Unscripted - Nicole Kronzer Page 0,22

UCB, as well as the film and television I’ve been doing in LA, I’ve had the great privilege to study with Marcus Holland right here at RMTA.”

Clearly a bunch of these guys had also studied with this Marcus Holland person because they stomped their feet and hollered even louder at the mention of his name.

Ben held up his hands to quiet them. “He was a successful stand-up comedian for more than twenty years, was a coach here for ten more, and taught me everything I know about improv. In his retirement, I am honored to take his spot as the Varsity coach, and my hope is to transmit his improv wisdom to you.”

I looked around at the faces next to me: determined, fearless. I smiled.

“So, lots of work to do,” Ben said, hopping off the stage, “and no time to waste. Let’s get started with the warm-up version of What Are You Doing?”

He strode through the room grouping people up.

“Are we all going to introduce ourselves?” I asked Ben when he paired me with a pale guy with short brown hair and extra-large ears.

Ben’s eyes were glued to his clipboard. “Everyone else already knows each other.” His eyes flicked around the room and he gestured at each of the pairs. “Brandon and Xander are over by the window—” That was Crotch-grabber and Finger-flipper to me. “There’s Cade and Donovan—” A big white guy with scrubby facial hair who looked closer to thirty than eighteen pretended to mow a lawn as his partner, a light-skinned black guy with chin acne, beautifully mimed shooting an arrow into the sky. “And then Trey”—he pointed at a round guy with dark brown skin miming lifting something heavy over his head—“and the other Jake.” A short, muscular white guy pursed his lips and fanned himself.

Ben clapped a hand on my partner’s shoulder. “And this Jake can introduce himself.”

Ben walked away, and I tried to exchange a look of, “Isn’t this a little weird?” with my partner, but he didn’t meet my eye. In fact, if I was being paranoid, he didn’t seem terribly excited to be paired with me at all.

“Hi, Jake. I’m Zelda,” I said and smiled.

“Hi,” he said, nodding at me.

“How many years have you been coming here?” I asked.

“This is my third. Second on Varsity. I had Marcus as a coach last year.”

“Oh, cool. He was a big deal, huh?”

“Yeah. He really loved Ben. What are you doing?”

For a second, I thought he was challenging my asking him questions. Then I realized he had already started the game. So much for team building. “Uh, okay . . . rowing a boat.”

He began to mime rowing a boat.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Painting a picture,” he responded, still rowing the boat.

I mimed dipping a paint brush onto my palette. “Ah, the lilies this time of year!” I cooed in a terrible French accent.

“No,” Ben stepped in. “There’s no talking in What Are You Doing? It’s about listening and space work.”

“Oh,” I stammered, “O-okay. It’s just that I was taught—”

“The high school version talks,” he cut me off. “But I’m training you to be professionals.”

I nodded and shook out my hands. “Okay. Got it.”

I watched him stride over to another pair of actors without a second glance in my direction.

Will had been totally wrong thinking Ben was flirting with me at dinner last night. He was basically pretending we’d never met. Or maybe meeting me was so unimportant that he wasn’t pretending—he just didn’t remember.

“Hey—what are you doing?” Jake asked.

What was I doing indeed.

?

Three hours later, I was flabbergasted. We’d worked on voice development. We’d worked on building characters through movement. We’d worked on miming objects and handing them off to one another. And every time I thought I knew how a structure worked or the purpose of an activity, Ben had shut me down. Now we were on to scene work.

“No,” Ben commanded me. “You’ve done three scenes in a row, and you’ve assumed a relationship each time. You can’t always know who your scene partner is.”

“Really?” I asked. Make statements and assumptions was one of Jane Lloyd’s rules, and this was her camp. Plus, that idea had been hammered into me back home. Assume the relationship. Start the scene in the middle.

“Really,” he said. “It’s a crutch.”

A crutch? It just seemed like common sense. When your characters already know each other, you don’t have to waste time with introductions. You just cut to the chase of what the scene’s about. Plus, I