Accept Offers: When It’s Refused

More from @WillHines.

improvnonsense:

Here’s a weird one: You make an offer. The other person quibbles with it. Don’t back down: re-make the same offer and address whatever the person quibbled about.

• Improviser 1: If we drill for oil here, we’ll hurt the environment. We should march right into the CEO’s office and just quit.
• Improviser 2: This is ExxonMobil. We can’t just march into someone’s office.
• Improviser 1: You’re right. We’ll send an email right now, and then we’re going home.

Choose to see it like this: Improviser 2 is basically saying “I see you’re making an offer, but I’d like you to make it a little bit better, please.”

I know this contradicts a lot of what I’ve been saying, but every great improv team has an unspoken level of acceptable quibbling.  It’s a way to make our scenes smarter:

• Improviser 1: If we drill for oil here, we’ll hurt the environment. We should march right into the CEO’s office and just quit.
• Improviser 2: This is ExxonMobil. We can’t just march into someone’s office.
• Improviser 1: You’re right. We’ll send an email right now, and then we’re going home.
• Improviser 2: It just doesn’t feel right. Us quitting won’t have any effect on the environment.
• Improviser 1: Maybe not, but for our conscience’s sake.
• Improviser 2: Okay, for our consciences, yes let’s quit.

Offer improved and accepted, scene can progress.

A few things:

• Quibbling/rejecting an offer can be a bad habit, even if you’re doing it for noble reasons. Be sparing.
• Quibbling is bullshit if you’re doing it just to get laughs out of making fun of your partner’s offer. I do it a lot. I suck when I do that.
• I think when you quibble, that you’re obligated to try and accept the offer once it it’s offered a second time. Certainly a third.
• If someone quibbles/rejects three times, just give up and move on. It’s bullshit that someone would do that but it happens and it’s better to move on.
• Quibbling happens, regardless of whether you approve of it or not, so you should learn how to handle it (stick to your guns a bit, then move on)
• I like bullet points, I’m just realizing that now.

Here’s something I realize now is true, even though it contradicts everything I’ve been ranting about. I’m okay with people refusing offers! Sometimes it has to happen. As long as they realize it’s a big deal and they should only do it if they really really think the scene needs it. And they should expect to defend themselves to the coach after the show. What I see too often is people doing it with no regard to how much they’re hurting their scenework.