Gary Austin - Part 3 - 2/19/07

JF: So, what was it like directing The Groundlings during the time that you were there? Did the emphasis change from mixing it up with Moliere or whatever to purely sketch or improv?

GA: We did all original material in the shows. We didn’t do any Moliere once we opened The Groundlings, and it was called The Groundling Show. Our very first show was a rave review in the L.A. Times. We never got a bad review the entire time I was there. I was there 7 years, if you count 72 when I started teaching, until 79. We were in a 30 seat theater in a very bad part of town, East Hollywood, and packed the place, not always, but we started to pack the place. Major heavy weights from the industry started coming in. Lilly Tomlin was coming in to watch us. Lorne Michaels, we didn’t even know who he was yet, was watching us. This is before Saturday Night Live, just before. Producers, directors, television stars, film stars were coming to see shows in this 30 seat theater. There were 25 people in the cast. 30 people in the audience when we packed it. Some times there would be 10 or 12 people in audience and we outnumbered the audience.

We did lots of improv, lots of music, and lots of material that came out of improv, like The Committee. We did scenes that were the same every night that had been derived from improvisation. We did musical improv and lots of music. I would say 1/5th or 1/6th of the time of a show was musical. The women outnumbered the men 2 to 1, the entire time I was there. This is almost unheard of in improvisational theater. It’s usually the men way out number the women in an improv company. The women outnumbered the men. Why? Because the women’s material was better than the men’s. [laughs] That’s not true. What I meant was …ok, I said the best stuff goes onstage, but I didn’t say it had to be mostly men’s. So, it turned out that when I put what in my opinion was the best stuff onstage the women outnumbered the men.


JF: How did the growing success of The Groundlings affect the culture there?

GA: It affected it in a very negative way in my opinion, which is one of the reasons I left. Let me compare it to today. I sincerely believe, and have friends at The Groundlings who tell me this is true, the main reason people join The Groundlings is to get on Saturday Night Live. The second main reason people join The Groundlings is to become a star, whether they get on Saturday Night Live or not. Lisa Kudrow became a star out of The Groundlings. Paul Ruebens, Pee Wee Herman, became a star out of The Groundlings without being invited to do Saturday Night Live. That’s true of many stars who came to The Groundlings. It’s the number one showcase in Los Angeles. Everybody in the industry goes to The Groundlings to get talent. That’s the main reason why people join.

That was not the case when I was there. Why did people join The Groundlings when I was there? Well, before we were successful, before we were well-known, before people were getting taken to do big jobs, it wasn’t successful in that way. People just wanted to do that work. I was running workshops 6 or 7 days a week, where all 90 of those students got private lessons from me. Half an hour each. I had a schedule that was unbelievable. I started at 8 or 9 in the morning, work all day, teach private classes. Some of the daytime classes were actual classes, not just private classes. Then at night I would teach classes.

I eventually trained two other teachers, Tracy Newman and Tom Maxwell, and eventually Phyllis Kaz. But at the beginning it was just me. I was the only teacher. People wanted to be there. So, when we built the theater in 1975 on Melrose where The Groundlings still exists with our own hands, and people donated their own money and people gave us no interest loans. It was out of the love of being at The Groundlings, the love of doing that work, the love of hanging out together. We would go on field trips together. We would do all kind of things together. It was an amazing, huge group of people. It was a gigantic family. That was why people were there. That’s not why people are there now.

I went back in 1990. I left in 79. They brought me back 11 years after I left to direct for 2 months. It was a whole different thing then, a whole different feeling. There were some people in the cast I loved working with: Andy Sterling, Lisa Kudrow, Patrick Bristow, amazing people, Julia Sweeny, who I loved working with. They were terrific, but it wasn’t the same. It wasn’t what it was before. It was very competitive. It was very cut-throat. It was the first time I ever ran the trust exercise where people couldn’t play it.


JF: What is the trust exercise?

GA: Everybody’s in a group in a circle, standing up. You put one person in the middle, have them close their eyes. You turn them around a few times to disorient them, then you have them walk in a straight line until they come to the edge of the circle. We turn them and send them back across the circle with their eyes closed. The Groundlings could not play that game. I have done that game since 1968. That’s the only time in my life where I’ve seen people who could not play that game. Why? They didn’t trust each other. They were afraid they’d get hurt. They’d fall of off the edge of the stage, because somebody wouldn’t catch them.


