When should you walk into a scene?

Whether you are an improviser who hesitates to walk on, or someone who just can’t resist entering a scene, you know a walk-on has the power to change what is happening on stage. 

Marcel Blanch-de Wilt is a Sydney-based improviser and he believes there is never a bad time to enter an improv scene. He encourages new improvisers to jump in and have fun. While others argue there are times when entering a scene may disrupt the flow or emotion, Marcel believes overthinking leads to hesitation.

This episode you also hear from Sam Irving and Vera Chok who take slightly divergent views on the how and when of a walk-on in improvised scenes.

Episode transcript:
Chapters:

(00:00) When should you walk into a scene? I've always been fascinated by

(03:41) Sam Irving: I'm a big fan of walk ons

(05:23) Marcel's thoughts on how to treat walk ons in improv

(12:04) Especially new improvisers have problems with cohesion

(12:54) Vera says any time a walk on is because of your ego is wrong

(16:09) How have improv scenes across the world changed following COVID Lockdowns

Marcel: There is never a bad time to enter a scene. Yeah. How? Sometimes people say, hey, you got to do it when it's right, or you've got to see if the scene needs you to enter. I say, there's never a bad time to walk on.

Lloydie: This is the Improv Chronicle. I'm Lloydie. When should you walk into a scene? I've always been fascinated by the views people have about how we perform. And when I was talking to a highly skilled improviser in a dog park in Sydney, Australia, I uncovered a pretty dogmatic opinion, pun intended.

Marcel: I am Martha Blanche de Wilt and I am, an improviser and comedian.

Lloydie: So what is your wild opinion? Most wild opinion on improv?

Marcel: There is never a bad time to enter a scene. Yeah. Sometimes people say, hey, you got to do it when it's right, or you've got to see if the scene needs you to enter. I said, there's never a bad time to walk on. Really?

Lloydie: I mean, what if that and I'm going to play devil's advocate here because I think I know what you're saying, but if there is a really intense moment where you can hear a pin drop and it is a very grounded scene, you're in quite a naturalistic world, would you not leave that? Is that not a bad time to enter a scene?

Marcel: Here's what I'm saying. I'm saying that all the things that tell us to hang back, wait until it's the right time. These are the things that get into people's heads about going, oh, I should feel it when it's right. I'll know it's when it's right. And all these things lead to just people being more glued to the back wall, waiting for that moment. Especially newer improvisers who are going, waiting for the clever thing, waiting for the funny thing, waiting for the right thing. But there is no right thing. Matt Higbee in Chicago was like a great instigator of the idea of, like, just get in there. Like, you're there to have a fun time. You're there to be in the show. People are looking at the people in the sidelines going, why isn't that person come in? Yes, of course, there are exceptions to the rule, but I'd way prefer to tell new improvisers especially, there's never a bad time to walk on. So they just enjoy always just going, oh, my shit. My feet are moving first and I'm walking into a scene. What the difference is that so many new improvisers don't get is you don't have to bring something in with you every time.

Lloydie: I figured some other people might have a more, I don't know, measured approach to walk ons. Vera, Chok is an actor, improviser writer, and performance maker.

Vera: I personally would wait until the scene is slightly established before walking on, but it depends on what kind of walk on. So if you're coming on and being sort of scenery, you can do that much quicker than coming on as an additional character. Does that make sense? Right? So if there's two people starting a scene and we'll go with the scene starting, we'll go chronologically and they establish the place, then yes, of course, you can come on immediately and start giving texture to it, sort of sonography wise sounds, blah, blah, blah. But I think if it were two people coming on and they haven't connected with each other yet, I would hesitate to say, yes, come on and mudy the waters further. Unless you come on, and unless they're in the shit and they're like, oh, I have to come in and be someone's got to do something.

Sam Irving: I'm a big fan of walk ons

Lloydie: Well, let's go now to a coffee shop midway through the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this year, where I put the question of walk ons to one of the performers I was enjoying stage time with for a few days while I was there.

Sam: My name's Sam Irving and I am, one, of the creative directors and performers with, the spontaneous players who put on spontaneous potter around the country. And I also perform with a few other improv, groups, including Men with Coconuts. I've had the pleasure of doing a.

Lloydie: Show with you for the last couple of nights, doing another one tonight at the Edinburgh Fringe. And there have been a couple of times when I've thought about walking on with a thing, and then haven't.

Sam: I've kind of judged.

Lloydie: I don't think the scene needs this right now. Is there a good and bad time for a walk on?

