Rick Horner, new Ensemble Director

Rick Horner (photo: Jennifer Gershon)

With over 25 years experience teaching, coaching and performing improvisation, Rick Horner has been named Ensemble Director for Bright Invention for the 2022 – 2023 season. After being a member of the ensemble for two years, Executive Director Benjamin Lloyd felt this was a logical next step for Rick. Ben said “we have been fortunate to have Rick’s experience in the ensemble. Now it feels like this is the right time for new creative leadership, and Rick was the obvious choice. I’m thrilled he is stepping in!”

Rick rehearsing with ensemble member Aimee Goldstein

Since 1997, Rick has been involved in studying, performing, coaching, and leading various improv groups in Philadelphia proper.  Rick was one of the Founders of the Philadelphia Improv Festival and was sole Founder of the F. Harold Improv Festival. Rick was one of the first House Team Directors at Philly Improv Theater (PHIT) (Team Activity Book), who created monthly long-form shows to sold-out audiences. Rick also created and has facilitated the Improv Incubator, which has been running weekly for almost seventeen years and which is open to anyone who is willing. Rick performs virtually with Vintage Improv (Timeless and the Merritt House Team), Ricochet Illustrated Improv and two teams in Improv College. Rick is also half of two different virtual duos; Holdwater and PortmanTwo. Rick created LCR, the progenitor of the fledgling Blue Bell / Ambler improv community scene, focused on creating a healthy improv community in the Philadelphia suburbs. Rick also coaches and directs a musical long form improv team (coming soon to a screen near you!) When not coaching or doing improv, Rick is re-watching Planet of the Apes movies, looking for meaning. 

Rick rehearsing with ensemble member Eric Walker, Jr.

Rick is interested in assembling the diverse, talented folks in and around the Philadelphia area into an improv community. “I have been inspired by the Bright Invention mission and am excited to develop new and innovative long form improvisation with the ensemble,” says Rick. “Improv encourages us to focus our attention on the present moment. We listen to each word that is spoken and watch each movement in order to understand who, where and when you are. This is great exercise for our brains and teaches us to trust ourselves. Improv is made up mostly of trust. Trust feels wonderful and lack of trust feels terrible.”

Ben will step back from creative leadership to focus on developing the company’s corporate training work, and to launch some new initiatives serving marginalized communities. Bright Invention will debut a new show under Rick’s leadership later this fall at their new performance venue at the Arden Theatre Hamilton Family Arts Center in Old City, Philadelphia. “I can’t wait to see what they come up with!” said Ben. “I believe it will be improv like you have never experienced it before.”

Layers of agreement

“Yes, and . . . “ is the foundational exercise of improvisation. It contains two essential features first defined in the “Kitchen Rules” of the Compass Theatre in the 1960s: agreement and collaborative story-building. The longer I have played with this game and the concepts it promotes, the more profound it has become for me.

Do you realize how much we depend on agreement in our everyday lives? Think about a four-way stop sign intersection on crossing roads. First we agree we will stop. Then we agree who moves first. Or forming a queue for . . . anything. An effective conversation depends on a simple agreement: you talk, I listen. Then, reverse.

I will go out on a limb here and say the following: the very existence of civilization depends upon agreements, often unspoken and unexamined. Civilization begins to break down when those agreements fall apart.

And here’s another observation: genuine agreement includes a loss of ego and a feeling of vulnerability. When we agree (even at the stop sign or the Starbucks line) we become partners. We have moved from an individual existence in which the only actions are my responses to the chaos of existence, to a shared existence in which we have seen and recognized each other and are organizing existence together. Agreement then can be seen as a defense against fear and isolation. But it requires that I don’t entirely get my way, I acknowledge you have something to say and contribute, and that I will make space for it. And though in joining me in agreement you ease my fear and isolation, your presence make me feel vulnerable . . . even just a little.

One of my foundational pieces of writing is David Foster Wallace’s This Is Water. The title refers to the a joke which plays upon the way we operate in ways we don’t even see. He calls this our “default setting,” and cautions us to be aware of when that setting is dialed in to negativity, cynicism and intolerance. But here’s a glass half full version: we can also notice when our default setting includes agreement.