JF: So, why did you leave The Groundlings in 79?

GA: I don’t know. I’m going to write a book about it. Part of what I’m talking about had to do with it. It started to become a thing where people were in it for selfish reasons. And I’ve always said to everybody, and I have it on paper, it’s documented: we can get careers out of this. We’re here to learn, to grow, to develop our craft, and we’re here to get careers out of this. Terrific. And when you get a career, you can come back and work with us some more. It’s always a home for you to come back to. And that’s true. It’s still that way. I still go back there and do my solo shows and I direct shows. As an alumnus, I go back there all the time and do stuff. I was there just a couple of weeks ago, but I’m not a member of it and I don’t make decisions.

There was a big split that happened. There were two groups, sort of like in Iraq now between the Sunni and the Shiites. It was a big battle between these groups. They saw things differently. A lot of things happened between me and other people. It became an intolerable, intolerable place for me. I hated being there. There came I point where I just snapped one day, gave them 2 weeks notice and just split. And I built the company. It was like a father walking away from his own kids and wife and house that he built. I walked away from what I created.


JF: It’s a shame.

GA: I guess. I went on and did better things. I look at that as my high school days. My work is far better now than it was then, as an actor, as a director and as a writer.


JF: So what are some things that you’ve been proud of since The Groundlings?

GA: The work that I’ve created, the people who I’ve taught, the work that I’ve done as a director and actor since then. Many of my students have become gigantic stars who were not Groundlings, people I’ve taught since I’ve left the Groundlings. I do work in my classes now that far surpasses anything I did with The Groundlings, that far surpasses anything that’s being done at The Groundlings. I develop shows with people. I direct the shows. I’ve worked all over the country. I work mainly right now in Washington D.C., Seattle, New York City and L.A. I worked a lot in Fort Collins, Colorado in a really cool theater there. Also, at Colorado State University. With the work that I do I’m breaking new ground in the same way that Del Close broke new ground. I’m creating work that’s never been done before, new styles, new forms of improvisation. Help people create incredible characters. And I do my own solo shows and so forth. And I’m a singer-songwriter. I’m involved in so many things with so many great people, and not just people who are improvisers and want to do comedy, but people who are actors or writers or producers, directors, or people who are not show business at all, who just want to do the work. And that’s always been the case even in The Groundlings day. Phil Hartman wasn’t an actor when he came to me. I was his first teacher. I taught him for five years. He was a graphic artist. He did album covers. So, we’ve always had to this day people from all walks of life, not just actors. I think there’s nothing more boring than a room full of actors. If they’re mixed in with other people, they’re cool, but just actors? Uch, pretty boring. [laughs]


JF: So has your approach changed at all?

GA: Yes, it’s changed in huge ways.


JF: And what’s allowing you to make this progress?

GA: Freedom. I have no bosses. I do what I want. I take risks. I take the same risks I took then. The Groundlings were created because of the risks we took. Nobody had done the kind of theater we were doing. It was different from The Committee and Second City and all that, not only because we had more women and did music, but also because we created wild and bizarre characters that went far beyond what most characters were at those other companies and full make-up and costumes. Because I’m a theater person. At The Committee or Second City, you put on a hat or a sport coat or a pair of glasses, very minimal costume. You’re wearing basically the same pants and shirt throughout the show. You would just change your coat or a hat or something to play a different character. But in The Groundlings, think of Pee Wee Herman. That’s my grey suit by the way, Pee Wee Herman’s suit.


JF: Oh yeah?

GA: Yeah, I gave that to him. That used to be my own personal suit, that I wore.


JF: That’s like, I don’t know, like a mixed compliment or something.

GA: [Laughs] Well, Paul’s bigger than me. He’s taller than me. That’s why it didn’t fit him. He had about 20 copies made, exact fabric, the exact cut, everything. The original he wore holes in both elbows and knees and had to put patches on it.


JF: So, how does this freedom show itself in your workshops? What are some signs that you’re allowing yourself to be more free?

GA: Because it informs the things we do. We make discoveries. And I go ‘Look what we did. We’re creating new forms and ways of working.’ People are having breakthroughs that are incredible, both in their craft and in the material we’re creating and the forms of improv that we’re creating. Del Close created the Harold. I was one of the actors in it. I was one of the people who was there when he created it. I was one of the improvisers. Well, that was new then. Now it’s done all over the world. I’m creating the same thing. I’m creating other forms that are catching on. You need to come to my workshops to see what I’m talking about. It’s really hard to explain what it is I do.


