This entry is aimed at people outside of LA and NYC who have bought UCB book and tried to do the pattern game and had trouble with it. Maybe even people IN LA and NYC, I don’t know. It’s an exercise which is a training wheels version of the pattern game. Let’s call it the “stations” pattern game.

And as you can probably already tell, this entry will be the most improvy improv entry ever. Holy shit, is this one ever nerdy. If you read this, you are in DEEP, my friend. But it’ll be worth it! I’ve been running this exercise a lot lately and it’s killing! You gotta try it!

WHAT IS THE PATTERN GAME AGAIN?

The pattern game is an opening. It’s basically a ritual where a group uses word association to turn a suggestion into a bunch of ideas. You then use the ideas to start scenes. At the UCB, as championed by Matt Besser, we use this ritual to aggressively develop and pitch very full comedy ideas at the very top of our show. You’ve heard of “game of the scene” – in the pattern game we almost build the entire game BEFORE the scene. Whoa, right?

Perhaps you’ve tried to learn the pattern game, which means you’ve become totally confused by the pattern game. I mean, it IS crazy. A bunch of people stand like robots in a semi-circle and blurt terms at each other. It puts everyone in their heads, and there’s no way to remember everything people say, and everyone’s eyes glaze over and looks down at each others shoes and it’s REALLY WEIRD. Right?

And to make it worse, everyone – EVERYONE – seems to do the pattern game a bit differently. Everyone likes their own way of doing it and turns their noses up at the way everyone ELSE does it.

Well, I like my way of doing it and I am looking down my nose at the way YOU do it.

Not really, but this exercise will help make the pattern game work. And once you get comfortable with it, you’ll see the pattern game is a powerful tool, and if you get good at it you will be able to do something that only a small percentage of improvisers can do: realize the game of the scene as you are doing it.

You should shudder with anticipation here, because that’s some major shit I just said.

THE PATTERN GAME IS WRITING

Okay, first off, give over to the idea that the pattern game is about writing. It just is. It’s pitching ideas to each other. You can try to liven it up with a lot of physicality and emoting, but you’re just delaying the root issue: you’re writing. That’s partly why this is hard. You’re using a different set of mental muscles than you do for the rest of improv.

There are people who think that anything that feels like writing is cheating in improv. Don’t be like that. Improv is acting AND writing. It’s MORE acting, yes, but it’s also writing and you should accept that.

I mean, the writerly types need to get over themselves and commit to abstract sound-and-movement stuff. And so the actorly types should get over themselves and do some thinky verbal stuff. Let’s all meet in the middle and use each others powers to become a huge comedy machine.

TELL ME THE EXERCISE ALREADY

Here we go! It’s a bit awkward to write out so stay with me, here.

6-8 people up. Could even be more. Whatever. Break into three groups of at least 2 people each. We’re going to call those groups “stations.”

STATION ONE: TERMS

Coach gives a suggestion to station 1, like “birdhouse.” Someone in the group says something which “birdhouse” reminds them of, like “hummingbirds” and then everyone word associates off the last term. Words or very short phrases. “sugar diet” “atkins diet” “fooling yourself” “lies” “the dog went to a farm."



The group should try NOT to be funny. Just do terms. Rich specific ones are better than simple boring ones.

STATION TWO: PITCHING AND CONFIRMING

As station 1 does their word association, the people in station 2 are listening and trying to think of funny ideas for scenes. When someone thinks of one, they go "stop” – and station 1 stops – and then the person in station 2 says their idea to the other people in station 2.



They just say it like a human being. They say “Okay, so maybe it’s a dad telling his kid about how the Atkins diet is not a real thing.”

That’s the pitch. Maybe that’s not funny. Maybe it is. The people in station 2 shouldn’t be too fussy. Be aggressive and say ideas even if you’re not sure of them.

Okay, so once a pitch has been said — SOMEONE ELSE IN STATION 2 HAS TO CONFIRM IT. They have to say back what is funny about the idea. They can clarify it, but they shouldn’t change it.

Something like “So it’s like a birds-and-the-bees talk, but instead they’re telling the truth about the Atkins diet, and that it’s a sham?”