We walk in the world through layers of agreement, and each one - from the “bless you/thank you” exchange after the sneeze, to the groundbreaking one in which we finally put all the anger behind us - each one is a spiritual affirmation. We are not alone. We can meet each other safely. We can move forward together.

New. Year.

I have felt for a long time that the Jewish new year is placed more appropriately on the calendar than the one on January 1st. Perhaps that’s because the academic calendar is so deeply ingrained in my consciousness. Or maybe it’s because that - as an actor - I felt the fall was the season of beginnings: new shows, new rehearsals, new events. But mostly I think it’s because the Jewish new year is in synch with the changing of the seasons. This new year begins and the world slowly transforms from heat and green to cool, and orange, red and brown. It’s as if the world reminds us: change and transformation is inevitable. After January 1st it just stays cold and dark for a couple more months . . .

Speaking of change and transformation, I believe we are in an era of cultural change unlike anything we have witnessed since the sixties. The similarities are striking. Both eras are focused on racial justice and the rights of those victimized by American capitalism and systems of oppression. Both are characterized by progressive politics and led by our youth. Both include a challenge to sexual and gender norms. And both are fiercely resisted by reactionary cultural and political forces. We live in an era in which it is impossible to remain neutral. We must align ourselves somewhere on the spectrum defined by the poles of these opposing forces.

What does improvisation teach us about this state of convulsive change we are in? Several things it seems to me:

• Listen before speaking. Great improvisors are exquisite listeners and observers. They will say “My job is to make my partner look like a genius.” It is in this deep listening that extraordinary co-creating can take place. I make my creative offers based on what I hear and see from and in you. Today it’s really hard to listen to someone who is on the spectrum far away from you. But more than ever it’s essential. The goal is not to come to agreement. The goal is to feel where the words are coming from, and ask: why? Why is this person saying these things?

• Let go of the need to know. When we are confronted by a threat we work feverishly to construct a future in which that threat is diminished. We are tempted to say: I know exactly how this is going to turn out, and perhpas engage in a pre-planned “prophecy.” But we don’t know how it’s going to turn out, or what the future holds, plan as frantically as we might. Then what are we left with? This very moment. That’s it. What is right in front us, where our feet are standing, and who we are accompanied by. Improv lives creatively in this tension between spontaneity and planning. Improvisors live in the present moment, and yet some part of our brain is playing out a series of what-ifs. The trick is not getting attached to any of them. As Dr. Angeles Arrien said, “Be open to outcome, not attached to outcome.”

• Conflict kills progress. Which is not to say, “don’t have a conflict.” Sometimes in a scene and in life a conflict is essential. Conflict is a part of the DNA of change and transformation. What is being left behind will cry defiantly and attempt to prevent change. Improv doesn’t teach us to avoid conflict, it teaches us not to get stuck in it. Watching an improv scene in which two people are locked in an endless conflict is a little like non-anaesthetized dental work. Improv thrives when it evolves, it dies when it doesn’t. I submit the same is true for our human species. I tell my ensemble and students, the conflict must evolve. Sometimes that means someone “loses”. Sometimes it means someone shouts “Look! A unicorn!” And sometimes it means the two amazing actors improvise their way into something truthful; something which doesn’t deny the conflict, allows for both characters to have integrity, and somehow gives birth to a way forward.

• Avoid the addiction to intensity. When a scene heats up emotionally, we sometimes throw gasoline on the fire by inauthentically stamping our feet, raising our voices, squeezing “emotion.” Some of us can become addicted to this state of fake noise and wheel-spinning anxious energy. In this state, listening usually goes out the window and conflicts are invited. But your intensity isn’t interesting to anyone, not even to you. If you’re honest with yourself, you will acknowledge that it is a burden. It misrepresents you. It is a useless energy drain. Because here’s the hardest lesson improv teaches us:

• You are enough. You don’t need extra energy, some missing brilliant idea, ten fewer pounds or more hair. You don’t need to prove to your teacher, parent, colleagues that you deserve to [ have that opinion / make that creative offer / lie down and rest / trust your gut and go for it / be here now. ] These eras of momentous change are like amazing and challenging improv scenes we find ourselves in, the ones Del Close used to tell us to “follow the fear” in. When we meet them, our natural human insecurity will tell us “you can’t do this, you don’t have what it takes.” But you do. You really do. Just as you are, breathing, listening, observing.

