How Improvising saved my ass.
Some years ago I toured a solo show.
It was called ‘Echo Chamber’.
At that time, I taught all over the world, and was often asked to perform ‘Echo Chamber’ alongside teaching gigs.
It was a hard-hitting piece: full of violence, nudity and some pretty dark material.
It was tough to perform and tough to watch. (I’m not sure I’d want to make it now. A lot has changed. But it was what it was, and reflected who I was at the time.)
I’d been invited to teach and perform at a drama school in rural India — on my first visit to that magnificent country.
There was serious miscommunication between the Indian organiser of my visit and the Principal of the school.
When the Principal realised what ‘Echo Chamber’ involved, respectfully and politely, he made it clear it simply couldn’t go ahead. The school was embedded in a traditional, conservative, rural village. Villagers attended every performance the school put on.
An ‘in-your-face’ provocative show such as ‘Echo Chamber’ would irrevocably damage the relationship between the school and its community.
Without that relationship, the school couldn’t survive.
My performance had to be cancelled.
Or did it?
When you face an insurmountable block, do you have to give up?
Sometimes the answer’s ‘yes’.
If something can’t happen, it can’t happen.
Sometimes though ‘I can’t’ can turn into ‘how could I?’
Instead of cancelling the performance (which the Principal really didn’t want me to do: he wanted his students to see my work and the villagers were expecting a show), I said I’d improvise.
So at 8pm that night, in ferocious heat, in front of a mix of students and villagers, many of them young mothers with babies in their arms, I walked onto the stage with no idea what I was going to do.
I was very, very present.
I knew I’d have to draw deeply on my skills.
I didn’t know WHAT I was going to perform, but I knew HOW to perform.
That was going to have to be enough.
I made a whole show up on the spot.
A lot of the audience had limited — or no — English, so I didn’t talk much.
I spontaneously created a 45-minute of unrepeatable performance material during which people laughed, cried and, at the end, cheered.
It was wild.
It was tough.
I had to dig very, very deep into my improvisation skills.
But I delivered.
I couldn’t deliver the performance I’d planned, but that didn’t stop me performing.
Was it the ‘best’ show I ever did?
Probably not.
Actually, I don’t what ‘best’ means.
‘Best’ compared to what?
It was what was possible for me, in that time, in that place.
There’s nothing to compare it to.
It was a unique event. Each event is offers a unique opportunity to create something new.
That show was what it was. It made the students excited and the villagers engrossed.
Women came afterwards and took photos of me holding their babies.
Students said they were inspired.
Village elders smiled and talked happily with the Principal.
The Principal and I had a great conversation coparing the deep-level skills of European and Indian performers.
I held my head high because I’d done the job I was commited to doing — even if I’d done it differently to how I’d planned.
Planning is great. But when things change, through miscommunication, misconceiving, misunderstanding, lay your plans aside and improvise.
To improvise.
It’s to give up knowing exactly what you’re doing and trust you know HOW to do things. Trusting your unique abilities to guide you as you apply your unique skills to each unique moment.
None of us control what will happen, however hard we try. We can, however, develop our ability to respond with skill, humility, resilience and good humour to the unexpected.
Life’s an improvisation.
Be an improvisor.
After thirty years performing, directing and teaching around the world, now I coach and mentor artists and others to live in joy and creativity. I also still perform sometimes, but usually keep my clothes on.
I recently published a free training ‘How to make BIG decisions when you feel really stuck’. It’s a PDF and video. You can get your copy here.
More information about me here: www.johnbritton.co
Email: [email protected]