Below are my homework assignments for The Second City sketch writing course. The world will see it before my instructor ever does. Assuming the world reads this blog.
The assignment was to describe a place or environment, and to describe an item that has special meaning in my life. So that's what I did. Eat meat, beer and cheese.
The Laundry Room
My laundry room is pretty disgusting by most people’s standards. In addition to providing my home a facility to wash clothes, it also serves as my dogs’ cafeteria, and sometimes their bathroom. Although, they usually prefer the carpet in the family room for the latter.
The floor in the laundry room is protected by cheap vinyl tile. It is the same tile that was there when I moved in nine years ago, as is the rest of the room’s decor, so I have no idea how old it is. It is scratched and tattooed with grime in some places. I see no need to replace it. The dogs seem to like its light blue flower trim pattern. The dogs and I are the only ones who spend any significant time in there. I barely notice the floor’s imperfections unless my wet feet alert me that something is amiss.
The washer is currently unplugged, unattached and pulled away from the wall. It stopped cooperating about a month ago. I’m at the end of trying to fix it. A new washer is on the way. The dryer sits in its customary place, to the left of where the washer should be, had it been behaving. Both appliances are white and stained with the memory of bunny effluence. The bunnies were evicted a few years ago, due to their incessant violations of our boarder contract.
Outside light infiltrates the room from a window over looking the washer and dryer area, and from a window on a door, which leads to the back yard, positioned to the left of the dryer. Both windows are donned with a wardrobe consisting of matching plastic green blinds, which complement the peeling warm red wall paper. These blinds also serve as dust repositories.
To the right of where an accommodating washer should be sits an off white speckled plastic stationary tub. This , too, boasts blemishes of its own, caused by the clean up efforts of the burnt red Venetian Plaster used to adorn the living room walls. On the wall behind the stationary tub is a make-shift splash guard hewn from a piece of faux brick wall covering. This helps promote the luxurious environment required when cleaning painting utensils or hand washing delicates. An electrical outlet, which provides power to the washer/dryer, looms perilously close to the tub, halfway up the wall. It’s a wonder I have not been electrocuted yet, with all the hand washing of delicates I do. To the right of the stationary tub of potential death is a door leading to a glorious bathroom.
Homemade cabinets and drawers, constructed with the finest plywood, cover the walls opposite the washer/dryer area and form an “L” shape through the corner. These are gilded with a pristine coat of brown paint and lacquer. Not paint covered by lacquer – paint and lacquer mixed together and then applied in a hurry, apparently. Depending on the humidity, temperature and wind patterns, some of the cabinet doors and drawers actually close all the way, sometimes. The largest cabinet, in the corner, leases itself to a furnace and a water heater. A mop and a bucket and some other infrequently used cleaning supplies keep them company. The rest of the cabinets secure such valuables as dog food, laundry supplies and whatever else cannot earn a spot in the important parts of the house.
There is a hook attached to the ceiling of the room in the corner. A paint roller hangs there as a reminder to how much this room needs some restorative attention. The ceiling also supports an uncovered light fixture, which is near is a pull down staircase leading to the attic. The panel to the staircase is painted brown so as not to be confused with the rest of the ceiling, which is white, except for remnants of bunny splash and other marks of mystery.
The dogs do their best to coddle the room with their discarded hair, as it comforts the creases and nooks created by the contents of the room. They also employ their own brand of aroma therapy in there, which is only supplanted temporarily by detergent and fabric softener fragrances on laundry days. They don't seem bothered by the room's condition. It is one step above living in the wild, although they spend most of their time on the couch.
The Fabio Photo
My eight by ten autographed glossy of Fabio is FABULOUS. In fact, I think “Fabio” is Italian for fabulous. If it isn’t, it should be. The photograph is black and white in a portrait layout. Fabio stands menacingly just off center to the left as if he was just about to make a proposition – one he is sure would be accepted. One of his hands playfully hides in the pocket of his casual black jacket, while his left hand confidently supports his pose on an unseen structure – probably a Donatello bust.
Fabio wears an angelic white shirt, with buttons hidden and a band collar fastened by an elegant dark bead. His Adam’s apple peaks out just beneath his massive and powerful square jaw, reminiscent of the animated Johnny Bravo of Cartoon Network fame. His golden mane hangs calculatedly untamed around his shoulders as he stares at the viewer like a lion concentrating on a deformed zebra. His enigmatic grin reveals his enjoyment in the zebra’s final doomed minutes.
Fabio's autograph, barely legible in gold ink, begins at his ornate belt clasp and drifts across to the right edge of the portrait. The placement of the signature reminds the viewer that the portrait is appallingly cut short at mid hip, leaving any package peepers wanting.
The picture frame protects the photograph with a frosty plane of glass. The frame is decorated with a double helix rope design bordered by two rows of half circles. The plastic construction is painted to appear as tarnished gold, as if to say, “Oh look, I’m an antique frame, but I was actually bought at a dollar store”.
On the outside of the glass pane, there is an autographed postcard of comedian Jake Johansson. He signed it, “I fucked a sock. Jake Johansson”. He didn’t want to sign it that way, but I asked him nicely, to commemorate one of his jokes in his act, and I wouldn’t leave him alone until he did. He was afraid I’d try selling it on eBay. I wonder how he’d feel sharing the frame with Fabio.
