GOOD GIRLS DON’T IMPROVISE: POST #1
A few months ago a female improv student of mine approached me about starting a day class. I told her if she can get together a group I’d teach it, which luckily didn’t take her long to do. However it wasn’t how fast she pulled it together that was most noteworthy, it was that, by sheer accident, the class ended up being only women…spanning different ages and backgrounds. I walked into the room that first day and thought, “Wow, you’ve got to be kidding me…!” I was overjoyed!
So I decided to bring in everything I have been learning, seeing, and experiencing in my many years as not only an improv teacher, director and performer, but also with a recent exploration I’ve been involved in which is looking into the structures that make up “WOMAN”…not just our psychology but our biology, our cultural identities, our consciousness, beliefs and definitions of “self”, “other”, “right”, “wrong”, “man”, “woman”, etc.
I started by asking the 10 women if they could relate to my experience as a teacher – that the women are usually very, very strong in class…noticeably so; they usually take to doing characters and getting really emotionally connected to each other very quickly…but then when the pressure is on during a performance, my experience time and time again is, “where did the women go???” They usually shrink, support the men but rarely lead a scene off, are tentative and play more passive characters.
This kicked off an incredible discussion…the women, one by one, chiming in about their own confusion and frustration in improv classes and shows. Knowing they were capable of more but not fully understanding why they preferred to play it safe, and how that just felt right….that is, until after the show when they felt pretty bad about the job they’d done. We also discussed our need to do everything right and perfect…and what is most ironic about that is in improvisation, it is much more obvious that there is no such thing as doing it ‘perfect’ because the scene is created on the spot, spontaneously, and is a product of the collective creating it. So this notion of getting it right is even more crazy — there is no ‘right’ to be striving for!…what is ‘right’ is what you are already doing. And yet, because needing to be perfect in every scene and exercise is so deeply important to us, it puts you in a schizophrenic state…being in the scene, pretending to be the saleswoman at Macy’s or whatever the scenario is…but also watching it from the outside and watching others’ responses as an indicator of how they’re doing. And you can see it happening in an all-female class much more than a mixed class…you can see when a woman leaves her own ‘self’ and starts grasping at what she ‘thinks’ she’s supposed to say.
And then it hit me…”Good Girls Don’t Improvise.” They can’t. It’s antithetical. At a certain point the only way to really improvise, to be free and spontaneous and in the moment is to not care, to not be attached to any outcome, and not be concerned one iota about one’s self-image. It is like kryptonite for Superman…it will not fly. I thought about this room of women, all caught between wanting to do it right, get the A+, figure it all out beforehand and be the best AND the part of them that made them want to take improv in the first place. No one who really wants to be perfect at everything would be attracted to improv. Improv demands you take risks, look like a fool, care about everything BUT yourself, and disappear in the moment without the controlling ‘do-gooder’ holding the puppet strings. So here we all were…attracted to that dynamic freedom and autonomous creativity AND plagued by the voices of “the Good Woman” in us that refused to look stupid and get it wrong, that preferred to support the strongest person, convinced that was the safest place to be. But based on the recent research that I and a group of women I know through EnlightenNext have been uncovering, this structure of the “Good Woman” is traceable and understandable. She comes from a very specific set of circumstances in our cultural heritage and therefore we can learn about her, uncover her motives and start to discern her voice from our own. Even if it’s a flicker, it’s our own. And that’s the same voice that compelled each and every one of us to this class, drew us to improv. Because it is in the freedom of improv that our true voice can begin to guide us, begin to have space and confidence to start shouting.
We can start blowing this open together, seeing the impersonality of it all, and see that it is not “those men” that are keeping us from our power…it is ourselves. Or more so, a structure within us that is more interested in being safe, right, perfect, and secure than taking risks, being free and uninhibited, being leaders and being full team players taking all the hits just like the guys do. And we can. So we will.
Without writing more now, I’d like to ongoingly report on how the class is going and what insights come up. I’m also hoping that the 10 women from the class comment here to give their experiences and insights as well.
Onward and upward!!
