What is water . . .

DO YOU THINK THESE PEOPLE ARE . . . HAPPY?

Yesterday, an online group I belong to considered the concept of “happiness.” In these [ cliche of your choice ] times, what do you do to conjure up some happiness in your life? Our discussion began with the usual suspects: time with loved ones, music, happy places, meditation and exercise. But then we began to consider the concept itself. What is “happiness”? How do you know if you have it?

Our host played a speedy TedX talk by Shaun Anchor, who made some excellent points. One of them is that if we identify the attainment of a goal as the source of happiness, we have set a trap for ourselves. Because then we begin an endless game of Whack-A-Mole, in which happiness is never actually attained, since as soon as we whack one mole, a new one springs up and our happiness is delayed. We agreed that “happiness”, if such a state exists, involves a sense of satisfaction in a process, not a product. I thought of one of the prayer flags which hang in my kitchen: Happiness is when your work and words are of benefit to yourself and others.

And I thought of David Foster Wallace, the tortured novelist whose novels were too dense for me to read, but whose commencement speech to Kenyon College in 2005 is one of my favorite works ever. It’s called This is Water. To me, it is an extraordinary paean to mindfulness. It begins with a joke which is where the speech gets its title:

There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says “Morning, boys. How’s the water?” And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes “What the hell is water?”

David Foster Wallace

He then goes on to describe how we live in a “default setting” in which everything that happens in the world is somehow about us, or against us, or caused by us. We are at the centers of of our universes. And that natural self-centeredness is a breeding ground for a wide variety of psychological distress. That is the “water” the two younger fish have no idea they are swimming in. Sidebar: it’s always been an important detail to me that the fish that asks them “How’s the water?” is an older fish.

For Wallace, the key to awakening to the water is awareness. It begins with the awareness that you are having thoughts, and that those thoughts are separate from you. They are noise, just like the TV, the leaf-blower and the hungry pet. This awareness leads to choice. You can actually choose which thoughts to pay attention to and which to let go of. This takes practice and it isn’t easy. But part of it, according to Wallace, is learning to pay attention to what’s happening, to really actually see it divorced from from your automated, default setting reaction to it. To be able to say, I actually don’t know what’s happening, I need to attend to it, take it in, consider it, before I decide I already know who this is, or what they want, or why they said that:

If you’re automatically sure that you know what reality is, and you are operating on your default setting, then you, like me, probably won’t consider possibilities that aren’t annoying and miserable. But if you really learn how to pay attention, then you will know there are other options. It will actually be within your power to experience a crowded, hot, slow, consumer-hell type situation as not only meaningful, but sacred, on fire with the same force that made the stars: love, fellowship, the mystical oneness of all things deep down.

This bit usually makes me a little weepy, written and spoken as it was by a beautiful and complicated human who took his own life three and half years after speaking these words. Because some humans can’t get out of the default setting. And it’s not their fault. Perhaps we need to pay attention to them - to their glory and their demise - and be grateful for our chance to feel the water, to celebrate it, even when the current’s strong, and it’s cold, and we’re swimming upstream.

I do not believe happiness is a choice. But I do believe we can cultivate practices which lead us away from fear and anxiety, and towards a sense of satisfaction which might be called “happiness”. And - no surprise - I believe improvisation practiced in groups, led by skilled and gentle facilitators, in person or online can be one of those practices. Because improv is all about getting out of your own head, paying attention to your partner, and focusing on the affirmative choices you can make together to create something original, bold and delightful.

Speaking of which . . .

What a summer!

I am proud and amazed at what we have accomplished since the pandemic hit mid-March.

• Eight pay-what-you-can online shows.

• 34 Improv Playgrounds

• Two online classes

• The creation and launch of our Patreon

• The creation and launch of our merchandise line.

• Creation and launch of our podcast ImPrOv'D

• Launch of an anti-racist task force, led by board member April Cohen and supported by Suzanne, Kiersten and Allison.

• . . . and everything else I forgot to mention :-)

We invite you to join us! You can . . .

• Register to see one of our two online shows per month!

• Enroll in one of our fall classes!

• Become a Patreon member and play in our Improv Playgrounds!