“Follow the fear” is often misunderstood to mean “do something outrageous and offensive.” No, all it means is that improv is a pathway to discovering innate (meaning you already have them) virtues in yourself. The four virtues of improv as I see them are courage, empathy, creativity and faith. Three out of the four need to have an event or encounter to be felt. Improv provides that encounter. Only creativity can be accomplished fully by yourself.

Perhaps the era we are living through, this new year, is an opportunity for us to feel the virtues we already have. I have adopted the inherently optimistic energy of improv, I admit it, but perhaps this new year is a canvas, or a stage, waiting for us to make our brave, empathetic, faithful and creative offers.

2020 is Both/And

THE BRIGHT INVENTION ENSEMBLE IN MARCH 2020, RIGHT BEFORE THE PANDEMIC HIT. PHOTO BY SARAH BLOOM.

Years from now, when we look back on 2020, we may have a surprising assessment of this tumultuous year. Without question, this will forever be a year of tremendous loss of human life. It will always be a year in which a madman tried to dismantle our democracy. It will be a year when our racist culture was seen and felt in unambiguous acts of violence. But years from now it is my belief that we will look back on 2020 and see that we found out what we are made of. 

AIMEE GOLDSTEIN AND OWEN COREY IN THE IMPROVATHON, FEBRUARY 2020. WE RAISED $1,000 FOR THE WEST PHILADELPHIA SKILLS INITIATIVE!

When I teach or coach improvisation, I tell people that practicing improv is way towards the Four Virtues of Improvisation: courage, empathy, creativity and faith. Improv does not impart these to you, it allows you to discover them in yourselves. How? Through a safe and playful “stress test.” You meet another human being in a creative space and co-create a story, while being observed by others (courage). You accept everything about this other person (empathy.) You and they continuously move forward in time adding endlessly to the story you are both creating (creativity.) You believe nothing can go wrong as you co-create (faith.) 

I believe 2020 was a great cultural stress test for America. Now, let me own my optimism and romantic nature (another by-product of practicing improv.) And let me again acknowledge the pain and trauma experienced by so many Americans this year, especially BIPOC Americans. And yet, I believe years from now we will see that we collectively discovered the Four Virtues of Improvisation in ourselves this year. Not all of us. But most of us. This entire year was a national improvisation. We had no script for any of it. All we had were each other and our own innate virtues. 

It’s tempting to apply binary judgments to 2020. “It was a total and complete horror show and it can’t end fast enough.” Sound familiar? And yet here too, improvisation has something to teach us. Improv resists binary thinking. Improv is not either/or, it’s both/and. I’m constantly coaching improvisors out of binary conflicts in scenes – I’m right, you’re wrong; my way or the highway. These kinds of offers in improv scenes grind the story to a halt. I say, yes it’s true your character was deeply hurt by the other character, but the scene still needs to continue. How will you maintain the integrity of the story, and also move the scene forward? Both/and. 

For instance, in 2020 Bright Invention lost the ability to offer any of its intensely in-person programs. And, we dramatically expanded our audience reach through virtual programming. We lost a great deal of money in canceled or deferred contracts, and we made new connections online, and developed new and viable virtual workshops and shows. We missed being physically close to each other, and we discovered how essential our online connections to each other were. 

THE ENSEMBLE REHEARSES ONLINE, MAY 2020

It’s an appropriate time to reflect. Here, at the winter solstice, many are contemplating, assessing, planning. We have crossed over now. Now the days become slowly longer and the nights shorter. Maybe now is a good time to ask – what story will we tell about 2021?

Maybe it will be a story about recovery. One in which you tell the truth about what happened to you this year – all of it, good and bad. And you asked for help, and you let others help you. A story about how you gave yourself permission to fall apart and collapse, to not have your shit together, and to become aware, dimly at first, that you are still loved. Perhaps your recovery started with your body, with deep breaths and stretches, with naps and something good to eat. And in that stillness, you heard the old tapes – the ones that don’t help. And you threw them away. 

