Paul was a tremendous teacher. He was at once incredibly warm and cantankerous. He seemed to always have a bit of a blood sugar problem that would grow worse with bad improv. He seemed to just really believe in what he was doing. And he inspired me.
I loved doing improv with Paul. For some reason, I was able to both be in my head and out of it at the same time. Paul was all about focus. Find your focus. And feeling your feet. I am sure he has influenced my work a great deal - though I am not sure how exactly.
Perhaps it is simply that desire for things to be better, to be right. A certain exasperated perfectionism that resides in the process rather than the product.
He was also a big Dylan fan so we had that in common. Of course, I was a 23 year old kid when I studied with him - so I was happy to find a formidable figure like him.
When I got back from my hiatus in 2000-2001, I bumped into him - at an opera. At ps 122 I think. I don't remember the details precisely (though I think it was the daughter of someone I was tutoring who was the composer). I asked if I could observe his class. And i did. what a trip: to see him teach again ten years later. I realized just how big an impression he made - I felt I could complete every word he would say. I knew the critique he'd be making before he did so. It was joyous to watch him work.
He will be missed - but truly, his work lives on.
Wednesday, June 4
Scientology??? WTF
I just looked at my blog and saw google ads is feeding a SCIENTOLOGY ad.
I am not a scientologist. I don't endorse scientology.
I was going to remove google ads - but I think I understand why the ad was served. The new york times paul sills headline referred to him as a guru...
I am not a scientologist. I don't endorse scientology.
I was going to remove google ads - but I think I understand why the ad was served. The new york times paul sills headline referred to him as a guru...
Paul Sills, a Guru of Improv Theater, Dies at 80
The New York Times
June 4, 2008
Paul Sills, a Guru of Improv Theater, Dies at 80
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON
Paul Sills, a founder of the Second City theater company and the godfather of modern improvisational sketch comedy, died on Monday in Sturgeon Bay, Wis. He was 80.
The cause was complications of pneumonia, said his wife, Carol Sills.
As a founder and resident director of a series of small theater companies that began in bars, former bakeries and Chinese restaurants in Chicago, Mr. Sills taught an approach to theater that would later feed directly into the creation of “Saturday Night Live” and influence a range of artists including David Mamet and Richard Foreman. Under Mr. Sills’s direction, performances were based on games, audience suggestions and bare-bones scenarios, the basic building blocks of improv comedy.
Many of these techniques Mr. Sills learned from his mother, Viola Spolin, who had used them as a drama teacher with the federal Works Progress Administration from 1939 to 1941 and later codified them in her influential book “Improvisation for the Theater.”
But while Ms. Spolin, who worked closely with her son throughout his career, might have developed and refined the theater-game approach, it was Mr. Sills who spread the gospel, starting the careers of comedy giants like Mike Nichols, Elaine May, Barbara Harris, Alan Arkin and Paul Sand. While his influence spread, Mr. Sills continued to stick with the basics, moving on to his next opportunity as a teacher and director and remaining mostly obscure.
In 1968, Mr. Sills created the story theater form, in which actors on a bare stage narrate, mime, sing, dance and create plays based on existing stories from the Brothers Grimm, Ovid and others. In 1970, “Paul Sills’ Story Theater” appeared on Broadway; Clive Barnes, writing about it in The New York Times, said it brought back “magic and innocence to Broadway.”
In Jeffrey Sweet’s book “Something Wonderful Right Away: An Oral History of the Second City and The Compass Players,” Mr. Sills explained his approach this way: “Theater is concerned with reality. Reality is shared. And reality of the moment can occur only with spontaneity.”
Paul Silverberg was born in Chicago on Nov. 18, 1927. His parents separated when he was young, and he moved with his mother to a rented mansion on Lake Michigan, where she and her friends lived communally. They relocated to California in 1943, but Mr. Sills returned to Chicago to finish high school. After graduating, he was in both the merchant marine and the Army and then enrolled in the University of Chicago.
During and after college, Mr. Sills began developing his directorial skills in theaters like the Playwrights Theater Club, which he helped to create and where he staged plays by Bertolt Brecht, who strongly influenced him and whom he later met. But in 1955 he and a friend he met at the University of Chicago, David Shepherd, created the Compass Players, an improvisational cabaret theater, where they put on revues based more closely on the Spolin approach.
At the Compass, actors would speak in gibberish, perform sketches in languages they could not speak and generally create plays from scratch while an audience was watching. In 1959, after the Compass had dissolved, Mr. Sills, along with Howard Alk and Bernard Sahlins, created Second City, at which they were joined by many of the actors from the Compass.