I keep the Fabio picture on my bar for all to enjoy. Friends who stop over and see it ask me if I’m gay, as if only gay people can appreciate the brilliance of Fabio. But I do wonder, sometimes, if I were gay, if I would be attracted to Fabio, and he to me. I also wonder if Fabio would ever consider keeping a photograph of me on his bar. If he did, would it be for the same reason I keep his picture – as a reminder of all that is silly in this world.
Showing posts with label Second City. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Second City. Show all posts
Monday, October 23, 2006
Thursday, October 12, 2006
Sketchy Rub
In my quest to become a Renaissance man non sequitur, I have embarked on yet another The Second City tutelage. For those of you who do not remember, or do not care, or both, earlier this year I enrolled in the first level of The Second City’s improv training program. That adventure proved to be too life threatening as I feared following in the footsteps of Chris Farley. Plus, improv makes me sweaty and sore, kind of like sex. So, I chose not to complete the other four levels of improv training and return to the comfort of staring at the wall in my family room to meditate. Even though there is a television set on that wall, with MTV airing on it twenty-four hours a day, it does not mean I was not meditating.
Who would have thought I would have become bored with Laguna Beach, Parental Control and Yo Mamma after seven short months? I needed some new terrain. I needed to find myself. I needed to spend the $260 I found in my son’s dresser before he discovered I had it. Joe Flaherty came to me in a dream and demanded that I call my friends at The Second City. He was clothed as a partially dressed Count Floyd, so I knew he was serious. I intended to enroll in their moonshine jug pottery class, but the only opening they had was in their Comedy Sketch Writing class. So I opted for that.
To prepare for the class, I watched all of Maury Amsterdam’s scenes from the old Dick Van Dyke Show. Or do you say Cock Van Lesbian? Either way works for me.
I was ten minutes late to the first class. The parking lot was full so I had to drive around a while until I was able to roll over a dead guy to park in his driveway. Mike, our reserved yet crafty and slightly crampy instructor, was not fazed by my tardiness. He introduced himself and asked me my name, to which I replied Maury Amsterdam, and I quickly made fun of the bald guy in the class, who happened to be him. I inflated the circle of seated students to create a spot for me diametrically opposed to Mike, except a little bit to the left, but I said diametrically opposed in an effort to show him who is boss – Carl Reiner.
The class consisted of one woman and seventeen men, who were all looking at the one woman with their mouths open. Even with faces agape, everyone had a look of grave concern. I thought I might have stumbled by accident into the obituary writing class instead of a comedy class. I asked the guy next to me which dead guy were we writing about? He said Maury Amsterdam. To lighten the mood, I tripped over an ottoman and Mary Tyler Moore tap danced on my face.
Mike was nice enough not to bore me by repeating the overview crap he had already presented to the rest of the class. He bored me enough with the twenty other minutes of overview he had not yet told. Eventually, we got to our first exercise, which was to interview a classmate and report back to the class how weird xe is. I was lucky enough to get to interview Kevin, a part-time college student, part-time bartender, and full time party dude. He had just gotten back from a week in the woods with a bunch of friends. He said he had to take some time to get away from all the drinking and having fun and naughty making. Good god, where the hell did I go wrong! My life sucks next to this guy! Kevin seems like a good guy and he made it a point to tell me he is not a spoiled asshole. Duly noted. He interviewed me, as well, and seemed impressed that I was not dead yet. We all told each other about each other. I don’t remember anybody’s name or anything about anybody. Well worth my son’s $260, so far.
Mike began to earn his money. He proceeded to teach us about character development. I will not get into the complex techniques required to build such in-depth characters, because I didn’t write them down and I forgot them all. I do remember that being a sketch writer legally allows you to be an eavesdropper, lurker, leerer and voyeur in order to build ideas for creating characters. I asked if it would be beneficial if we wore trench coats while we develop characters. Mike was impressed with my progressive thinking and gave me a gold star. He suggested we also wear the trench coats to class.
Mike is a great proponent of writing for writing sake. He declared that ninety percent of everything one writes will be crap. He must be familiar with this blog. Consequently, we should behoove ourselves to write as often as possible. To assist us in that quest, Mike introduced an exercise where we would write for twenty minutes in stream of consciousness mode, purging ourselves of all thoughts that come to mind. I am very familiar with this technique as it is what I use for Leper Pop articles. The theory is the more you write the more crap you’ll eliminate, kind of like a mental enema. He gave us twenty minutes to dislodge ourselves while he stepped out for a few bong hits.
Following is the fruit of my crap dislodging. As you can tell by reading this, I do not really need to be in this class, but it gives me something to do on Tuesday nights.
