Hey everybody, welcome to the SoCap Improv Comedy
Podcast. My name is Ralph McLeod. I am the owner
and artistic director of the SoCap Comedy Theatre
in Toronto, Ontario. Socap .ca, that's S -O -C
-A -P as in Peter, dot C -A. That's our website.
We do shows, improv classes, rentals, all kinds
of things. And this improv podcast is about...
We're really talking about my now going on like
30 some plus years of experience as a performer,
as a teacher, and what observations I have made
and what I try to pass along to my students.
So today, part of what I'm going to talk about
are individual exercises. And that's what today's
episode is about. So I'm going to go through
a specific exercise, what it is, how to do it,
why we do it. This is the important one, right?
Because if you don't have a reason why you're
doing certain things, don't do it. I mean, I
know, you know, I've been shown so many improv
exercises and I remember with teachers and I
was just like, why are we doing this? This seems
to have no function whatsoever. And I came to
realize that probably we were doing it because
they were shown to do it and it was a time filler,
but it didn't seem to have much point to it.
If there is no point, why do it? So the first
exercise I'm going to talk about is the first
exercise that, in my experience, is the beginning
exercise in every improv class. And certainly
for me, unless I have fewer than four students,
I'm doing this exercise. And it's called clap
focus. It sounds exciting. But here's the exercise.
And it's a key one. So what we do is you stand
in a group. Everybody standing in a circle is
the best way to do this. You know, I've done
it in chairs. I've done it in rectangular rooms.
You know, I've done it in all kinds of things
because of, you know, just what kind of, you
know, shape space you have and how many people
you have and all that. But generally, if possible,
in a circle where you can see everybody, you
can see everybody to your right and left of your
peripheral vision. You can see the whole group
and everybody's facing each other and looking
at each other. And then one person starts, and
what they do is they make eye contact with anybody
in the circle, and they clap towards them. So
they make a clapping sound, and they do that,
and they kind of shoot one of the hands as if
they're pointing to the other person. So they
kind of clap and point at the person while making
eye contact. And it's important. To make the
eye contact, that's part of it. It's being clear
with who you are clapping towards. A lot of people
who do this at the beginning, they will look
at one person and clap at someone else. It's
kind of the game. I like messing around, which
we will get to at some point. But in this exercise,
that's not what we like to do. We want to be
clear and direct who we are clapping towards.
In terms of the communication, It's not just
enough for me to send my message out and assume
it's been accepted. I want to be looking at the
person as clear as I can, clapping at you, yes.
And then I'm not done until I see you accept
that and start clapping towards someone else.
Then I'm done, right? We've closed the circle
on communication. My job's not done until the
other person picks that thing up and runs off
with it. And now we take care of each other.
We continue to do this. And you go as pretty
much as fast as you can. Like not, not, not racing,
but it's pretty quick. It's crisp. You know,
I don't, I don't like, I don't like the word
racing, but it is really fast. And, and we just
keep going like that. Now, a variation that will
come up and my variation that I've added is sometimes
when that's going on, I'll start a second class.
which will, of course, throw everybody into complete
chaos. Everybody will laugh, and they get really
nervous. They don't know what's going on. And
I like to make the point that I never said at
any point there could only be one cloud. But
that's just a bullshit rule that we all just
accepted, or you all just accepted, and didn't
even question it. It's an invented rule. Now,
it makes sense. I'm not trying to say everybody
should know immediately we can do two, but it
was never stated. It's an implied rule. were
inferred that people just accept and they huh
and then you minute you can have two you can
see people's eyes get big and go oh that's interesting
anything about that exactly unknown unknowns
which is something we will get to certainly at
some point in here as well but the point there
is like well what limits are you putting on yourself
that you don't even don't even know you're putting
on right here's an example of something you were
doing a limit that you had put on yourself without
even thinking about it and how many other places
in your life are you doing that And then when
you see that something is possible that you didn't
think was possible before, it starts to open
your mind and you just go like, oh, right, what
else is possible? And that's it. That's kind
of where we're trying to get at. So back to the
actual exercise of clap focus. If you do keep
one and you're moving around real fast, why are
we doing this? Well, improv really relies on
being in a state of presence. That means that
the individuals, as many as possible, are existing
in this moment, this moment that we call infinity,
you know, this one. Infinity is not a when, it's
now. It's this moment, this moment, this one.