JF: How do you encourage students to make these breakthroughs in class?

GA: By creating an atmosphere of support and trust so that they’re willing to take risks without thinking that they’re going to be ridiculed. There’s got to be no negative fallout if they fail. It’s all support and trust. You do the work. It’s valid. If you do the tasks of the exercise, if you do the craft of improvisation, you do what those things are to make the work work, then whether it succeeds or not and whether you make mistakes or not is not important. What is important is that you commit 100% to doing your best possible work. There’s no failing in my class. You can’t fail. It’s impossible. Because if you do something that doesn’t work then you learn from it, so how is that failure?


JF: In New York, one of the big things in the improv community is ‘the game,’ creating patterns and stuff. Do you ever encounter students who mention ‘the game’ to you?

GA: I don’t know what they mean by ‘the game.’ We used to do a thing in The Committee called the game, but I don’t think that’s what they’re talking about. What are you talking about?


JF: Um, repeating patterns within a scene.

GA: Repeating patterns is a technique. That’s nothing new. That’s from the beginning.


JF: Is that something that you encourage in your work?

GA: If a pattern emerges, we go ‘Oh, that’s interesting.’ Del Close said in Guru ‘All this bullshit about patterns. Screw it. I’m interested in relationships.’ Well, he went back and forth. Sometimes he would be interested in patterns, but you can’t be interested in one thing forever. It’s like ‘Ok, now I’m emphasizing patterns. Now I’m emphasizing breaking patterns. Now I’m breaking both breaking patterns and doing patterns.’ That’s what an artist does. People who get stuck in one way of doing things, to me, aren’t artists and they don’t do valid work. You keep changing your work.

Del Close and I became very close toward the end of his life. We talked about shit like that. He would disavow things that he’d done before. I’d mention something he’d done years ago and he said ‘I don’t do that anymore.’ And I feel the same way. I don’t do The Groundlings anymore. If they invited me back to direct there, I’d say ‘No, don’t want to do that anymore. I’ve already done that. I want to do something different now.’


JF: In your opinion, what makes a good improv team?

GA: Supporting each other’s work. Listening to each other onstage. Taking giant risks. A willingness to fail, not a desire to fail, but a willingness to fail while trying to succeed. Love, L-O-V-E for each other. That doesn’t mean you don’t fight. Families fight. It’s a family. You get angry. Fine, but you know you stick it out together. You’re not out for yourself. You’re out for the work. It’s about the work. It’s about making something work. It’s about entertaining an audience. It’s about getting an audience to come and see you. [laughs]


JF: Where would you like to see improv go in the future both artistically and commercially?

GA: I care that it’s theater. Period. If improvisation isn’t theater, I hate it. I hate to watch it and I won’t do it. What’s theater? Theater is putting the truth onstage period. As Shakespeare said, holding the mirror up to nature. Also, I add to that holding the mirror up to the audience. When you do anything in the theater, when I say theater I’m also talking about songs and movies and plays and television, good television that is, there ain’t a lot of it, basically you’re holding a mirror up to the audience and saying ‘This is what you look like you guys. And we’re all the same in so many ways. And we’re doing you. We’re doing us. We’re all the same. We’re showing you the truth about humanity and the truth about the truth about the world we live in. The truth about who we are inside and the truth who we are on the outside, the truth about our environment, the truth about global warming, the truth about relationships.’ That’s theater to me. And that’s what we do. And that’s where I want to see improv go.

My opinion of improv in this country and I’ve seen a lot of it is that 90% of the improv in this country is bullshit. 90% of the improv in this country has always been bullshit. 90% of the improv in this country is not theater. It’s people going up and talking and trying to come up with funny lines. And that’s bullshit. Del Close said the same thing.


JF: Do you have anything that you would like to say to the improv community that we didn’t get out?

GA: [laughs] Yeah, do good work, because most of you aren’t.


JF: [laughs] Oh, the gauntlet has been laid down.

GA: Yeah, if somebody says back to me ‘Who are you to say that?’ I’d say ‘I’m Gary Austin. Who are you?’ [laughs] If you have a different opinion, fine. Go have it. If you want to join my theater join it. If you want to join my workshop, join it. If not, go somewhere else.