I’ve got to get me my own dumpster. This dumpster sharing is too familiar. I don’t like my garbage touching other people’s garbage. There are remnants of spit on garbage. That’s the last thing I want is my spit mingling with other people’s spit. It’s like making out with everyone in the entire building. I don’t want to make out with everyone in the building. I can’t even remember the last time I actually made out with anybody. Do people my age actually do that? Wait a minute, I do remember when it was. And who it was. I don’t want to remember that. Hard to believe I was that drunk and did not black out. Blacking out comes in handy sometimes. You can never depend on a good blackout. My power was out for three days last week. I felt like Annie Oakley. The cowgirl dress was a little tight in the waist. Thought the hat looked nice, though. I’ve never ridden a horse. A horse has never ridden me, either. So, we have a mutual respect for each other. I like to wave knowingly at horses because of it. They look at me like they have no clue what I’m doing. I know they know. They stand there chewing their cud like I don’t exist. Do horses chew cud? Cows do. What the hell is cud? Maybe I should open up a cud bar, where people can come in and chew cud from exotic places. Cows look pretty relaxed when chewing their cud. It’s probably good for the soul. I’ve never seen a cow have a nervous breakdown. I’ve never seen a human have a nervous breakdown, either. Maybe I’m just not paying close enough attention. The cud can be used for medicinal purposes as well as social. Pharmacies can create special cud sections to aid the mentally stressed. Where is the king of Walgreen’s when you need him? Or, is it a queen? Either way, I’ve never seen xe. There is a lot of stuff I haven’t experienced, apparently. I need to get out more, or at least out to more places like farms and Walgreen’s headquarters. Do headquarters have kneepads? Why wouldn’t they? The fact that I don’t know may not be a fact at all. The cream in the church cannot be investigated. There is no way to find the proper channel. Creating a mob is little different, or differs little, than undertaking a bamboo festival. The festival does not interrupt Tuesday. But, Tuesday sometimes impedes the livery driver. Still, munching seems like the best alternative, which brings us back to cud. Cud Munchers will be the name of the bar, although it may be more like a coffee house, depending on the clientele we attract.
We all felt a lot emptier after that. And a little not so fresh. Back to character development. To finish off the class, we played a little cluster exercise. As a class, we were to build three lists of ten items. I do not enjoy group exercises like these when it comes to writing. To me, writing is a personal and solitary task, and my brain doesn’t work so well when being felt up by others. I guess learning as a group is a little different than writing as a group, so I will check my whining at the door. Still, my brain wouldn’t cooperate.
First, Mike asked us to toss out ideas for types of jobs. All I could think to say was “armadillo”, which I offered three or four times while others were suggesting such occupations as policeman, architect, sheep dipper, proctologist and garbage man. Speaking of proctologist, this brings up another aspect of these group games that ruffles my pterylosae. Invariably, in these kinds of groups, there are always one or two people who can’t help but work a little blue. I’m not against working blue, but we are all aware that butts and crotches and everything associated with them and their uses are hilarious. Let’s try to be a little more creative, shall we? Nevertheless, we had to hear the likes of proctologist, OB-Gyn, sperm banks, sheep herder, breast exam, brain enema, and giant rubber dildo. We all know sperm banks are funny because guys are ejaculating in there, and what’s more funny than the look on a guy’s face when he is achieving spasmisitc bliss? Maybe Benny Hill is more funny, but that’s about it. My point is that we need to move beyond those kinds of things to find new hilariousness. Not that I’ve ever actually seen a man’s face when he was ejaculating.
Mike wrote down the first ten of our suggestions he knew how to spell. He then asked us to name examples of emotions. Again, “armadillo” was all I had, and I shouted it a few times, progressively louder each time. Others competed for hilarity with their inane proposals such as torpidity, languishness, gnarlish and tetchy, among the usual emotions, like pretty. Nobody was pretentious enough to suggest “ennui”. I was thankful for that.
Finally, Mike asked us to purge our thoughts about types of places.
Mike pretended to write it down to make me feel better. I don’t remember what everybody else said, since my last outburst caused me to fall to the floor and writhe. Before we moved on, Mike asked us to compile one more list - a list of the most common road kill in Texas. He did this for me and my armadillo obsession. Unfortunately, my mind was road kill at the time and could only produce, “Sea Urchin”. We didn’t use that list in the exercise, but Mike gave me a copy of it for home use.
We chose one item from each list and built a character and a scene out of them. Well, they did. I sat there and wondered if a sea urchin has ever been run over by a pick up truck in Texas. But, I did learn that characters need to have a “want” in a scene. That knowledge should come in handy. I wondered if sea urchins ever want to be run over by a pick up truck in Texas. I wonder if Will Ferrell could play a believable wanting sea urchin. Did Maury Amsterdam ever want Rose Marie? What about Millie? Most guys probably think she was a real goer in the sack since she seemed so dippy and naïve on the surface. They may think she unleashed herself in the bedroom as the sultry bush woman seething with tangles of lust that she really was. I don’t think so. I bet she and Jerry never even did it on Jerry’s dentist chair. Why keep your dentist office at your house if you and the little woman never do it on the dentist chair? What a despicable waste. It saddens me to consider it. I’m glad this class session is almost over. I don’t think I could learn anymore in this emotional state.
Before we could bolt out of class, Mike harnessed us with a homework assignment. I didn’t write it down, so I’m not sure what we are supposed to do. I’ll make a macramé flower pot holder this week and hand that in. He’ll probably admire my progressive thinking and assess it as a metaphor for being a peeping tom, which is the foundation for building multi-dimensional characters. I can tell I’m going to be Mike’s favorite student.
Who would have thought I would have become bored with Laguna Beach, Parental Control and Yo Mamma after seven short months? I needed some new terrain. I needed to find myself. I needed to spend the $260 I found in my son’s dresser before he discovered I had it. Joe Flaherty came to me in a dream and demanded that I call my friends at The Second City. He was clothed as a partially dressed Count Floyd, so I knew he was serious. I intended to enroll in their moonshine jug pottery class, but the only opening they had was in their Comedy Sketch Writing class. So I opted for that.
To prepare for the class, I watched all of Maury Amsterdam’s scenes from the old Dick Van Dyke Show. Or do you say Cock Van Lesbian? Either way works for me.