Sam: So I'm a big fan of walk ons. I am very keen. I think if you asked the other guys in the group, they'd be more likely to say, I do it too much rather than too little. I would hope they say, I do it just the right amount, but obviously, if it leads one way or the other I'm a big fan of walk-ons, particularly given in the show that we do, there's this whole cast of main characters and secondary characters to draw from. So if I do want to add a little bit of information to a scene, I can just pick a character at random from the back of my head. Doesn't have to be someone that's already been established in the story, and just walk on as that character. so I think, broadly speaking, you can almost always do a walk on. I, would say for me, the caveat and the exception would be if two people are having a very emotionally grounded scene, which is not gamey, not gaggy, but very focused in the relationship and in the emotion, then walking on as a third character, unless you have a very strong reason for doing so, is probably not a good idea.

Marcel's thoughts on how to treat walk ons in improv

Lloydie: Back to that dog park in Sydney and some more of Marcel's thoughts about how we treat walk ons.

Marcel: I was teaching a workshop recently in Brisbane, and it was revolutionary to some of the improvisers, and some of them had been playing for a few years. That you don't need to walk on and announce who you are. And what your deal is that you can be the butler in the background walking on and brushing a few things on the mantle and then walk off immediately. And they're like, oh, okay. And what the gift is with those moments. Take the butler and the mantle piece. You walk on. They're having their intimate moment. You brush something on the mantle, you exit. You've then given them the gift of do they want to talk about the butler? Are they going to gift you with something while you're off? And now you can hear that and go, oh, you know what? I can come back on now because they've told me that they never trusted the butler, and the butler's been stealing again. Now, when I come back on as the butler, I can do the same walk of dusting something, but also inspect one of the things on the mantle with a sort of eye of, oh, maybe this is something that I'm going to pinch, and then walk off again. Now, we've developed a game, but they still can continue their intimate, beautiful moment. And I can decide when is going to be right for me to and I'm using that word right again, even though, damn it, you've called me out. But what I'm saying is Matt Higby, I watched him in staff shows, faculty shows. He'd come on, it's a fishing scene. These two people are fishing. They're having a conversation. All right? He's going to be a fish. So see him just swim through the scene because he's there to have fun. And that added imagery and color to the scene. He didn't make the scene about him. It didn't pull focus. But what it did this is the other key thing, is it invites everyone to have just as much fun as you are. Hey, guys, I'm getting in here. Have as much fun as me, rather than those moments where people get to the pub after the show and they go, oh, can you believe how much Marcel was getting in the show? I mean, who does he think he is? Like, hey, guess what? You can edit me out. You can swipe the scene. I can come back on later. Guess what? You can be getting in just as much as I am. I'm here inviting you like, come on, guys, this way. And if it feels like shit, Marcel's getting in a lot, guess what you can do? Get in just as much as me and have as much as fun I'm having. I'm not making the show about me. I'm just here to go. Guys, aren't we here putting on a show? Are we here where rarely any of us are getting paid for it? The only thing we're getting paid in is how much fun we're having and how much does it suck. When you do a show, you get up and you go, I wasn't really in that that much. Get in there.

Vera: definitely. I believe that you follow your impulse. I was training people to like, this is how you stand on the side so that you're absolutely ready and this is how you warm up your body and your imagination, your mind. So you're not even thinking. It's just your entire being is just like there's an impulse. Get on stage. So it's before thought happened, maybe really pretentious. And you just have to like, I just step onto stage and contribute. I do think there are bad times to come on stage now.

Lloydie: I would agree with you on that. I definitely bad times to come on the stage and I've seen it happen. And whilst I absolutely understand that a walk on can be a very positive thing, and is very often a very positive thing and can be justified as a positive thing even if it initially seems incongruent, I do. Think the more we play together, the more we learn what style we're playing in and the more we are listening and paying attention, then the more it will be instinctual when to walk on.

Vera: Yes. And that is the other thing, in terms of playing with people you trust and people whose styles complement each other. So, rightness or wrongness can also be beyond technical. It's about whether it's not moral or ethical, but whether it's going to sit well with your teammates, is it going to upset people, your team.

Lloydie: So if it needs to sit well with our teammates, I guess we need to know what sort of walk ons people do like to do. Sam Irving so there's two types of.

