When we talk ‘at’ each other, as opposed to ‘with’ to each other, it puts us in our own head and forces us to have to think, instead of responding and creating a give-and-take of ideas. It’s time for a fresh dialogue, says Norm Laviolette
Listening is the main way most of us receive information, both simple and complex. It is a function and a skill that we begin developing at birth. From the first soothing sounds a parent makes to comfort a newborn baby, we hear things and begin to process that information and try to make some kind of sense of it.
Listening is done passively all the time. In the car listening to radio, watching TV, in class or in a meeting, or listening to your boring-ass friend tell another one of their pointless stories about what they did last weekend. Passive listening takes no real effort. Much like breathing, it just happens. We don’t sit down on the couch and consciously say to ourselves ‘OK, I now have to listen to Game of Thrones as I also watch it.’
How much information we retain is a different matter, but the act of passive listening is mostly subconscious and does not require much thinking or effort to do so. Anybody can listen, and in fact almost everybody in the entire world already does.
People ask me all the time what is the most critical skill for a successful improv comedian to develop. Most think that it is the ability to be funny or to come up with ideas out of nowhere. Some people think it is a gift that comes naturally, the ol’ ‘you either got it or you don’t’ syndrome.
Many assume that you need to be extroverted and have incredible charisma or a larger-than-life personality. None of this is correct.
The single most important thing that makes an improv actor successful on stage is his or her ability to listen. To the other actors. To the audience. The concentration point is always on the other person, hearing what they are saying and reacting to that. We are trained in improv to focus our attention on the other person. To listen to what they are saying and respond to what we have heard, not what we think. This is a very different style of listening from passive listening. Improv actors and comedians are trained to actively listen. The improv actor focuses on what is being said and tries to truly understand what they are hearing.
Actor A then responds to the dialogue that was just spoken by actor B. Instead of thinking of something to say or trying to invent some kind of funny response, all actor A has to do is respond to what actor B just said. Actor A’s concentration is solely on the sentence just spoken by actor B. In that sentence there will be plenty of details to respond to. Let’s look at an example. We will set the scene in a train station:
Bob: Looks like the train is running late again.
Helen: Unbelievable! This is going to make me late for my job interview.
Bob: What company are you interviewing with?
Helen: Livingroom.com. It is a new startup that is essentially Airbnb for your living room. If you don’t have friends or family to watch your favorite TV shows with, you can schedule time with someone else’s friends and family.
Bob: You are not going to believe this, but I am the CEO of Livingroom.com.
Let’s take a look at this scene. Aside from it being a fairly poorly written improv scene (it played a lot better live on stage), this is a good example of how listening to your scene partner will give you as an actor all the information you need to respond. With the first line of dialogue Bob states: ‘Looks like the train is running late again.’ Helen only has to process this information and respond: Unbelievable!’ That is all.
Helen did not have to invent any crazy scenario or pull some amazing concept out of the ether. She simply listened to Bob and responded to what she heard.
Helen’s next line of dialogue, ‘This is going to make me late for my job interview,’ adds context as to why she is waiting for the train and how that train being late will affect her. Bob only needs to respond to what Helen just said. All he has to do is find one thing to reference in Helen’s response.
In this example Bob focuses on the fact that Helen is late for a ‘job interview.’ This allows Bob to respond in a very simple and natural way with the question ‘What company are you interviewing with?.
No wild invention or clever responses needed. Helen in turn now only needs to answer Bob’s question. In this instance my answer (I’m playing both the role of Bob and Helen) is somewhat more elaborate for comedic effect. It would work just as well if Helen had said:
- A bank
- A library
- Dunkin’ Donuts
- Anything the hell she wanted to say
Bob then reacts to what he hears and defines a relationship to what Helen has just said, in this case by being the CEO of the company she is going to interview with.
By listening to each other and responding to what is being said, Bob and Helen have removed ‘overthinking’ from the communication process. This was not passive listening, though. With each sentence Bob and Helen picked out one detail to understand and drive their response.
I know, you’re probably saying to yourself ‘That’s it? Obviously this is what has to happen. It is what people do all the time.’
I beg to differ. Let me show you how that scene or scenes like it have often played out. We will get the exact same scenario of a train station:
Bob: Looks like the train is late again.
Helen: Here comes the C train, right on time.
Bob: It is so annoying, the T never runs on time.
Helen: Here it is. Let’s get on and head to Fenway.
Beyond the astoundingly bad dialogue, we see two people who have heard the initial idea of ‘train station’ but are not listening to each other at all. Each person is working on and sticking to their own agenda. With each separate line of dialogue, both Bob and Helen have to keep inventing ideas.
Eventually a couple of things will happen. First, Bob and Helen will most likely run out of new ideas. Second, it is pretty obvious that they are not on the same page and the conversation will end up being confusing and frustrating for both of them.
I have witnessed conversations like this both on stage and off thousands of times. People talking around a subject but not actually to each other. When we talk ‘at’ each other, as opposed to ‘with’ to each other, it puts us in our own head and forces us to have to think. Instead of responding and creating a give-and-take of ideas, we often get caught up in a loop where the individual keeps restating the same idea or versions of that idea. Nothing original is being created, or if it is, it is either one-sided or competing against another idea.
This kind of conversation often leads the feelings of frustration. That sense of ‘You aren’t listening to me’ or ‘You are not hearing what I’m saying.’
This creates a disconnect between the two people trying to communicate with each other, which can lead people to shut down communication altogether. The ‘screw it, why bother’ attitude takes over, and the exchange of ideas comes to a screeching halt.
This is an edited extract from The Art of Making Sh!t Up: Using the Principles of Improv to Become and Unstoppable Powerhouse, by Norm Laviolette (Wiley, 2019).
Norm Laviolette is the co-founder and CEO of Improv Asylum, IA Innovation and Asylum Gaming and Esports (AGE). He has performed, directed or produced more than 10,000 improvisational comedy shows on three continents. He brings the experience of building companies from the ground up into multi-million dollar businesses. Learn more at iainnovation.com / @normlaviolette