I was ten minutes late to the first class. The parking lot was full so I had to drive around a while until I was able to roll over a dead guy to park in his driveway. Mike, our reserved yet crafty and slightly crampy instructor, was not fazed by my tardiness. He introduced himself and asked me my name, to which I replied Maury Amsterdam, and I quickly made fun of the bald guy in the class, who happened to be him. I inflated the circle of seated students to create a spot for me diametrically opposed to Mike, except a little bit to the left, but I said diametrically opposed in an effort to show him who is boss – Carl Reiner.
The class consisted of one woman and seventeen men, who were all looking at the one woman with their mouths open. Even with faces agape, everyone had a look of grave concern. I thought I might have stumbled by accident into the obituary writing class instead of a comedy class. I asked the guy next to me which dead guy were we writing about? He said Maury Amsterdam. To lighten the mood, I tripped over an ottoman and Mary Tyler Moore tap danced on my face.
Mike was nice enough not to bore me by repeating the overview crap he had already presented to the rest of the class. He bored me enough with the twenty other minutes of overview he had not yet told. Eventually, we got to our first exercise, which was to interview a classmate and report back to the class how weird xe is. I was lucky enough to get to interview Kevin, a part-time college student, part-time bartender, and full time party dude. He had just gotten back from a week in the woods with a bunch of friends. He said he had to take some time to get away from all the drinking and having fun and naughty making. Good god, where the hell did I go wrong! My life sucks next to this guy! Kevin seems like a good guy and he made it a point to tell me he is not a spoiled asshole. Duly noted. He interviewed me, as well, and seemed impressed that I was not dead yet. We all told each other about each other. I don’t remember anybody’s name or anything about anybody. Well worth my son’s $260, so far.
Mike began to earn his money. He proceeded to teach us about character development. I will not get into the complex techniques required to build such in-depth characters, because I didn’t write them down and I forgot them all. I do remember that being a sketch writer legally allows you to be an eavesdropper, lurker, leerer and voyeur in order to build ideas for creating characters. I asked if it would be beneficial if we wore trench coats while we develop characters. Mike was impressed with my progressive thinking and gave me a gold star. He suggested we also wear the trench coats to class.
Mike is a great proponent of writing for writing sake. He declared that ninety percent of everything one writes will be crap. He must be familiar with this blog. Consequently, we should behoove ourselves to write as often as possible. To assist us in that quest, Mike introduced an exercise where we would write for twenty minutes in stream of consciousness mode, purging ourselves of all thoughts that come to mind. I am very familiar with this technique as it is what I use for Leper Pop articles. The theory is the more you write the more crap you’ll eliminate, kind of like a mental enema. He gave us twenty minutes to dislodge ourselves while he stepped out for a few bong hits.
Following is the fruit of my crap dislodging. As you can tell by reading this, I do not really need to be in this class, but it gives me something to do on Tuesday nights.
I’ve got to get me my own dumpster. This dumpster sharing is too familiar. I don’t like my garbage touching other people’s garbage. There are remnants of spit on garbage. That’s the last thing I want is my spit mingling with other people’s spit. It’s like making out with everyone in the entire building. I don’t want to make out with everyone in the building. I can’t even remember the last time I actually made out with anybody. Do people my age actually do that? Wait a minute, I do remember when it was. And who it was. I don’t want to remember that. Hard to believe I was that drunk and did not black out. Blacking out comes in handy sometimes. You can never depend on a good blackout. My power was out for three days last week. I felt like Annie Oakley. The cowgirl dress was a little tight in the waist. Thought the hat looked nice, though. I’ve never ridden a horse. A horse has never ridden me, either. So, we have a mutual respect for each other. I like to wave knowingly at horses because of it. They look at me like they have no clue what I’m doing. I know they know. They stand there chewing their cud like I don’t exist. Do horses chew cud? Cows do. What the hell is cud? Maybe I should open up a cud bar, where people can come in and chew cud from exotic places. Cows look pretty relaxed when chewing their cud. It’s probably good for the soul. I’ve never seen a cow have a nervous breakdown. I’ve never seen a human have a nervous breakdown, either. Maybe I’m just not paying close enough attention. The cud can be used for medicinal purposes as well as social. Pharmacies can create special cud sections to aid the mentally stressed. Where is the king of Walgreen’s when you need him? Or, is it a queen? Either way, I’ve never seen xe. There is a lot of stuff I haven’t experienced, apparently. I need to get out more, or at least out to more places like farms and Walgreen’s headquarters. Do headquarters have kneepads? Why wouldn’t they? The fact that I don’t know may not be a fact at all. The cream in the church cannot be investigated. There is no way to find the proper channel. Creating a mob is little different, or differs little, than undertaking a bamboo festival. The festival does not interrupt Tuesday. But, Tuesday sometimes impedes the livery driver. Still, munching seems like the best alternative, which brings us back to cud. Cud Munchers will be the name of the bar, although it may be more like a coffee house, depending on the clientele we attract.
We all felt a lot emptier after that. And a little not so fresh. Back to character development. To finish off the class, we played a little cluster exercise. As a class, we were to build three lists of ten items. I do not enjoy group exercises like these when it comes to writing. To me, writing is a personal and solitary task, and my brain doesn’t work so well when being felt up by others. I guess learning as a group is a little different than writing as a group, so I will check my whining at the door. Still, my brain wouldn’t cooperate.