Second City, which turns 50 next year, would go on to become a comedy mecca, performing a revue on Broadway under Mr. Sills’s direction, setting up satellite theaters in Toronto and Detroit and grooming alumni including Dan Aykroyd, John Belushi, Bill Murray, Mike Myers, Gilda Radner and Tina Fey.
But before Second City became ensconced in the comedy establishment, Mr. Sills had moved on, starting theater companies and teaching workshops using theater games. In 1988, Mr. Sills, Mr. Nichols and George Morrison created the New Actors Workshop in New York, where for the next 15 years Mr. Sills taught and directed productions based on the idea of story theater.
Mr. Sills spent more and more of his time in Baileys Harbor, Wis., where he lived with his wife. His survivors also include a son, David Michael; four daughters, Rachel, Polly, Aretha Amelia and Neva; four grandchildren; two great-grandchildren; and a brother, William.
In Wisconsin, Mr. Sills put on plays with a community theater group, rehearsing in a large barn and performing at local theaters and town halls. His approach to his career was not unlike his approach to theater in general.
“He always wandered away well before opening night,” Mr. Nichols said in an interview, “because he had no interest at all in results, only process.”
June 4, 2008
Paul Sills, a Guru of Improv Theater, Dies at 80
By CAMPBELL ROBERTSON
Paul Sills, a founder of the Second City theater company and the godfather of modern improvisational sketch comedy, died on Monday in Sturgeon Bay, Wis. He was 80.
The cause was complications of pneumonia, said his wife, Carol Sills.
As a founder and resident director of a series of small theater companies that began in bars, former bakeries and Chinese restaurants in Chicago, Mr. Sills taught an approach to theater that would later feed directly into the creation of “Saturday Night Live” and influence a range of artists including David Mamet and Richard Foreman. Under Mr. Sills’s direction, performances were based on games, audience suggestions and bare-bones scenarios, the basic building blocks of improv comedy.
Many of these techniques Mr. Sills learned from his mother, Viola Spolin, who had used them as a drama teacher with the federal Works Progress Administration from 1939 to 1941 and later codified them in her influential book “Improvisation for the Theater.”
But while Ms. Spolin, who worked closely with her son throughout his career, might have developed and refined the theater-game approach, it was Mr. Sills who spread the gospel, starting the careers of comedy giants like Mike Nichols, Elaine May, Barbara Harris, Alan Arkin and Paul Sand. While his influence spread, Mr. Sills continued to stick with the basics, moving on to his next opportunity as a teacher and director and remaining mostly obscure.
In 1968, Mr. Sills created the story theater form, in which actors on a bare stage narrate, mime, sing, dance and create plays based on existing stories from the Brothers Grimm, Ovid and others. In 1970, “Paul Sills’ Story Theater” appeared on Broadway; Clive Barnes, writing about it in The New York Times, said it brought back “magic and innocence to Broadway.”
In Jeffrey Sweet’s book “Something Wonderful Right Away: An Oral History of the Second City and The Compass Players,” Mr. Sills explained his approach this way: “Theater is concerned with reality. Reality is shared. And reality of the moment can occur only with spontaneity.”
Paul Silverberg was born in Chicago on Nov. 18, 1927. His parents separated when he was young, and he moved with his mother to a rented mansion on Lake Michigan, where she and her friends lived communally. They relocated to California in 1943, but Mr. Sills returned to Chicago to finish high school. After graduating, he was in both the merchant marine and the Army and then enrolled in the University of Chicago.
During and after college, Mr. Sills began developing his directorial skills in theaters like the Playwrights Theater Club, which he helped to create and where he staged plays by Bertolt Brecht, who strongly influenced him and whom he later met. But in 1955 he and a friend he met at the University of Chicago, David Shepherd, created the Compass Players, an improvisational cabaret theater, where they put on revues based more closely on the Spolin approach.
At the Compass, actors would speak in gibberish, perform sketches in languages they could not speak and generally create plays from scratch while an audience was watching. In 1959, after the Compass had dissolved, Mr. Sills, along with Howard Alk and Bernard Sahlins, created Second City, at which they were joined by many of the actors from the Compass.
Second City, which turns 50 next year, would go on to become a comedy mecca, performing a revue on Broadway under Mr. Sills’s direction, setting up satellite theaters in Toronto and Detroit and grooming alumni including Dan Aykroyd, John Belushi, Bill Murray, Mike Myers, Gilda Radner and Tina Fey.