This moment that just keeps going on and on and
on. And we want to be here. We don't want to
be, you know, worried about the future, depressed
about the past, thinking about things we can't
control. We want to be here and now. Because
that way we are open and we are able to engage
and play with other people. Play is a really
big one that I will spend many episodes talking
about play and how important it is. So that's
why we do it. We go as fast as we can because
when it's zipping around, you can't be thinking
about what's for dinner, who's picking up the
kids, you know, oh, that project I got to go.
Like, you know, oh, this essay I've got to write.
You can't think about those things. You know,
you're here in the moment and you're engaging
and you're part of something. And that's what
we try to do. And that's why we do Clock Focus.
And that's why it always starts. because I can
always tell if that's going real fast around,
it's going to be a great class. If it's not,
if it's scattered, we do it a little bit longer.
I try to get people into doing it, but the class
is going to not be as crisp as it can be when
that's flying around. So that's the first exercise
I do. That's the way I do it. That's a variation.
Another variation you can do is, especially with
new groups or newer groups, you can, as you clap
towards someone, you can say their name. And
this will help us get names real fast. I always
make it clear that, you know, we all forget names.
So if you forget it once or twice, ask and they'll
tell you. Or pronunciation is another one. I
like to pronounce people's names the way they
want to, you know, the way they like to have
them pronounced. Now, sometimes that's not possible
because there's some vowels I just can't do.
But I can do as much, I can do the best job I
can. So that's a good way to get names real fast.
Go around, get everybody's name. And I say, just
remember one. You just have to remember one at
the beginning. Just remember one name, and then
you can do it. And that's very, very fun. There's
another little thing that happens since I'm talking
about clap focus. And this will open up the door
into vulnerability, which is another topic that
we'll spend a lot of time talking about. There's
often a moment, especially with newer groups
doing clap focus, where it'll get dropped. Someone
will clap at someone. It doesn't really get...
it doesn't get you know communicated and the
person who's on the spot looks at everybody like
with help me written all over their face was
that me and they're really embarrassed and they
feel like they let everybody down and the group
usually responds to that with a big hearty chuckle
it's laugh it's very funny it's funny we're not
funny we laugh laughter and humor that's another
one we'll spend lots of time talking about but
uh and in that moment you know it's those are
key moments i love teachable moments and that's
a key one And I just point out, well, that's
interesting. We laughed. Why did we laugh? Well,
there's a lot going on. But the big thing is
empathy. Anybody who was staring at that person
knows what that feels like because they were
terrified it was going to happen to them, that
they were going to be the one that messed up
in front of everybody and look silly or foolish
or humiliated. And we all laugh, but that laugh
is not derisive. We're not laughing at the person.
We're laughing in... not in association with,
but in empathy with. I understand what that would
be like, but it happened to you and not me. And
that makes me feel better. And also, the other
part about that is I like you more. The person
who got, you know, failed or whatever, who got
embarrassed momentarily is now generally well
-liked by everybody in the group. And if you
immediately took a straw poll as like, who's
the president of this group, that person would
be the front runner. And it's true. So vulnerability
is incredibly powerful, and we'll talk about
it, but that's a key thing that happens in CloudFocus,
happens almost every time I do this with a new
group. There's going to be that moment where
someone, was that me? Oh, I don't know. Oh, oh,
no. And everybody laughs when we talk about it.
Laughter is interesting, and there's often things
to talk about when we're laughing, especially
when the scene is going on, when we're doing
something together and we're laughing, right?
Laughter and humor. I'm not getting into it now
because it's a whole... dozens of episodes but
you know when you laugh at something hmm what
was that about that's interesting uh okay well
that's clap focus that's the way it works uh
that's why i know it's valuable because it helps
bring everybody into a state of presence here
and now and that's where you want to be uh i
spend as much of my life as possible in a state
of presence and it's uh um boy boy it's hard
not to go down rabbit holes of talking about
things because presence is very healing for the
body, for sure, for the body and the mind. All
right. So that was a little thing of the clap
focus. So again, my name is Ralph McClatt. I
am the owner and director of the SoCap Comedy
Theater, socap .ca. I do a show the fourth Friday
of every month at the old SoCap called The Stupid
Good Comedy Show with three of my good friends.
And that's always a hoot. And before that, at
six o 'clock, we do a class. It's called Making
Friends. So you basically come, you do a 90 -minute
improv class. then you watch my show and then
we all hang out and have a good time. And it's
a great way to meet people in a very stress -free
or at least very low stress. We do as much as
we can to take away all the stress and all the
stakes and make it just a fun thing. Because
you can't really play if there are stakes. If
you feel like there's some winning and losing
going on, we try to take that right out of it.
Anyway, hope to see you all soon. This has been
the SoCap Improv Comedy Podcast. Take care, everybody.
Bye.