringe with Acaprov and teaching a Playback Theatre intensive core training with London Playback.
I truly enjoyed the two shows I was able to perform with Acaprov, specially the one in the kids slot, ironically there was only four kids in a room packed with adults, including a hen do. They all had a really great time.
I also feel blessed for the group we had in the Playback Theatre training, some coming deliberately from Italy to take it. For all the attendants it was a very intense and challenging to pick all the concepts and techniques, but they endured wonderfully as they could demonstrate during the showcase at the end of the course.
🧠 On improv
Approaching improv from a place of positivity is always the best approach. Not just from our perspective, but from the perspective of our characters as well. If we are doing improv comedy, it’s not pleasant to have angry and negative characters on stage, that tends to leak into our persona leaving a bitter aftertaste. I’ve been in the position of hating a set that I just did due poor choice of approach. Hence, me now leaning into kindness and positivity when I’m about to do a scene. I guess I learned the rough way.
Does that mean we cannot play certain types of emotions on stage? The answer would be… you can, but handle with care. Grounded and theatrical improv, specifically, thrives on intense emotional exchange between characters. Sometimes we want to rise the stakes and some times we tend to go to dark places.
Last week, again with Chris Mead, we were doing scenes à-la David Mamet. There were a scenes with arguments, disagreements, swearing… and it was fun to do. As actors we find pleasure in being mean and intense, pulling all the muscles of our training. When used properly, and to propel the narrative of the scene, it’s powerful and oddly satisfying for the audience as well.
Be mindful of certain considerations before playing this way though. Don’t do it on improv jams where you don’t know your scene partners, don’t do it without setting a context where that style of improv is adequate, and try to land the scene on a positive resolution.
Now, go out there and be bad to the bone.
🪑 On Playback Theatre (PT)
The stories from the tellers during a performance gives us a wonderful gift, and that is context. Without context, symbolism doesn’t work.
We use a lot of symbolism on Playback Theatre, specially when it comes to re enact stories bounded to trauma and sensible topics. We will never be literal on stage with a story surrounded by violence and/or death, we want to avoid triggering the trauma on the teller.
There are many forms or techniques that are more adequate to tackle those stories, where symbolism comes to save the day. With symbolism comes indirect suggestion and subjective interpretation that works because we have the proper context facilitated by the story.
When starting doing Playback Theatre, learners are always concerned about what to do on stage ignoring that any choice is valid. Any action chosen by the actor will work, most of the times, because the brains will interpolate and map any action to the context of the story.
Never be afraid of your choices during a re-enactment. If done with confidence, it will make sense.
🗣️ Shout-out!
Improv Fest Ireland has open applications to perform this November. You can apply your established act, your work in progress o to be part of an ensemble. I can’t encourage you enough to do it.
I love this festival and the Irish improv community. I’ve been attending consecutively since 2018 and I plan to attend this year as well. There are already a few workshops that I have my eyes set on! See you there?
Visit their website to access the application forms.
📆 What is coming up
Catch me with Acaprov doing our monthly show at Shoreditch Balls on the night of the Friday, 9th of May. Come for a good time filled with fun and inspiring improv. Get your tickets.
📚 🎮 🎥 📺 The geeky dessert
I’ve been watching the anime One Piece on and off for the last 26 years, when they started airing it. The last hiatus was when I moved to the UK. The surprisingly enjoyable live-action adaptation, released by Netflix two years ago, made want to get back to it. It only took 26 years, but I’m now finally caught up!
The main reason I like this anime is the heavy social commentary we can find in their story arcs, there’s always the moral of fighting injustice, oppression and corruption from the wealthier and the governmental institutions. If you can get over the increasingly objectifying and cringey design of female characters, you’ll find a very left leaning show.
On the other hand, reprising it, reminded me why I kept swaying away. This anime is horribly paced and you can tell Toei Animation’s need to stretch it, like their main character’s limbs, to get more air time. The story needs urgently to find an ending, although Eiichiro Oda, the author, plans to reach a conclusion by 2030. Will the story be good enough to keeping me from tapping out again?
✨ That’s all folks ✨
Thanks for reading Playing Back an Improvised Life, a newsletter by Ferran Luengo.
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