But before Second City became ensconced in the comedy establishment, Mr. Sills had moved on, starting theater companies and teaching workshops using theater games. In 1988, Mr. Sills, Mr. Nichols and George Morrison created the New Actors Workshop in New York, where for the next 15 years Mr. Sills taught and directed productions based on the idea of story theater.
Mr. Sills spent more and more of his time in Baileys Harbor, Wis., where he lived with his wife. His survivors also include a son, David Michael; four daughters, Rachel, Polly, Aretha Amelia and Neva; four grandchildren; two great-grandchildren; and a brother, William.
In Wisconsin, Mr. Sills put on plays with a community theater group, rehearsing in a large barn and performing at local theaters and town halls. His approach to his career was not unlike his approach to theater in general.
“He always wandered away well before opening night,” Mr. Nichols said in an interview, “because he had no interest at all in results, only process.”
Tuesday, June 3
Yale reunion
This weekend I spent at my 20th college reunion. It was a blast..From friday at 6 until sunday at 1 it was a continuous recollection of days gone by and finding where folks have ended up.
I participated in a panel on saturday - following a panel discussion of election politics with a list of very impressive panelists/classmates. It was led by ursula burton and included screenwriter gillian horvath, actor phil lamarr, singer-songwriter julian fleisher and me.
The questioned ranged from "how did yale inform your career pursuits" to "what do you think about american idol?". I am grossly simplifying.
I felt very nervous and serious. (Not sure, have I lost my college silliness?). I imagine the single question that most threw me into a tizzy was about law school. A classmate who I took the LSATS with, who remembered my struggle, asked me if I had any regrets about not going to law school. "Mom? Mom?" I cried out, eyes closed. "What are you doing at my 20th reunion???"
I really hope I wasn't insulting, but I do believe I referred to my being a lawyer as an incredibly excruciating horrible choice for me. Only that's not at all how it came out.
"Don't have a family": 3 of the 5 panelists don't have children and one of the questions seems to have evoked ambiguous responses. I think the question was "what advice do you have about balancing a family with a life in the arts". My response was meant to mean "I don't have children. This question is not applicable" though it could easily suggest that my advice is not to have a family. That's not my advice. Have a family. Have several. I don't have children.
I felt a bit raw following the panel. I mentioned this here blog too. Perhaps its because we followed the serious election panel. Or perhaps its just really exposing to talk about life in the arts. Either way, I am proud that I was asked to do the panel. I'd do it again.
But I won't go to law school.
I participated in a panel on saturday - following a panel discussion of election politics with a list of very impressive panelists/classmates. It was led by ursula burton and included screenwriter gillian horvath, actor phil lamarr, singer-songwriter julian fleisher and me.
The questioned ranged from "how did yale inform your career pursuits" to "what do you think about american idol?". I am grossly simplifying.
I felt very nervous and serious. (Not sure, have I lost my college silliness?). I imagine the single question that most threw me into a tizzy was about law school. A classmate who I took the LSATS with, who remembered my struggle, asked me if I had any regrets about not going to law school. "Mom? Mom?" I cried out, eyes closed. "What are you doing at my 20th reunion???"
I really hope I wasn't insulting, but I do believe I referred to my being a lawyer as an incredibly excruciating horrible choice for me. Only that's not at all how it came out.
"Don't have a family": 3 of the 5 panelists don't have children and one of the questions seems to have evoked ambiguous responses. I think the question was "what advice do you have about balancing a family with a life in the arts". My response was meant to mean "I don't have children. This question is not applicable" though it could easily suggest that my advice is not to have a family. That's not my advice. Have a family. Have several. I don't have children.
I felt a bit raw following the panel. I mentioned this here blog too. Perhaps its because we followed the serious election panel. Or perhaps its just really exposing to talk about life in the arts. Either way, I am proud that I was asked to do the panel. I'd do it again.
But I won't go to law school.
Lonesome Hollow redux
I don't think I've had a reading of a play after a performance before. But today i am "directing" a cold reading of lonesome hollow, by lee blessing. This is the play I directed at CATF last summer.
The whole cast is reuniting except Sheffield Chastain - who is rehearsing something else. PJ sosko is doing the reading of the role of tuck. Which just goes to show: about 3 possibly four years ago I did a "one-on-one" session, and pj was one of the actors
"One on one" is a place where actors can meet directors: actors perform a monologue, directors critique the work, and hopefully, relationships are formed. And I think you get 9 minutes.
Well - here's an instance of where one of these casting things paid off.
It'll be great to see the rest of the old gang as well: frank deal, lou sumrall, anne marie nest and andrea cirie round out the cast.
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