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I’d never linked the Good Woman, to my experience as an actress before. (I worked for TV and in the movies in France for 18 years, my career started very well and then slowed progressively to a stop 10 years ago – hmm interesting…)
I just remember how in rehearsals in theater class and while warming up before shooting, I was full of creativity, energy, ideas, I was out there unselfconsciously going for it, busting through whatever initial fear I had. And then as the time got nearer to shooting or to the performance I would start withering. Some of it seemed caused by outside remarks – people found me too ‘out there’ – too “American” they’d call it. But it was mostly from what you are saying, from my inner eye criticizing, holding back, constantly looking outside for any indication that I was right/wrong, great/terrible, at least okay. So I’d reign myself in, smooth everything out, try to fulfill some idea I had formed about the part, or thought others expected – and felt horrible.
There were rare moments of creative freedom, I’d have no idea who I was, no care for what I looked like, just serving the action, the text – and in those moments I had another way of seeing myself as part of a whole creative unfolding – it wasn’t me acting but “I was acted”. I could act, watch, and be aware of everything at the same time. Really cool. I could not figure out where that came from and could not reproduce that state at will. But I do think now, that it was a lot because for a brief moment I would have a reprieve from the Good Woman. There was no “way” things had to be done, there was just “let’s find out”, let’s try this or that and find out. And there was a relaxation and a trust and a lightness even in super dramatic scenes!
Studying the Good Woman I can see how she is antithetical to acting – not only to being funny! – and to creativity, freedom of speech, art – to even just saying authentically what you think. You’ve got to be able to make mistakes, take risks, be ridiculous, fall on your face and also to be extraordinary, be surprised, in awe at what you can create – be fantastic!!
Kelly is saying, that it is a matter of choice. But what we are talking about runs real deep. We have a structure in us that points us towards the home, the supporting role, being sweet and good. It takes guts to face this and take action regardless of it. Every time we do, we gain strength and confidence that this is just a structure that we can see as such and make a different choice. Doing this together, as you are, is so important. You are all giving each other strength and creating a sisterhood of understanding.
Can’t wait to hear more !
I have always thought of myself as a pretty ‘fearless’ person. Willing to take risks, make a fool of myself and being a clown. What I recently discovered, through Holly’s Improv and other experiences, is that there is so much more to ACTUALLY being free, than just feeling free.
In class I began to discover this deep fear within me. It’s not a fear I identify with on a regular basis or through my personal circumstances, but it is way deeper than that. That is how I relate to the ‘Good Girl’ issue. Ultimately, it’s fear. Fear that people will think I suck, or that I’m not good enough, or they won’t like me anymore when they see me mess up. Improv really helped to highlight these issues for me, since good improv is driven by fearlessness. If you are not in that place, then you are faced directly with that fear…and it’s ugly.
Logically speaking (as a woman), there’s no reason for me to feel this fear around men anymore. I am no longer a second class citizen and have freedom of speech, and thought and everything else. But, it still exists. I must say, I totally agree with Holly that this is a cultural structure that exists within us and in order to be free of that structure we need to deconstruct ourselves, and see what the hell is really going on. The all female class with Holly has been doing just that, and I am so excited to be a part of this essential discovery. Thank you Holly!!!
OK so I am at my bar; I’m a bartender and Barbara comes in. She is a writer/producer from LA and we start talking about the class and the “good girl syndrome” and she tells me that she is working on just this same type of idea in her world. She is not so worried about what others think but she realizes that this is holding us back and it made me realize again that all it takes is for us as people,not just women, to change our minds in order to change our lives. PS. We are also reading, by coincidence, the same book right now- Ask and It is Given- by Esther and Jerry Hickes.
I have been aware for some time now that I have an overwhelmingly major case of the “need to please people.” In classrooms from elementary to graduate school I have always tried to be the teacher-pleasing good girl and for much of my educational life that was a quality/behavior that was applauded and rewarded. Who knew it was holding me back in a lot of ways as well???
My eyes were first opened to the difficulties of being a “good girl” during graduate school when I struggled between identifying my own needs and process (both in my daily life and as an actor) vs. the perceived desires and demands of the professors and directors. I needed to find a way to balance the two.