First, Mike asked us to toss out ideas for types of jobs. All I could think to say was “armadillo”, which I offered three or four times while others were suggesting such occupations as policeman, architect, sheep dipper, proctologist and garbage man. Speaking of proctologist, this brings up another aspect of these group games that ruffles my pterylosae. Invariably, in these kinds of groups, there are always one or two people who can’t help but work a little blue. I’m not against working blue, but we are all aware that butts and crotches and everything associated with them and their uses are hilarious. Let’s try to be a little more creative, shall we? Nevertheless, we had to hear the likes of proctologist, OB-Gyn, sperm banks, sheep herder, breast exam, brain enema, and giant rubber dildo. We all know sperm banks are funny because guys are ejaculating in there, and what’s more funny than the look on a guy’s face when he is achieving spasmisitc bliss? Maybe Benny Hill is more funny, but that’s about it. My point is that we need to move beyond those kinds of things to find new hilariousness. Not that I’ve ever actually seen a man’s face when he was ejaculating.
Mike wrote down the first ten of our suggestions he knew how to spell. He then asked us to name examples of emotions. Again, “armadillo” was all I had, and I shouted it a few times, progressively louder each time. Others competed for hilarity with their inane proposals such as torpidity, languishness, gnarlish and tetchy, among the usual emotions, like pretty. Nobody was pretentious enough to suggest “ennui”. I was thankful for that.
Finally, Mike asked us to purge our thoughts about types of places.
“ARMADILLOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!”
Mike pretended to write it down to make me feel better. I don’t remember what everybody else said, since my last outburst caused me to fall to the floor and writhe. Before we moved on, Mike asked us to compile one more list - a list of the most common road kill in Texas. He did this for me and my armadillo obsession. Unfortunately, my mind was road kill at the time and could only produce, “Sea Urchin”. We didn’t use that list in the exercise, but Mike gave me a copy of it for home use.
We chose one item from each list and built a character and a scene out of them. Well, they did. I sat there and wondered if a sea urchin has ever been run over by a pick up truck in Texas. But, I did learn that characters need to have a “want” in a scene. That knowledge should come in handy. I wondered if sea urchins ever want to be run over by a pick up truck in Texas. I wonder if Will Ferrell could play a believable wanting sea urchin. Did Maury Amsterdam ever want Rose Marie? What about Millie? Most guys probably think she was a real goer in the sack since she seemed so dippy and naïve on the surface. They may think she unleashed herself in the bedroom as the sultry bush woman seething with tangles of lust that she really was. I don’t think so. I bet she and Jerry never even did it on Jerry’s dentist chair. Why keep your dentist office at your house if you and the little woman never do it on the dentist chair? What a despicable waste. It saddens me to consider it. I’m glad this class session is almost over. I don’t think I could learn anymore in this emotional state.
Before we could bolt out of class, Mike harnessed us with a homework assignment. I didn’t write it down, so I’m not sure what we are supposed to do. I’ll make a macramé flower pot holder this week and hand that in. He’ll probably admire my progressive thinking and assess it as a metaphor for being a peeping tom, which is the foundation for building multi-dimensional characters. I can tell I’m going to be Mike’s favorite student.
Monday, January 09, 2006
Improv Rub
So StivOO and I were walking around the city, looking for unexploded fireworks left over from Thanksgiving, and all of a sudden, we were at Piper’s Alley, the home of Second City. There, some weird lady, wearing an ironing board as pants and wire hangers for curlers in her hair, lured us in with a sign that said “Free Sex and Money”. StivOO and I made a pact to go for the money only because we would be able to pay for sex with it, which is always more fulfilling than getting sex for free. When we walked in, to our astonishment, there was neither free sex nor free money. Immediately, we were swooped upon and placed before an improv training recruitment officer. After twenty minutes of berating, spitting, bull whipping and orifice violating, StivOO and I had enrolled in the beginner’s level of improv training offered by Second City. That’s right, they wouldn’t let us in unless we violated some of their orifices, including light sockets.
Our first class was Thursday, January 5. Upon arriving, we received our official Second City Training Center Student ID card (pictured).
As you can see, this card tells us that Second City does not have a graphic designer on staff, as a lemur with a lisp could have designed a more professional card. I would have expected at least a caricature of Steve Carell on it. My card expires March 5th. This way, if I’m no good, they can keep me out of their hallways after putting up with me for a mere two months. That is assuming my talent doesn’t earn me another card for the following session. And by talent, I mean two hundred and sixty dollars.
StivOO and I entered a windowless training room, which, as we learned later, also serves as the staging area for the Second City skybox stage. I spent the first ten minutes sniffing the carpet and walls hoping to get a wiff of Tina Fey sweat from years gone by. All I could sense were gallons of Rachel Dratch residue, which, I’ll admit, is funnier, but not as sweet smelling as Tina’s. Our instructor, Jackie, eventually showed up and told me to get my nose off the wall and have a seat.
Jackie entertained us with about fifteen minutes of introductory yak yak. Then she demanded that we partake in our first exercise. I don’t know how much actual improv we’ll end up doing in this class. I think it’s more wax on, wax off type training. Before we know it, we’ll know how to inflict karate on unsuspecting whale watchers. The exercise consisted of the eighteen of us trainees meandering around the room, making eye contact with others and saying “hi”. I, being the overachiever when convenient and easy, chose to say “hello” and “howdy, pardner” to some of my fellow classmates. They seemed to enjoy it and I can tell they really, really like me a lot. StivOO and I avoided each other, as we have made eye contact plenty of other times and have even said hello to each other on occasion. Next, Jackie expanded on that motif and told us to continue doing the promenade, but this time, introduce ourselves and provide a one sentence statement about ourselves. This is where I was thrown off, a little. I stuck to the rules, stating things like, “I have shoes”, “I get itchy when bowling”, and “I’ve never been eaten by an alligator.” Consequently, I rifled through the entire class. Classmates I met tried conversing with me, but the rule was to say one thing, so I turned my back on them right quick after their first comment. Then I noticed everybody was paired up and talking. That wasn’t the direction. We were only supposed to say one thing! And, Jackie did nothing to prevent it. So, I went back to sniffing the carpet until the next exercise commenced.