That confirmation part is important. Because a lot of people will accidentally completely change the idea. They’ll say something like “So this is a world where Atkins is a huge conspiracy and you get in trouble if you’re not on Atkins?” In that case, the person who pitched it would say “no, not like that.” THAT’S RIGHT, IT IS OKAY IN THIS EXERCISE FOR THE PERSON WHO PITCHED THE IDEA TO SAY NO. Then someone else tries to confirm it, or that person who already tries keeps truing. Maybe the person who pitched it has to re-explain. They are talking like normal human beings here.

If the person who is confirming says something that amounts to a different idea, and the pitcher likes the new idea better — you should still stick with the original idea. For right now, being able to understand someone else’s idea is more important than pitching around.

Phrases that help to clarify a game: “instead of” and “as if” – instead of birds-and-the-bees, it’s about Atkins. Or it’s as if the Atkins Diet was the story of Santa Claus and kids have to find out.

Once the pitch has been clarified, station 2 is done.



STATION 3: EXAMPLES AND TITLING

The people in station 3 will then give three examples of things that might be said in the scene that station 2 pitched. Either lines of dialogue that would be said at some point in the scene, or just things that might happen.

“Son, it’s time to talk. Put down that bacon strip.”

“Johnny, when a person loves his body very much, he stops shoveling crap into it just because of a fad diet book.”

“My parents were pretty progressive. We never did the Atkins diet, they were big on telling me the truth when I was like 3. Yeah, it was intense.”

Really hilarious, right? Okay, it’s not great. But you can see how these examples fit the scene that was pitched. And if there was any doubt as to what this idea really was, we will now know. You’ll be able to feel it: AH, yes, that’s what the idea is.

After there’s been 3 ideas, then someone in station 3 gives a title. The title is not really a title but a phrase that describes what the game is. This part may be redundant with something that was said in the station 2 portion, but do it anyway.

So maybe someone titles this scene “If the Atkins Diet was like the Santa Claus story.”

Then the coach gives a new suggestion to station 1 and you do it again. Do it a bunch. Everyone take turns being in different stations.

What happens very quickly is people learn how to communicate their ideas to each other. And they see that even the weaker ideas can be very fun once station 3 tries to come up with examples for it. You learn how to talk to each other about games.

NEXT STEP: EVERYONE IS IN ALL STATIONS

For the next phase, everyone stands in a semi-circle and there are no stations. Anyone can do any part. But you still go through the same phase. People are saying words, then someone pitches an idea, then someone confirms, then 3 examples, a title and start over. So the same person might say a term, and then later give an example.

FINAL STEP: NO STATION 2, NO TITLING

And the last step is to skip what station 2 was doing, and you also don’t bother titling it because it sounds lame.

You do terms, and then instead of pitching an idea with full words – you just give an example when you think you’ve got something funny. And then the group does two or three other examples until you feel like you all get it, and then you go back to doing terms.

So it’d be like…

birdhouse, humming bird, sugar diet, atkins diet, fooling yourself, “son it’s time we had a talk – you’re too old to be avoiding carbs anymore.”

And then you’re doing something very close to the pattern game. At the very least you will have a common language for describing the games of the scene.

And as you do this more and more, try to use fewer and fewer words. Brevity is the soul of wit and all that shit.

Wait, who am I to talk about brevity? This entry is… oh my god, 1500 words. This is insane.

But wait, more!

HISTORY

I did an version of this in a class at UCB in New York, and one of the students was Shaun Diston. Then years later when I hired Shaun to be a teacher I saw him doing a stations pattern game in a practice of his I was observing. I was like “hey, I love that exercise” and he said “I got that from your class!” But he had improved it greatly. Then I took the way he was doing it and tweaked it again to the version I described above. I’m sure Shaun has tweaked his and it’s probably better than mine again. What I’m saying is that Shaun and I are at war.

Ok, that’s it! If you have read the UCB book and are interesting in learning the mad ritual that is the pattern game I recommend this training wheels version! Also if you want a way to practice naming the game of the scene!

Whew.