Maybe it will be a story about reconciliation. You and someone else see the enormous distance between you. It seems hopeless. And you name it. You say, there is a huge distance between us and it seems hopeless. And then you look up the canyon, to a place where the gulf narrows and both of you can see the water flowing below. Instead of trying to build a bridge – so expensive, so complex, so daunting – you both carefully climb down to the water’s edge and drink. And you discover you share a great love for this water, and that you can hear each other from across the river. So you talk. 

AUDIENCE FOR ONE OF OUR LIVE SHOWS . . .

Maybe it will be a story about redemption. You think, maybe this one is binary: I either throw people away or I don’t. Maybe you feel the grace of the present moment, in which you realize in a flash that the past doesn’t exist, it’s not real, and it only holds on to you because you invent a story – a story about how the past holds on to you. And you can choose to tell a different story. Maybe it’s about your growing awareness that the future isn’t full of monsters and plagues, and it’s not full of parties and victories either. The future is . . . empty. And you choose to begin a story to fill it with, one in which you and the guy across the river both grow and change. One in which you are not alone, and you invite others to co-create this new story with you. Yes, maybe even with him.

Here’s my plan. In everything I do in 2021, I will strive to create real human connection, between myself and others, within groups of people, through my work, while at play, in person or online. Maybe I will meet you along the way, playing “Yes, and . . . .”

What Improv Teaches us about Community

BRIGHT INVENTION ENSEMBLE MEMBERS SHEA SONSKY AND KIERSTEN ADAMS AT THE STEEL CITY IMPROV THEATER GETTING READY FOR THE POST-SHOW JAM WITH AMAZING PITTSBURGH IMPROVISORS!

OFF WE GO

It’s Saturday morning and I’m recovering from driving 10 hours over the past 24. Members of my ensemble Bright Invention and I went to perform at the Steel City Improv Festival in Pittsburgh PA. The four of us tumbled into my cranky Subaru Outback Thursday bright and early and enjoyed the middle of the Keystone State as we passed through farmland, exits to the state capital, and finally, five hours later, the rolling hills approaching Pittsburgh. We napped (well, some did - I was driving), told stories and bad jokes, played I Spy and Would You Rather. We stopped at a couple of the fine rest stops along the way and indulged in bad food.

Our hotel was a corporate behemoth in the middle of downtown Pittsburgh - an art deco relic that had once been a Federal Reserve branch. In the basement, next to the fitness center, giant safes with lapped plates of thick steel stood open and empty. Our rooms were bland but we felt like Important People. We were staying in hotel! And - the festival organizers had left us bags of SWAG at the front desk! The Steel City Improv Festival is a CLASS ACT.

KIERSTEN AND SHEA CHILLIN’ PRE-SHOW.

At six on Thursday we Ubered to the Steel City Improv Theatre, and each of us fell in love with Pittsburgh a little. The gorgeous pre-fall weather helped, and the slanting warm sunlight. But I was captivated by the swelling hills on all sides and the blend of mid-century rust belt grandeur with multi-cultural hipness. At the theatre we were met by shiny, happy Pittburghians in Steel City Improv yellow tees, who showed us around the very cool, funky yet well-appointed theater and green room where there was - yes - more SWAG. We hung out in the green room, took selfies, warmed up a bit, felt giddy, tried to calm down, met other improvisers, drank soda and water, ate more bad food, watched the theater fill up, and - before we knew it, the act before us was coming off stage.

Our set was a 30 minute '“mono scene”, which means we picked a location from an audience suggestion and the the entire scene occurred in that location in near continuous time, with the the same characters coming and going, and new ones popping up now and then. We used “pop-out monologues” to introduce new characters by speaking in character directly to the audience then entering. The word our audience gave us was “haberdashery”, so our set took place . . . in a haberdashery. There were two generations of hat makers, new ideas competing with old ideas, visitors from Minnesota, neighbors from the Caribbean, and laughter and enjoyment from the audience. It was that particular improv blend of thrilling and terrifying. Afterward, we had a group hug and agreed that we had done well.

Over the course of the next 2 - 3 hours, we went and got some good food, were interviewed by a local journalist, watched the other teams perform, and then, in what might have been the coolest part of the evening, we hung out with improvisers from Pittsburgh and Detroit, ate pizza, drink libations and participated in an improv jam with them in which this cheerful group of 47 (we counted) were divided into three teams, and each team took a turn delighting the others with 20 minutes of montage improv.