As a current member of Holly’s class, I am fascinated by not only how deep-seeded the “good girl” is within me, but how it affects me as a woman who loves to go crazy and be spontaneous and say “yes” to myself and my partners as an improvisor. I am loving this class and the women in it and am now better able to identify my “good girl”moments.
Example:
The other night I was walking out of my other improv. class and found myself saying to a classmate, “Do you think Holly was mad at me for our
discussion about one of my characters? I don’t want her to think I was being defensive. I should apologize/say something.”
Then as I sat on the subway to Brooklyn the penny dropped – I was having major “Good Girl” moment – I was WAY too focused on my need to be liked to be approved of that I couldn’t just accept the debate I had with Holly as a normal, healthy time of asking questions and clarifying my opinion.
And even though I identified the moment, I still sent Holly an email that ended:
“And also…um….I’m-sorry-if-it seemed-like-I-was-getting-defensive-and-I-was-just-trying-to-understand-what-you-were-saying-
and-understand-what-I-was-thinking-and-I’m-sorry-and-please-don’t-hate-me…there, I said it….whew.”
I’m working on it. And I’m very happy to have a forum in which to continue that work and exploration as a “good girl” and as an improvisor.
Thank you so much Holly!
Holly,
I am so very excited about your blog and our class and the experiences that I know are going to occur.
I feel as if we are at the beginning of a new era of self awareness and adventure. I keep writing and erasing what I am going to say. I think it is because I am so nervous and also awakened by the new possibilities of this time in our lives AND I am feeling that good girl wanting to write the right thing. For now I just love that you are my teacher. Here’s to getting outside of our comfort zone.
I’ve been improvising, teaching, directing now for almost 20 years and I tell my women students who want to ‘get it perfect’ that the way to do that is to not be perfect. Think about the actress playing Elphab in Wicked – Green Body paint is hardly this year’s fashion statement. The time to be a pretty girl, a good girl , a girly-girl is AFTER the show…on stage anything goes. Because that’s what it means to be a performer.
As a teacher and performer I sometimes feel a little exasperated by the ‘women are holding themselves back’ concept – I see that some do but it feels more like a choice. Almost like when you tell someone the way to get a better body is to work out and they say they can’t. Can’t or Chose not to? Those are two very different things.
There are so many great comic women role models – Carol Burnett, Gilda Radner, Mindy Sterling, Amy Poehler, Jill Bernard and hundreds more in the local scenes around the country. I think maybe we, as women teachers need to start referencing these women more. And we need to stop pampering our students. Instead of discovering a ‘root cause’ or inventing a reason why women hold themselves back – be it from performing improv or winning a foot race, or going for that great job – and push them just bit to a place outside their comfort zones to that place of real life authenticity. – Truth in Comedy baby!
Hi Kelly – thanks very much for posting a reply. Always nice to meet fellow improv teachers! :) I agree that there is a tired ‘women holding themselves’ back dialogue that has been going on way too long. And for many years I didn’t want to have anything to do with that. But the more work I have been doing with the structures of women’s consciousness outside of teaching improv, the more I am starting to see how its acting itself out in my classes. I really agree about ‘can’t’ vs. ‘choose not to’…it’s an important distinction. However, I’d like to toss into that discussion, sometimes there are more things going on than meets the eye. And they’re not personal/psychological hang-ups which is what I think you’re pointing to…but more structures and habitual ways of thinking that are more culturally-based. I saw time and again, and also in myself, women hit a barrier that this GOOD WOMAN structure from the Modern era explains. And I have seen when you put pressure on women to ‘just get over it’ without them understanding these different motivations within us, you often get a woman ‘trying to do it “more right” by acting like she doesn’t care, acting like a guy, etc’ and all those bad habits — versus what I’m saying, which is just to see how this GOOD GIRL/GIRL STUDENT operates in us all and choose something different. It’s not pampering at all, it’s just illuminating something that at least the women in my school are finding helpful…that can help explain the often confusing experience of complete risk-taking vs. wanting to get affirmation and get it right. Thanks for helping make that more clear!