One of the key elements of improv is answering these three questions in your scene: What? Who? and Where?
What? is the task that you are trying to accomplish. Every improv skit should begin with a task. If you are not doing, you are doing it wrong. Simplicity is key here. The more complicated the task and more difficult it is to pantomime or explain, the less likely the audience will catch on and enjoy it. Likewise, your teammates should be able to add to your actions. While outlandish actions seem like they would be more humorous, often these choices are difficult for beginner improv artists to convey and audience members to receive. Your task should be easily communicated without need for dialogue. Every good improv artist should realize the monumental tool that their body is to convey meaning and context.
Who? defines the characters on the stage and their relationships with one another. It is important when you are first starting improv or even if you are trying to refine your talent, to focus on character development. When beginning a scene, you should establish your relationship with other characters within 30-40 seconds. Although all the nuances of the relationship may be fleshed out through the scene, it is important that the audience see and understand clearly how you feel about the other character. There is no ambivalence in improv.
First start with relationship, how does your character know this person? Then ask yourself, how does your character feel about them? How does that affect the way you move and speak to that person? Do you want them to know how you really feel or are you trying to hide it? Often within the realm of “Yes, And..” we can make choices about others and help shape their characters more than we shape our own. Meanwhile, our scene partners will being likewise creating choices that shape our character. While you can have an idea of who you want to be when you walk on stage, do not be too rigid in those choices, they are bound to change. It is much easier to think about your relationship with others.
Where? establishes the setting of the scene. It is important through both the task and relationship to convey the setting of the scene. While dialogue can also help paint the picture, this choice is not as strong and can feel forced to audience members. Some settings are created very quickly and easily, but others can be more nuanced. Practicing setting a scene without dialogue can really help improv artists move away from exposition based dialogue.
Once you have What? Who? and Where? in place, you should consider your objectives and tactics.
Objectives are simply what your character wants to happen. For example, if I want to stay home from school, my objective is to stay home from school. Tactics are what my character does to obtain that objective. In this analogy, I might beg my mom, feign illness, aggravate the bus driver, etc. Tactics should always be expressed in action verbs. Developing what you want quickly and then using tactics to obtain it are key to the conflict and its resolution. Understanding these principles allows you to understand beyond improv into human behavior. When we interact with patients, residents, attendings or other medical students, each person we encounter will have an objective. These objectives change from day to day and sometimes they have more than one at a time. Individuals will use tactics to obtain their object. Sometimes, due to social norms, cultural barriers or introversion, individuals will often use tactics that are contradictory to their objectives. For example:
A female patient is in the hospital for cancer treatment. When the nurse comes, she yells at him that the food is cold and the hospital is terrible. The nurse ignores her yelling, gives the medicine and leaves without saying anything. The patient sits quietly when the doctor explains the metastatic cancer has spread to her colon, liver and lungs. The doctor asks if she need anything, but she just looks out the window. In a hurry to see other patients, the doctor leaves the room telling the patient to have a nice day. Once alone, the patient starts to quietly weep.
While this seems silly, it is a common scenario seen, even at The Ohio State. Let’s consider analyze this patient with our objective/tactic principles. Clearly her objective is to get attention to fill the loneliness and suffering they are experiencing. But look at her tactics?
YELL
IGNORE
Will these tactics help her obtain what she wants? Probably not. Sadly, given her current medical states, she needs comfort and support yet her actions are pushing others away. Yet that is where we come in. We don’t have to be tactic based reactors. We can be objective based reactors.
Let’s look at the scenario again and see how the nurse and doctor can react based on the patient’s objectives.
A female patient is in the hospital for cancer treatment. When the nurse comes, she yells at him that the food is cold and the hospital is terrible. The nurse sits down beside the patient and quietly asks what he can do to make it better? The nurse explains that he understands being in the hospital is stressful and that he is here to help her.
The patient sits quietly when the doctor explains the metastatic cancer has spread to her colon, liver and lungs. The doctor asks if she need anything, but she just looks out the window. Seeing her get quiet, the doctor sits down and takes her hand. “I understand you were upset earlier with the nurse. Anyone in your situation would feel this way. It is okay to feel upset. Do you want to talk? I am happy to listen. This is not an easy thing you are dealing with. I am here for you.”
We have the power to be phenomenal influences of compassion and professionalism in every interaction. As medical students, we have the opportunity to take more time than physicians to talk with and comfort patients. Be active in seeing past tactics to the deeper objectives. If you ever cannot tell what a person wants, just ask them! Some patients are more willing to divulge this than others and some cannot articulate or formulate what they really want but if you always reach out with compassion, you provide them with the safe space to feel comforted and share with you.