I could choose to focus on so many horrible things. But I choose to focus on this: the playful creativity a group of people have made just by making a commitment to each other. And in doing so, I am better equipped to deal with whatever life throws at me. Maybe that’s called happiness . .

Thoughts on creativity and service

Written to the Bright Invention Ensemble last week . . . .

Good morning Inventors! I have been thinking about our rehearsal Monday night, especially our discussion about "negative choices" and my reaction to the ones I witnessed during rehearsal. I'd like to share some more thoughts about that.

CARAVAGGIO’S NARCISSUS

The lightbulb moment I had that stopped me from abandoning my acting career 20 years ago was this: I came to understand my creative gifts as an opportunity to be of service to people. I had been thinking about the narcissism of the actor a lot. I believe we must pass through a period of intense narcissism in our development, when we are are obsessively fascinated by ourselves, our feelings, our choices, our appearance. I call this necessary creative narcissism. All realistic actor training is built upon it. What am I feeling? How can I use what I am feeling creatively? What do I want? Why do I want it? Exacerbated by the natural tendency of teenagers towards narcissism, the young actor is primed for this exploration, and this explains the ferocity with which many of us attached ourselves to acting at a young age.

My creative crisis 20 years ago had to do with my observation of some professionally talented but personally miserable adult actors through my work and social life in New York and Philly, and my own self-awareness that my acting career had hitherto been all about me, me, me. I connected the dots. The adult actor has to somehow transform that creative narcissism, or add to it, or adjust it somehow, or they become a bitter, neurotic and depressed artist - able to create extraordinary performances, but prone to self-destruction, addiction and broken relationships off-stage. I was plagued by the question: why am I doing this? The only answer I was coming up with is that it made me feel good, and that wasn't cutting it anymore.

The breakthrough for me was the concept of service. I have been given these creative gifts in order to be of service to other people - that's why I do this. What people? Those strangers that came to sit in the theatre (or online) and watch me. My students. You guys. The world. Adopting this point of view leads to some other lightbulbs. I need to believe that I have something worth serving, and I need to believe that in serving it, I am being of use to those who receive it.

Creative narcissism in improv is tempered by Yes, And. I must accept my partner's offer and build on it, so it can never really be about me. And yet, paradoxically (and don't get me started on creativity and paradox), it's all about me. Everything that comes up and out of me in an improv is my invention, not a playwright's, not a director's, not the result of a 3 week rehearsal. Because of this, I have a responsibility for the substance of my creative choices. I can blame a depressing play on the playwright. In a scripted performance, I can blame a negative choice on the director. But the great gift and great burden of improv is that I am actor, director and playwright simultaneously - co-creating with another actor/director/playwright.

In longform, we are eager to explore emotional and performative territory that isn't comic. And we must explore there - that's kind of the point. But we must also remember that we are servants to our audience.

Think about the world currently. What is our audience longing for? What do they need? How can we use our creative gifts in ways that will lead to revelation, healing, hope? Here's another lightbulb: Improv by its very nature is essentially optimistic. That optimism is embedded in Yes, And. It's the product of two or more people performing the astounding act of creating delightful and astonishing theatre on the spot through their total commitment to each other. Sometimes that means our scenes must include conflict between characters. But the optimism of improv means that conflict and negative energy must be transformed.

Think of this way. You and your partner realize your scene includes a betrayal of one character by another. That can't be an honest dramatic event unless someone is hurt, angry, even nasty in their reaction. But it can't stay like that. Something has to shift, change, evolve.

What is our audience longing for? What do they need? At its foundation, theatre (and I'm including improv under that umbrella) offers an audience a chance to see themselves through us - navigating an absurd situation, dealing with an aunt with a crazy voice, and yes, working through a betrayal. Perhaps the greatest gift we can offer is vulnerability. In being vulnerable with each other through our fictions and inventions, and co-creating workable, hopeful, sometime hilarious outcomes from that vulnerability, we are serving up empathy. And God knows we need as much of that as we can find . . . .

“SERVE YOUR AUDIENCE A DELICIOUS MEAL, AND THEN SPILL SOME OF IT . . . “ #IMPROVGOALS

George Floyd, Whiteness and Improv

PAINTING OF GEORGE FLOYD

Bright Invention unequivocally denounces the murder of George Floyd and stands with those who are protesting for an end to racist policing, institutional racism and the systemic oppression of people of color in this country. It may seem odd for a small, creative non-profit based in improvisation to make a statement like that. But in my opinion we would be complicit in Mr. Floyd’s murder if we did not.