THE GREEN ROOM WAS ACTUALLY . . . GREEN!

During this heady time people we didn’t know came up to us and told us how much they liked our set. We sat with improvisers from Pittsburgh and chatted, laughed, and connected. We discovered that we do indeed know what we’re doing, that we’re actually good at it, and that we are part of a tribe much bigger than our little ensemble, filled with others who also good at it, who love to share, say yes, and build stories together.

It was close to 1 AM when we all collapsed in our beds back in the hotel, tired, happy, and full.

When I created the organization now called Bright Invention I knew two things needed to be a part of it: improvisation and ensemble. As much as I loved being a scripted actor, I was keenly sensitive to the way I made these deep bonds with the casts I was in, and then those casts evaporated when the show closed, and I was left feeling bereft and lonely. I have been on a lifetime search for long-term, reliable human connection (aren’t we all, really?) Being in plays was in some ways an exercise in repetitive heartbreak, so I was determined to create an ensemble which was together over time, regardless of the vicissitudes of each person’s professional life, through the personal ups and downs we all navigate. In this way, our commitment to each other went beyond each individual’s “talent” or creative achievement. The economics of our work are irrelevant to our connection to each other. We are invested in each other’s complete wellbeing, and our rehearsals are sometimes group support for one or another’s trouble. In Bright Invention, we have helped each other with mental health resources, housing leads, creative dilemmas with outside projects, relationship woes, parenting challenges, and the list goes on. Some of us refer to us as “family” and mean it. For others, we are dependable group of talented collaborators. Each of us makes the bond to the group that is right for us. We come and go, and the ensemble changes its configuration each year.

WE CALL THIS ONE, TAKEN AT A REST STOP ON THE PA TURNPIKE, THE “ALBUM COVER.”

I believe we come together for live performance for several reasons, but one we don’t talk about enough and lift up for celebration is the mere fact of being in a room together with people we haven’t met before and sharing an experience. Improv capitalizes on this aspect of live performance in that it relies on audience participation and is spontaneously created. Community is created at improv shows through the immediacy of the performance. Knowing we are making it up right in front of you pulls you into the shared present moment more (I submit) than if you were watching us present something we had carefully rehearsed over weeks.

So now I’ll really go out on a limb. I believe that this spontaneous connecting through shared, safe and joyful experience is an essential requirement for our human wellbeing. I believe that if we don’t get it, we get sick. And yes, I mean that literally. And I believe that we now live in The Age of Isolation, making our efforts to create opportunities for this kind of connecting urgent and acute.

Most improv groups exist over time, as ensembles. They are usually called “teams” or “groups” but I like “ensemble”. To me, it emphasizes the togetherness. And not just improv groups. Many young performing artists are forming collectives of various kinds through which they devise all kinds of new and exciting shows. My Advanced Improv class has a core group of students that have been meeting with me to study improv for over two years. They have created their own ensemble and it is vital and important to them. Ensembles recognize that the performing artist seeks compensation in a variety of ways - not just money. We seek the compensation of dependable, safe and creative community. For that, many of us will make the time to connect each week, work on projects, or drive out and back to Pittsburgh for 30 minutes on stage.

HAPPY IMPROVISERS AFTER A GOOD SET . . .

For us, community isn’t a nice abstract concept to cultivate through neighborhood associations and alumni groups. It is at the center of our creative process and a pillar of our emotional and psychological wellbeing. We learn not to take it for granted, and that it only gives as good as it gets. My community shows up for me when I show up for them. The inevitable comings and goings help keep us fresh, welcoming and inclusive. The creative life can be so lonely, and it’s full of rejection, uncertainty, and hardship. But when we share it with each other, indeed, when we create joyfully out of it, our journey through this creative life ceases to be a desperate solo, and instead becomes an extraordinary chorus sung among friends.

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Short videos of Bright Invention members playing in the improv jam post show at the Steel City Improv Festival, including Ben walking a murderous platypus and getting busted, Kiersten and her artist lover, Shea telling her son to stop eating other people’s dandruff, and Eric working on someone’s teeth . . .