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Josh Heller: Most often when people talk about improv, they're talking about improv comedy, where performers will go on stage without a script and find out if they're about to have the best night of their creative lives or if they're going to cry in the parking lot. Host (Wesley Slover): This is the Collab Collection, where we collect stories and useful insights about creative collaboration.
Improv comedy is a form of unscripted theater where actors create scenes on the spot, often based on audience suggestions. Many comedic actors like Amy Poehler and Will Ferrell started in improv. But beyond the stage, improv teaches valuable skills, so much so that some theaters offer workshops for businesses, teaching improv to benefit employees in the workplace. To explore this, I spoke with Josh Heller, a systems engineer by day who teaches and performs improv on nights and weekends. Josh teaches through games, and his favorite is one that he plays with students on their first day.
Josh Heller: I take it very seriously and I raise my voice—it might be too much for day one, but I'll do it on day one. And that's called Category Shootout. First, I get all the students in a circle. Then I get in the middle of the circle and I spin around while pointing and making intense eye contact so that they are anxious.
And then I'll point at one student. That student must duck under my point. Then I'll say the name of a category like "automobile manufacturers." And then the two people on either side of the student who has just ducked must be the first to point. It doesn't count if you don't point and say "Ford" or "Alfa Romeo." And then whoever loses has to go in the center, and they continue the process.
Host: This exercise acclimates the students to being in front of an audience and thinking on their feet. The way we do it, you have to duck under someone's point and then two other people on either side point over you. That is not very professional—that is pretty silly, I would say. And if you're not prepared to do the silly thing and act like it's important, then you're not learning the full lesson of that game.
From here, they learn to collaborate. At the core of improv is the mantra "Yes, and," which is the idea that you accept what was given to you in the scene by your scene partner—that's the "Yes"—and you build on it—the "and." For example, in a scene, a performer might say, "I can't believe we're flying a spaceship," and the second performer acknowledges and builds on that: "Yes, and it looks like we're headed straight for an asteroid field." "Yes, and" is a way that moves the plot of a scene forward. But the idea also leads into another cornerstone of improv comedy.
Josh Heller: There's a theory of making your partner look good. That's your job. Because if that's everyone's job, then everyone looks good. I guess if I dragged you to an improv show and you had to play in the improv show, you might be concerned about, "Well, how do I make sure that I don't look bad? How do I make sure that I'm not the one who's not funny?" That alone doesn't really work and isn't productive.
Students are more likely to get frustrated because I don't teach them to be funny. We spend almost all of our time talking about how to cooperate and how to communicate and how to perform under the pressures of having people look at you and having to accept what other people are going to do on stage. You're having to trust somebody who's crummy just like you, because everyone's crummy when they walk into a level one improv class. So that's really what the training center is—is teaching you to be comfortable enough to feel psychologically safe enough to be cooperative.
Host: For Josh, this value translates to his day job as a systems engineer.
Josh Heller: In my job, the team you have is the team you're working with. The values and goals of the company are more or less values and goals that you've taken on yourself. So, you really do want to make the other people you're working with look good and present as best as possible and make things work.
Host: There's another mantra in improv that expands on this: "Bring a brick, don't bring a cathedral."
Josh Heller: I would say, you know, if you were my improv student and you're saying, "I'm bringing in this funny thing," I would say, "Don't bother. Don't decide what's funny first." In other words, if someone brings a fully formed comedy sketch into a scene, it doesn't leave any room for collaboration.
We're doing a show with the rest of your cast and the audience. So, why don't you go out there and offer something that's interesting or something you noticed or something you're feeling and see what comes back from a partner who is acknowledging and building on what you're seeing or feeling or thinking. And if you do that maybe twice more, you're probably going to find something that's funnier than what started out in your head.
Host: It doesn't just lead to a funnier result, but this process enables sustainable creative output. This form of collaboration where you let go of fully formed ideas and trust your scene partners can even turn your failures into success. The thing that was your mistake might end up being the most fun thing of the night. But sometimes the team just has to make the best of a tough situation.
Josh Heller: Truly, one of the roughest was—I definitely don't want to call out any local institutions—but wonderful folks who I love booked a really cool event where they had all these different things going on in their space at once.
My group, Plant Parenthood, was scheduled to perform right next to a band that was soundchecking. We didn't have a stage or a PA, but we were prepared to fight through the noise and do whatever it took to deliver a comedy show. The whole thing—standing on chairs, hoarse at the end of the set, and just the most egregious "give me your attention" behavior. Anything I could say to delight or shock or upset just to get you to not look at the band and instead to look at my comedy show, I was saying it. I'm pretty sure somebody took off their shirt. There was a lot of rough language. It was not a good show.
Host: This practice of being willing to make things work with the people you have beside you has made a difference for Josh on and off the stage.
Josh Heller: Improv provided me two values amongst others. I'm a very anxious person and I kind of had no skills to manage that socially. Before I did improv, I played in bands and I was terrified of being in front of the people. I've learned a lot—I'm not scared to talk at work. I'm not scared to talk in front of groups of people.
The other thing is kind of problem-solving in non-perfect scenarios. Our saying was: "Start somewhere, build something, maybe it'll be useful," or it'll be the thing that teaches us what we didn't know to build the useful thing. In improv, just the assumption is that you're going to go out without everything you need and you're going to do the best version of what you can when you can.
Host: This episode was written and produced by me, Wesley Slover, with help from Jake Merritt. It was mixed by Trevor Richardson. Our artwork and branding was created by Audrey Havey. She's a phenomenal collaborator and I cannot recommend her highly enough.
If you have any thoughts on collaboration, we would love to hear from you. Send us an email at the collab collection at sanctis.audio. The Collab Collection is a project of Sanctus Audio, a sound and music design studio. Hear our work at sanctis.audio. And if you could use a sonic collaborator, hit us up.