It’s worth noting that performed theatrical improv is a white male world. As such, theatrical improv more often than not fails to represent the diverse experience of people of color (and, it’s worth noting, other marginalized populations, such as the LGBTQ and disability communities.) This week has made it clear to me as a leader of an improv group that only intentional and focused work by straight, cis-gender white people will make this change happen.

Yesterday I took part in a short online focus group through the weekly online Open Space facilitated by the Applied Improvisation Network, which I am a member of. AIN is a worldwide collective of professional practitioners of applied improvisation, which means using improvisation for ends other than the delight it brings when performed. We are therapists, workshop leaders and trainers. And for the most part, our clients are white and well-off, as are we. The focus group I was in was about white privilege. I wish I could report that the 12 of us white people in that focus group came away with a unified response to the inequity we represent. At best, we had 30 minutes to have frank conversation and experiment with one exercise. It was paltry, but it was a start. I thank Mallory Penney for having the courage to offer this space for us.

PROTEST IN PHILADELPHIA, MAY 30,2020. PHOTO BY SARAH BLOOM.

My goal for funding a more diverse application of our work uses money made through our Creative Corporate Training program to subsidize workshops offered to marginalized communities. Last year, we were able to offer an eight-week structured improv class to The Village: Hope in Action for Children and Families as the beginning of this vision. Kiersten Adams (one of the two people of color in our ensemble) and I led this class for 20 - 25 young women, predominantly black and latina. In order for Bright Invention to be a force for diversity, equity and inclusion we must offer more programs like this to marginalized communities, and continue to diversify our ensemble of performing artists.

Today I will participate in board and staff meeting for Bright Invention. We are considering ways to raise money to get us through the pandemic, which has put our organization in jeopardy. I intend to raise up the issues described in this post, and to suggest that a funding priority for money raised be on diversifying our ensemble and subsidizing workshops offered at little or no cost to marginalized communities. This is the only way we will lift those voices up and hear the stories they tell. This is the only way we will begin to dismantle institutional racism and awaken to the roles we as white people have played in preserving it.

PROTEST IN PHILADELPHIA, MAY 30,2020. PHOTO BY SARAH BLOOM.

TJ Jagodowski is one half of the legendary longform improv duo TJ and Dave. I heard TJ interviewed on a podcast once and he was asked about the famous improv exercise “Yes, and . . . “ This exercise is usually described as one that teaches students to accept their partner’s offers, and build a story based on it. In this interview, TJ described his slightly different take on it. He said he feels that the “Yes” part is about acknowledging that “this is really happening”, and the “And” part is about going more deeply into what is really happening.

People of color are being systemically oppressed, and sometimes murdered, by a white majority culture defended by racist policing. This is really happening. Let’s go more deeply into it, so we can begin to come out of it.

PROTEST IN PHILADELPHIA, MAY 30,2020. PHOTO BY SARAH BLOOM.

Sarah R. Bloom is a professional photographer that takes our ensemble portraits. Please check out her remarkable photos of the Philadelphia protest here.

Pandemic Update

Hello friends!

The board, staff and ensemble of Bright Invention hope you’ve been safe during the COVID-19 crisis. Like you, we are sheltering, disinfecting, distancing, zooming, uncovering old hobbies, learning new skills and new ways to stay connected. We're also finding new ways to tell those around us we love them and to laugh together.

BOARD MEMBER APRIL COHEN

I want to take a moment to thank our board of directors who have been steadfast in their support of me and Bright Invention in these uncertain times; our staff including Finance Director Bob Stineman - juggling new numbers and making new projections in response to this “new normal”; Development Consultant Allison Pokras - donating her time to support our strategic initiatives and assisting in marketing content; Executive Assistant Francine Brocious - champion note-taker and social media engineer. Lastly, I wish to thank our ensemble, who have dived directly into the deep end with me as we co-create online content and offer new programs, working for the love of this organization, each other, and in the belief that we will again generate meaningful income for them in the future.