Next, we circled our blossoming improv chuck wagons. Jackie instructed us to shout out our names while accompanying it with a unique physical movement. She demonstrated by shouting her name and doing a karate type kick. We were to all repeat what she did, using her name and movement. So we did. People decided to follow the rules this time, if you can believe it, which was good because sniffing the carpet was starting to make me gag. Then, we began doing our own with the group repeating the name and movement. I screwed mine up. I attempted to do the Brady Bunch “Keep On” single knee kneel-down with the flamboyant arm circle, but it came out more like an around the world bowling move. I have never been more embarrassed the entire month. StivOO chose to go with the classic 213 Thumper move. I won’t describe it, but he did it wrong, too. I corrected it when it came around to me. We were both failing miserably as improv-ers. Jackie turned that ordeal into a game where one person would start with her/his own name and move and then say another persons name and do their move. That person would pick it up and lay it down to pass it to another person, and she told two friends, and they told two friends and so on and so on. I presume the intent was to get us to learn each other’s names and loosen up in the process. I can only speak for myself, but I don’t think it worked so well since the only people's names I can remember are Crotch Grab, Nipple Tweak, Squat Kick and Take Your Leg Off (amputees are welcome at Second City, by the way).
Once that was over, we maintained our circle. It’s a symbol of unity and it promotes ensemble behavior, which is a cornerstone in improv communities. OK, I don't know what I'm talking about, but it may be correct. We did stay in the circle formation in order to play a game called Time to Start Sweating and Hurt Yourself. You may know this game by its other name, Kitty Wants a Corner. To play the game, one person starts in the middle of the circle. Jackie volunteered since the rest of us didn’t know how to play. The person in the middle of the circle, the Kitty, is supposed to go up to one of the people on the perimeter and say, “Kitty wants a corner.” The person spoken to was to instruct the Kitty to ask one of his/her next door neighbors and point to which one. Then the Kitty would go to the person next to the first person, as instructed, and ask the same question. The point here is to show how stupid cats are, since circles have no corners. Not in this dimension, anyway. While this was going on, the other people on the perimeter were supposed to be trying to make eye contact with each other. Once two people achieved that, they had to attempt to run across the circle and switch places. The Kitty’s goal was to usurp one of the switchers and commandeer an empty spot on the circle, causing a new Kitty. The people on the perimeter had no incentive to switch places, but that didn’t seem to matter. I guess the incentive was to try to screw over one of your fellow classmates by causing them to become Kitty. So much for the ensemble unity. This is where the sweating and injury came in. Cinderblock walls surrounded three quarters of the circle. In order to get to the opposite open space without crushing my skull, I had to accelerate and decelerate faster than a driver’s ed student on the first day. My metabolism didn’t like that very much, so I began to drip. My knee didn’t like that very much either, so I began to think, in between the intense pulses of pain surging underneath my knee cap, about having reconstructive surgery . My pain was eased when I later learned that StivOO twisted his ankle. What a dork. Old people shouldn’t play improv games. I never had to be Kitty, so I guess I won. It helps when you stop switching places halfway through the game because you’ve blacked out from trauma shock. Besides teaching us why cats are retarded, this game got our blood running and facilitated some incidental collisions and fondling, otherwise known as foreplay, further promoting the ensemble unity.
Finally, Jackie stopped the insanity with an endearing, “Game Over.” Before I could go take a shower, Jackie had us splitting up into pairs. I ended up with Ron, otherwise known as Belly Scratch with Tongue Out. He’s a fifty-year-old orchestra leader. Nice guy. StivOO, conveniently, ended up with one of the four women in the class. I’m sure it was coincidental and the fact that she has the body of a professional athlete (soccer player) had nothing to do with it. His partner was Erin, aka Put Your Leg Behind Your Head. This exercise was boring so I won’t get into it too much. It involved intensely examining your partner, turning around, closing your eyes, and turning back around to try to figure out why your partner’s zipper was undone and he was wearing a shoe on his head. I like to think I won that game, too, since I didn’t fall down and I stopped sweating. The fact that it wasn’t a game doesn’t matter. I won.