Sam: Walk on I really like to do. I like to do, what I guess I would call maybe a punchline walk on or something where, you know, you've got a, scene's been building and then as an external third character, you come on, say one thing, boom. Big laugh, blackout, end the scene. which I think everyone likes getting the big laugh, right? But, I would never want to poach it, but sometimes it feels like an external character is the right person to do that. So I love that. And the other thing I do, and this is it only works within the dynamic of our group. And I think everyone's group, your mileage may vary. is doing a walk on to call out something that's been, misspoken or misstated in the scene. so if somebody has slipped up, or said the wrong name or whatever coming on as the walk on to say, sorry, did I hear you say this? and putting them on the spot a little bit and mining it. But as I say, I wouldn't feel comfortable doing that in a jam or if I was guessing, in a group that I don't perform with regularly. But I know my guys well enough that I know that any of them would be happy for me to do that and put them on the spot like that.

Marcel: And then when it comes to a team that's played a lot, then they should be getting everyone's rhythms. Like, take the sort of idea of like, a band. All right, I play the rhythm section. You know when I'm going to be coming in. You know when to compliment me. You know when to come in with your lead guitar. You know when to come with your symbol, with your maracas, whatever it is. I've seen Bands. I know what instruments are.

Lloydie: You've seen clearly more than one band.

Marcel: But what I'm saying is, if you played for a long time and everyone's diving in, if they're bunning heads the problem isn't about, the idea of sharing the stage. You've clearly got more pressing issues. And also, that's the sort of example of a problem. I'll solve that when we get there.

Especially new improvisers have problems with cohesion, you say

Marcel: But I'm yet to see many issues of, especially newer improvisers, because I'm in the market of the business of teaching improv, especially new improvisers have really had the problem of shit. All of us are so excited to get on stage. Wow, we're having too much fun. If only someone could tell us to do less stuff. And this goes back to that book that I haven't read, which I'll just cite the title of. What is it? Like, it references, like, robot players and pirates and ninjas.

Lloydie: Robot pirate. Ninja. No, I've read half of that whole book.

Marcel: But like, that idea of, like, all right, if you put the team together effectively, then you're going to be getting the different, styles of play. So even if people are super keen to come on, they're coming on with different energies that aren't canceling each other out.

Vera says any time a walk on is because of your ego is wrong

Lloydie: Okay, so when shouldn't we walk on here's?

Vera: Vera again, I suppose any time a walk on is because of your ego is the wrong time. Because of your inflated ego. If it's, like, know again, ego is what do we mean by ego? Ego is not necessarily negative, but I mean by selfishness or by sort of you haven't been paying attention or you think you have a better idea. All those sort of, like, quite obvious improv. No, no's, don't do that.

Lloydie: Oh, my goodness, that is such a good point because I've seen that kind of a walk on and that is not the time to do a walk on. It's usually a guy, but, you're like, I'm the funny guy. I've got about 16 jokes about cheese and they just mentioned cheese. I'm going to walk on. Actually, no, don't. Because they're just talking about, I don't know, a, painful relationship moment or something. Maybe now is not the time to talk about the great joke you've got about Groje or Edam. I don't yeah. So, for me, that's a bad time to do a walk on.

Vera: I was experimenting with something, the other day where I was kind of side coaching, and I just said, just walk across the stage, walk on, walk off, like, mid scene. And sorry, this is tangential, but it was so interesting to see what happened because I suppose I don't like, who describes it. Gael says, when there's two French fries on stage doing nothing, it's just two bodies talking. And I saw I definitely don't like that. So if you don't want to stay on stage, after you walked on, I think it's perfectly valid to just walk through.

Lloydie: Do you know, that's a really interesting point because you cannot walk through a scene without A being seen and B, changing the energy somehow.

Vera: Yes, and it does still leave the character's space, but it does sort of kind of add energy on stage, which is a very, comedian delarite trick of, like, when you come on stage, you bring energy. When you leave the stage, you leave energy. and that's a nice trick.

Lloydie: I think Marcel's original opinion holds a lot of weight when you see where he's coming from. He wants to encourage newer improvisers to get in there and be part of the fun. What's been interesting to me is how so much of that fun might be determined by the group who we're playing with and the energy that happens between everybody. But, no matter, whether we choose to walk on or not, that choice will either be giving or denying the scene a certain energy, whether that's helpful or whether it isn't in the next episode.

Jorin: I think right now, we're really fragmented and weird, and it's hard to know where to go, to see stuff that's really good, instead of sort of the Emperor's New Clothes stuff of, like, people say this is good, you go see it, everybody says it's good, so you assume it's good, but actually it's not that good.

How have improv scenes across the world changed following COVID Lockdowns

Lloydie: How have improv scenes across the world changed in the last couple of years? Following the COVID Lockdowns, hear thoughts from around the globe next time. The improv chronicle is produced and hosted by me, lloydy james. Lloyd help keep the podcast going by Donating. There's a link in the show notes, along with a link to my newsletter, too. Sign up and get the world of improv in your inbox.