Since the quarantine began mid-March we have been moving a lot of our programming online. Here are some highlights!

• We have been holding Zoom rehearsals with the ensemble each Monday night. The Inventors and I have come up with some great online formats for fun improv shows. And we are continuing to hold each other up with emotional and practical support. A few lucky ones remain at work, but most of the ensemble work in the performing arts “gig economy” and so have been especially vulnerable to the delayed unemployment benefits and loss of work.

• We maintained our spring show schedule and are offering online improv shows we call Improvademic! These are fun, hour-long shows with some opportunity for audience play-ins, and also function as fundraisers for causes the ensemble cares about. At our April show we raised over $1,000 to feed frontline healthcare workers at Temple University Hospital, and supplied them with 100 meals from a local restaurant, the West Avenue Grille. For our May 2nd show, we are raising money for MANNA, which feeds those who are homebound by age, sickness or disability.

• Our classes have been meeting once a week tuition-free with our actors with disabilities and our adult improv class. These are Zoom meetings with the instructors to play games, do some improv and check in with each other.

New online programs:

FINANCE DIRECTOR BOB STINEMAN

• Our Creative Corporate Training program has created three new online offerings:

  • Games with Bright Invention! Do your online socials or Zoom happy hours need a boost?

  • Virtual Meeting Bootcamp. Basic training for effective online participation.

  • People Not Products. For managers who want to lead online teams with humanity and clarity.

• You can learn more about these workshops here. We will be featured by L&D of Greater Philadelphia for their online happy hour May 13th!

• We have launched our Improv Playgrounds - hour-long, gently facilitated improv classes with me plus a member of the ensemble. These too are free/pay what you can. These meet on Zoom Wednesday night at 7 pm and bring the kids to our Saturday morning playground at 10 am!

We will face many challenges in 2020. Like other nonprofits, we have applied for grants and loans (we are waiting on the much ballyhooed PPP loan). We understand and respect that many philanthropies formerly supporting arts and culture are now bending their efforts to essential services.

I continue to deepen my skills in developing online content by taking workshops through our affiliation with the Applied Improvisation Network, Yes And Brain, L&D Philly and other groups. However, our primary revenue generator, Creative Corporate Training, is a deeply “in-person” program, bringing groups of people indoors, to learn, laugh and explore complex interpersonal dynamics together in close quarters. It’s a pretty tough sell these days - a non-starter, really - made even harder by the contraction of our clients’ budgets. Luckily, one of our biggest clients Merck Pharmaceuticals is working with us to see how we can move the workshop we were designing for them into virtual space.

ZOOM ENSEMBLE REHEARSAL . . .

How will the summer and fall play out? There’s no way of knowing right now. When it’s safe, we will again offer our fun and meaningful in-person workshops, classes and shows. But here are a couple of things I’m sure of:

• There will be a Bright Invention in 2021. Our nonprofit was designed to be economically nimble. We have few expenses. One of our mottos is “People, Not Products” a slogan which reminds us to bend all our efforts to supporting the people we serve and the people who work for us. So much of what we do - our shows, our playgrounds - we offer for the satisfaction of sharing our gifts with new friends. We ask our audiences to place their own value on what we create. So all of that will continue.

• We will ask you for help. Getting to 2021 will be a group effort. Our ensemble, staff and board have already begun the work of creating innovative strategies for remaining a vital and attractive organization for entertainment, education and corporate training into 2021 and beyond. One of the benefits of meeting much of our budget through earned income is that when we do fundraise, we’re often doing so to benefit others (see our Improvademic shows above!) However - like everything else in these strange times - that has to change this year, in a “put your own facemask on first” kind of way.  It’s not an ideal time to launch a campaign, but in order to respond to the challenges we’re facing we’re developing strategic fundraising for Bright Invention . . . and we will be inviting you to “play-in” be to be a part of it.

THE ENSEMBLE IN MARCH - PRE-SOCIAL DISTANCING . . .

It’s become a cliche, but it’s true: this crisis has exposed our strengths, and our weaknesses. As an arts nonprofit, we have accomplished the “big ask” funders make to arts nonprofits: diversify your funding streams and find a new ways to generate revenue. We innovated. We invented. We used our creative foundation - improvisation - to create a dynamic program in Creative Corporate Training that empowers organizations to navigate sticky professional, interpersonal situations and create more stable work cultures . . . and we get paid well to do it. And we use that income to subsidize our creative work and stabilize our work with the disability community.

