[What do you think an improviser absolutely needs to know...?]
Trust your partner, the audience is already on your side, and above all else ... listen.
-Randy Dixon, in The Improv Handbook by Tom Salinsky and Deborah Frances-White
I'm pulling this quote because I was reminded of it it this weekend. I was talking with Laura Lind from The Amish Monkeys. When I asked Laura about what she's learned over her career of playing, the idea that the audience is already on your side came up similarly.
Improv, for the most part, has an audience that is ready to go with you. Unlike, say, stand-up [Derek Minto, am I way out of line here?]. There's the old high-wire act metaphor, the danger and unpredictability and... frankly... gimmick of it does get you some slack.
That's good to know, on some level, because you need to trust your audience to go along with you. To be as smart and patient as your partner on stage should be.
Don't just do the easy stuff to please them because you'll end up insulting their intelligence. Just like if you blew a scene for a joke and hung your teammate out to dry.
Trust and respect them when you're performing.
And I say this as a guy who says "Fuck the audience" before shows a lot.
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