After a short break, we all took a seat around the room. Since we did such a fine job in the prior exercise, Jackie asked us to pair off again, where your partner was the person sitting next to you. As luck would have it, Erin was sitting next to StivOO. I was also sitting next to StivOO, but I was on the wrong side of him. Erin and StivOO were partners, again, amazingly. I turned to look to my left to find Richard, the ADD, attention-deprived, trust-funded, unemployed spaz sitting next to me. Also known as Point at Yourself. Our task was for one partner to listen while the other partner told her/his life story in five minutes. Then, the listening partner would summarize the life story to the class in one minute. After half the class’s stories were told, we switched and the listener in each pair got to tell his/her life story to the other. I finished recapping my life to Richard about a minute early. It’s not that there isn’t much to tell. I don’t pay attention all the time, so I’m not sure what happened in my life. Consequently, my story was pretty boring. Luckily, Richard lives in his own little world, and the class now thinks I co-starred with Mel Gibson in Braveheart, I’m a champion dart player and I make up two of the six children in my family. Richard was so all over the place with his story to me, it was hard to keep track. I ended up keying my portrayal of him on an incident in high school where he quit the wrestling team because a teammate was leering at his tallywacker in the shower. After living through that, I’m guessing anything else that happens to him is trivial. And then there was StivOO and Erin. Oh, they are both so cute and successful. They had a grand ole time relaying each other’s stories. It made me sick. Physically sick. I had to re-swallow some puke, I tell ya. Of course, StivOO brought up Marty, which brought about some interest from the class. However, there were only about three or four people in the class that were familiar with him. And it turns out Erin is the granddaughter of hall of fame baseball player, Red Schoendienst. Relatives of famous people, isn’t that cute? But the worst part was that StivOO had the numbskullity to tell Erin that he and I are friends and that I am the funniest person he knows. And, she remembered to tell this to the class. Thanks a lot, StivOO. Nothing like setting everybody’s expectations of me super high so they can scorn me when all I got is poo comments when we get to the improv stuff. I would have run right out of there if my knee hadn’t been swollen to the size of rutabega. Besides ruining my improv career, the point of that exercise, as far as I could tell, was to give a chance for people to brag about themselves through a proxy. I tried to brag, but my fireman coloring trophy in kindergarten didn’t seem to stand up to the Iron Man triathelete chemical engineer with an MBA, or the woman with five thousand college degrees writing a mystery novel, or the computer wizard dude who designed his own coding language when he was twelve and whose hobby is to use one hundred dollar bills as post it notes.
Jackie finally dismissed us. I put my head down and limped out. On the way back to my car, the spirit of John Candy appeared in front of me and said, “You should have gone with the One Handed Cartwheel instead of that weird bowling move.” It wasn’t a bowling move, John Candy, Mr. Dead Smarty Pants! This is going to be a long eight weeks.
Our first class was Thursday, January 5. Upon arriving, we received our official Second City Training Center Student ID card (pictured).
As you can see, this card tells us that Second City does not have a graphic designer on staff, as a lemur with a lisp could have designed a more professional card. I would have expected at least a caricature of Steve Carell on it. My card expires March 5th. This way, if I’m no good, they can keep me out of their hallways after putting up with me for a mere two months. That is assuming my talent doesn’t earn me another card for the following session. And by talent, I mean two hundred and sixty dollars.StivOO and I entered a windowless training room, which, as we learned later, also serves as the staging area for the Second City skybox stage. I spent the first ten minutes sniffing the carpet and walls hoping to get a wiff of Tina Fey sweat from years gone by. All I could sense were gallons of Rachel Dratch residue, which, I’ll admit, is funnier, but not as sweet smelling as Tina’s. Our instructor, Jackie, eventually showed up and told me to get my nose off the wall and have a seat.
Jackie entertained us with about fifteen minutes of introductory yak yak. Then she demanded that we partake in our first exercise. I don’t know how much actual improv we’ll end up doing in this class. I think it’s more wax on, wax off type training. Before we know it, we’ll know how to inflict karate on unsuspecting whale watchers. The exercise consisted of the eighteen of us trainees meandering around the room, making eye contact with others and saying “hi”. I, being the overachiever when convenient and easy, chose to say “hello” and “howdy, pardner” to some of my fellow classmates. They seemed to enjoy it and I can tell they really, really like me a lot. StivOO and I avoided each other, as we have made eye contact plenty of other times and have even said hello to each other on occasion. Next, Jackie expanded on that motif and told us to continue doing the promenade, but this time, introduce ourselves and provide a one sentence statement about ourselves. This is where I was thrown off, a little. I stuck to the rules, stating things like, “I have shoes”, “I get itchy when bowling”, and “I’ve never been eaten by an alligator.” Consequently, I rifled through the entire class. Classmates I met tried conversing with me, but the rule was to say one thing, so I turned my back on them right quick after their first comment. Then I noticed everybody was paired up and talking. That wasn’t the direction. We were only supposed to say one thing! And, Jackie did nothing to prevent it. So, I went back to sniffing the carpet until the next exercise commenced.
Next, we circled our blossoming improv chuck wagons. Jackie instructed us to shout out our names while accompanying it with a unique physical movement. She demonstrated by shouting her name and doing a karate type kick. We were to all repeat what she did, using her name and movement. So we did. People decided to follow the rules this time, if you can believe it, which was good because sniffing the carpet was starting to make me gag. Then, we began doing our own with the group repeating the name and movement. I screwed mine up. I attempted to do the Brady Bunch “Keep On” single knee kneel-down with the flamboyant arm circle, but it came out more like an around the world bowling move. I have never been more embarrassed the entire month. StivOO chose to go with the classic 213 Thumper move. I won’t describe it, but he did it wrong, too. I corrected it when it came around to me. We were both failing miserably as improv-ers. Jackie turned that ordeal into a game where one person would start with her/his own name and move and then say another persons name and do their move. That person would pick it up and lay it down to pass it to another person, and she told two friends, and they told two friends and so on and so on. I presume the intent was to get us to learn each other’s names and loosen up in the process. I can only speak for myself, but I don’t think it worked so well since the only people's names I can remember are Crotch Grab, Nipple Tweak, Squat Kick and Take Your Leg Off (amputees are welcome at Second City, by the way).