On the downside, our dependence on a single program with specific application makes us vulnerable to a disruption in that marketplace. On the upside, we have discovered that we are ideally positioned to energetically serve our mission in this difficult time. We designed our creative work to serve diverse communities independent of financial constraints, and we are committed to ensuring that will continue.

We’re excited about our new programs and invite you to join in. Here are some links to to discover your potential with us!

• See our shows!

• Play in our playgrounds!

• Learn more about online Creative Corporate Training!

• Make a donation to Bright Invention!

Bright Invention uses improvisation to empower people and organizations to unlock their potential.

Many times during the past several weeks, I have been grateful for the essential skill improvisation has taught me: to say yes, this is happening; and to say and, let’s build a story about it together . . .

Stay safe,

Ben

Benjamin Lloyd, Executive Director, Bright Invention

Performance and spirituality in the digital age

Recently a Medium article by Nicolas Berger has been making the rounds on social media, especially among theatre artists. It’s called The Forgotten Art of Assembly; Or, Why Theatre Makers Should Stop Making. In it, he argues that we theatre artists should resist the temptation to put our work online, to perform Instagram songs and monologues, to do Zoom shows - as my company is doing tonight. His article is deeply felt and affecting. “I realize [what] I am really reckoning with is my own non-essentialism” he writes. “Theatre and its practitioners have been deemed non-essential in this moment and our refusal to acknowledge this has resulted in disposable digital work that dismantles the very intimacy our form demands.”

SOME OF OUR ENSEMBLE REHEARSING RECENTLY.

At the center of his argument it seem to me there are two essential positions. One is economic and political and it speaks to a deeply held concern of mine. In throwing our work out into cyberspace for free, we are are cheapening our already marginalized and devalued art form. “Simply relocating existing structures of theatrical art production online doesn’t solve the problems that existed in those structures IRL” he writes. “Instead of rushing at cleverness and temporary solutions, contorting theatre inside out, maybe we ought to examine the capitalist establishment we live under that demands artists, natural-born hustlers, empaths, and problem solvers keep hustling to make a buck online, a field already overpopulated with free content, during an unprecedented global pandemic. Nevermind the fact that, in doing so, we’re ignoring the one defining quality of our field, its liveness.”

The end of of that paragraph hints at his second essential point: that what we do as live performers depends on it being live and in-person. In putting our work and play online we are misrepresenting ourselves in a damaging way by attempting to offer our meal without it’s special sauce: the simple and profound truth of being in the same room, at the same time, experiencing something collectively, what Berger calls “assembly”. And I agree . . . to a point. I have often calmed performer friends of mine who fret that our live performance “careers” will go extinct under the crushing advance of digital forms, streaming media, film and television. No, I say. Deep in our DNA we are a tribal species and we we crave being close to each other the way growing things bend towards the sun.

BIRTHDAY PARTY FOR MY SON WITH FAMILY ”ZOOMING” IN.

One way to view the explosion of “Zoomexperience” during this quarantine time is as a manifestation of that yearning for closeness. We cannot survive without connecting to each other - even introverts like me. So we connect through these strange voyeuristic squares and rectangles on our phones, tablets and laptops. We speak, share, confess, cry and yes, sing, act and perform for each other through this technology, not because we prefer to, but because we have to. To stay alive. To be human beings. And in doing so we discover something mysterious, miraculous. The soul-sustenance of connecting to each other uses a spiritual energy which doesn’t obey any laws of physics, which doesn’t need physical proximity, which isn’t measurable or quantifiable in any scientific terms, but which keeps us alive. And it’s why I for one will continue to look for ways to perform online.

Once upon a time, I wrote a great deal about the connections between spirituality and performance. I had some articles about it published in academic journals. This exploration is at the center of my two books. I actually created a workshop in 2004 or 5 called “Revival: Meetings for Theatre” which sought to blend my twin callings to theatrical performance and Quaker spirituality. I had come across several things which had started this ball rolling. One was the electric performance energy of a person standing and speaking during Quaker meeting for workshop. The other was my discovery through research that the great master fo realism, Constantine Stanislavsky, viewed what the actor does as a spiritual event at its essence.

