Birthday Improv

In the immortal words of the lovely ShayWhat – “You can’t embarrass people who do faire.”  By which, she means myself and my cohorts who are characters at Waxahachie's Scarborough Faire.

Now I won’t say “can’t” because I’m guessing there are still things that could be done to embarrass me or any of the other people who do faire.  However…I have noticed that it’s definitely considerably HARDER to do.

I do not consider myself an “Improv trained actor”…however, I do think I got some incredibly good Improv training from some very talented teachers/actors.  I learned a lot from them…and I find myself using this training in my everyday life in a million different ways.

Back in September...I took the opportunity to use it... to deflect any embarrassment I may have felt on my birthday at Genghis Grill…when my mother decided to tell the waiter that it was my birthday and that I needed to be sang too…humiliated…etc.

The diligent waiters all ganged up and came to my table where I was sitting with my friend Michael and another friend Michele.  They said “I hear someone here has a birthday.”  I pointed to Michael immediately and said it was him.  Then I said it was Michele.  But they knew.

So they asked me my name and I blurted out “Alfred”. 

The guy just looked at me and said “Really, what’s your name?”

 I replied “Alfred”.

So he said “Ok, if you won’t tell us, we’ll give you one.  Ok Sara, how old are you today?”

I said “84, I look good for my age, right?”

They laughed…as did all the people who were now staring at me from every corner of the restaurant.    “Ok Sara, can you stand up?”

I said “My name is not Sara.  It’s Alfred.”

He said “Come on Sara, stand up.”

 I said “I’m not Sara…if you call me Alfred, I’ll stand up.”

He sighs…”Ok, Alfred can you stand up?”  I stood up. 

Someone said “How do you spell it?” referring to my name…

To which I replied, “It starts with a  ‘Q’ so it can be very confusing.”  Again, I get laughs. 

He turns to the crowd and announces “Genghis Grill may I have your attention please!  This is Alfred and she is 84 years old today!”  The crowd laughs and applauds.  He tells me “We are going to sing to you and while we are singing, we need you to use your arms and body to spell out your name.”  I agree to this.  They start to sing…and I spell out “QALF” and that was as far as I got.  The crowd is cracking up, I’m cracking up…it was funny.  I did not get embarrassed…I made other people laugh…and I had fun doing it.

So … points for me and my introduction to Improv training…it makes my life so much more interesting.