Once that was over, we maintained our circle. It’s a symbol of unity and it promotes ensemble behavior, which is a cornerstone in improv communities. OK, I don't know what I'm talking about, but it may be correct. We did stay in the circle formation in order to play a game called Time to Start Sweating and Hurt Yourself. You may know this game by its other name, Kitty Wants a Corner. To play the game, one person starts in the middle of the circle. Jackie volunteered since the rest of us didn’t know how to play. The person in the middle of the circle, the Kitty, is supposed to go up to one of the people on the perimeter and say, “Kitty wants a corner.” The person spoken to was to instruct the Kitty to ask one of his/her next door neighbors and point to which one. Then the Kitty would go to the person next to the first person, as instructed, and ask the same question. The point here is to show how stupid cats are, since circles have no corners. Not in this dimension, anyway. While this was going on, the other people on the perimeter were supposed to be trying to make eye contact with each other. Once two people achieved that, they had to attempt to run across the circle and switch places. The Kitty’s goal was to usurp one of the switchers and commandeer an empty spot on the circle, causing a new Kitty. The people on the perimeter had no incentive to switch places, but that didn’t seem to matter. I guess the incentive was to try to screw over one of your fellow classmates by causing them to become Kitty. So much for the ensemble unity. This is where the sweating and injury came in. Cinderblock walls surrounded three quarters of the circle. In order to get to the opposite open space without crushing my skull, I had to accelerate and decelerate faster than a driver’s ed student on the first day. My metabolism didn’t like that very much, so I began to drip. My knee didn’t like that very much either, so I began to think, in between the intense pulses of pain surging underneath my knee cap, about having reconstructive surgery . My pain was eased when I later learned that StivOO twisted his ankle. What a dork. Old people shouldn’t play improv games. I never had to be Kitty, so I guess I won. It helps when you stop switching places halfway through the game because you’ve blacked out from trauma shock. Besides teaching us why cats are retarded, this game got our blood running and facilitated some incidental collisions and fondling, otherwise known as foreplay, further promoting the ensemble unity.
Finally, Jackie stopped the insanity with an endearing, “Game Over.” Before I could go take a shower, Jackie had us splitting up into pairs. I ended up with Ron, otherwise known as Belly Scratch with Tongue Out. He’s a fifty-year-old orchestra leader. Nice guy. StivOO, conveniently, ended up with one of the four women in the class. I’m sure it was coincidental and the fact that she has the body of a professional athlete (soccer player) had nothing to do with it. His partner was Erin, aka Put Your Leg Behind Your Head. This exercise was boring so I won’t get into it too much. It involved intensely examining your partner, turning around, closing your eyes, and turning back around to try to figure out why your partner’s zipper was undone and he was wearing a shoe on his head. I like to think I won that game, too, since I didn’t fall down and I stopped sweating. The fact that it wasn’t a game doesn’t matter. I won.
After a short break, we all took a seat around the room. Since we did such a fine job in the prior exercise, Jackie asked us to pair off again, where your partner was the person sitting next to you. As luck would have it, Erin was sitting next to StivOO. I was also sitting next to StivOO, but I was on the wrong side of him. Erin and StivOO were partners, again, amazingly. I turned to look to my left to find Richard, the ADD, attention-deprived, trust-funded, unemployed spaz sitting next to me. Also known as Point at Yourself. Our task was for one partner to listen while the other partner told her/his life story in five minutes. Then, the listening partner would summarize the life story to the class in one minute. After half the class’s stories were told, we switched and the listener in each pair got to tell his/her life story to the other. I finished recapping my life to Richard about a minute early. It’s not that there isn’t much to tell. I don’t pay attention all the time, so I’m not sure what happened in my life. Consequently, my story was pretty boring. Luckily, Richard lives in his own little world, and the class now thinks I co-starred with Mel Gibson in Braveheart, I’m a champion dart player and I make up two of the six children in my family. Richard was so all over the place with his story to me, it was hard to keep track. I ended up keying my portrayal of him on an incident in high school where he quit the wrestling team because a teammate was leering at his tallywacker in the shower. After living through that, I’m guessing anything else that happens to him is trivial. And then there was StivOO and Erin. Oh, they are both so cute and successful. They had a grand ole time relaying each other’s stories. It made me sick. Physically sick. I had to re-swallow some puke, I tell ya. Of course, StivOO brought up Marty, which brought about some interest from the class. However, there were only about three or four people in the class that were familiar with him. And it turns out Erin is the granddaughter of hall of fame baseball player, Red Schoendienst. Relatives of famous people, isn’t that cute? But the worst part was that StivOO had the numbskullity to tell Erin that he and I are friends and that I am the funniest person he knows. And, she remembered to tell this to the class. Thanks a lot, StivOO. Nothing like setting everybody’s expectations of me super high so they can scorn me when all I got is poo comments when we get to the improv stuff. I would have run right out of there if my knee hadn’t been swollen to the size of rutabega. Besides ruining my improv career, the point of that exercise, as far as I could tell, was to give a chance for people to brag about themselves through a proxy. I tried to brag, but my fireman coloring trophy in kindergarten didn’t seem to stand up to the Iron Man triathelete chemical engineer with an MBA, or the woman with five thousand college degrees writing a mystery novel, or the computer wizard dude who designed his own coding language when he was twelve and whose hobby is to use one hundred dollar bills as post it notes.
Jackie finally dismissed us. I put my head down and limped out. On the way back to my car, the spirit of John Candy appeared in front of me and said, “You should have gone with the One Handed Cartwheel instead of that weird bowling move.” It wasn’t a bowling move, John Candy, Mr. Dead Smarty Pants! This is going to be a long eight weeks.
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