CONSTANTINE STANISLAVSKY (5 JANUARY 1863 – 7 AUGUST 1938), AUTHOR OF “AN ACTOR’S WORK ON HIMSELF”, THE SEMINAL BOOK ON REALISTIC ACTING, BROKEN INTO THREE BOOKS BY HIS AMERICAN TRANSLATOR AND HER PUBLISHER: AN ACTOR PREPARES, BUILDING A CHARACTER, AND CREATING A ROLE.

LEO TOLSTOY (28 AUGUST 1828 – 20 NOVEMBER 1910)

Most theatre people don’t know this about him. We view him as the architect of “objectives”, “actions”, “tactics” and “beats” - those psychologically based text analysis tools. But did you know that his hero was Leo Tolstoy? That he trembled and wept during his one brief audience with the great spiritual teacher? That his primary aid during his most prolific writing and teaching was a disciple of Tolstoy’s named Leopold Sulerzhitsky (known as Suler)? Stanislavsky’s biographer David Magarshack writes “It is indeed questionable whether he would have undertaken so hard . . . a task as the formation of his ‘system’, if he had never met [this] remarkable man who for over ten years was to be his closest friend and confidant.” Improv sidebar: Suler championed a method of creating plays through - wait for it - improvisation.

In my article called Stanislavsky, Spirituality and the Problem of the Wounded Actor ( Cambridge University Press 2006) I wrote “few subjects in Stanislavsky’s writing will make the theatre academic more squeamish than his relentless examination of the spiritual component in acting.  But it is unavoidable: ‘The essence of art is not in its external forms but in its spiritual content’ he says in the beginning of An Actor Prepares. Then, over the course of the An Actor Prepares and Building A Character  . . . he uses the words ‘spirit’, ‘spirituality’ and ‘soul’ 136 times. The chapter called ‘Communion’ in An Actor Prepares is an explicit examination of the transmission of spiritual energy between human beings, a process he calls ‘irradiation’ using ‘rays.’” For Stanislavsky, the actor transmits spiritual energy, energy which is aroused by human feelings. He believed that actors are people who are trained to focus that spiritual energy on each other, and then by extension, on the audience. In The Player’s Passion Joseph R. Roach writes “[Stanislavsky] sought to create a religion of art, in which the theater was a temple, the audience worshippers, and the actors celebrants in a mysterious rite. A mystic and an idealist, he tolerated his own mechanization of the art he loved only within definite limits . . .”

LEOPOLD SULERZHITSKY (SULER)

What would this father of the acting style which we now simply call “acting” by default, what would he make of this new “mechanization of the art he loved” through iPhones, Zoom and other online platforms? An eternally curious soul, I’m sure he would marvel at the way our urge to create breaks through any restriction, any barrier. But at the end of the day, I’m equally sure he would assess our online performance this way: as evidence that the spiritual energy we transmit leaps across distance, time zones and technology. And while not as directly felt as it is when we are physically present with each other, it never the less continues to link us, connect us in this mysterious rite aroused by human feelings.

It is Passover, and Easter. I am a Christian, and I celebrated a Seder with my Jewish girlfriend this week. We prayed and ate and sang with a virtual community of her faith broadcasting through my computer placed high atop a filing cabinet close to our dinner table. Tomorrow I will sit in worship quietly in my home staring through a mosaic of digital rectangles at the beautiful multi-generational faces of my Quaker meeting, as we celebrate the moment when our faith became unbound from the earth and eternal. Nothing is cheapened or degraded in these meetings. And nothing will be cheapened or degraded when my improv ensemble performs tonight as we attempt to make people laugh and raise some money to feed frontline healthcare workers. I believe the Divine is present in everyone all the time, and as such It doesn’t care how we connect, only that we connect.

Maybe what my Russian acting teacher Slava Dolgachev said is true: “Theatre is for stupid people.” In other words, theatre is for people who don’t need to prove anything, quantify anything, apply objective metrics and thoughtful rubrics to the art they make. Like people of faith, we don’t know things, we believe in ideals. And unlike things, ideals live outside time, space and technology. Still . . . I can’t wait to be close to you again soon.