First day at The Second City: Complete

Yesterday was a lot of fun. I had a great time at my first class! I can’t wait to go back and do it again next weekend. The day started out with an unexpected roadblock, but luckily I planned ahead in case something like that happened, so everything turned out fine in the end. Let’s recap, shall we?

I woke up early, showered, and got ready to go; the usual. I invited my roommate and one of our friends to come along to Chicago with me, partially because I was nervous about driving there alone and partially because I knew they’d have a good time exploring Chicago while I was in class. We loaded up in the car and started to head out when my beloved TomTom died right in front of our eyes, so we were stuck with no GPS and thus, no idea how to get to The Second City. Luckily, Amy’s mom saved the day and let us borrow her GPS for the trip. 

Finally, after a pitstop at BK, we were off to Chicago. All systems were go until the GPS took us to a ghost town on the edge of Indiana. We were surrounded by creepy abandoned factories with zero people in sight. It was a scene straight out of 28 Days Later, but eventually we found our way back to the highway. The entire way, I really wasn’t as nervous as I thought I’d be. I was just excited.. until I saw the Chicago skyline. The minute I made eye contact with the Sears tower, my heart started racing. I don’t know why I always get so nervous on the first day of classes, but I do. As I turned onto Wells St., my nerves turned to inspiration as I saw the giant The Second City banner hanging from the building. I was ready to do the damn thing! 

We found a place to park and parted ways as I headed to The Second City Training Center. I was a little early, so I chilled in the lobby outside and waited. Fifteen minutes later, I made my way to my classroom. The back of the room was lined with black chairs, the front of the room only had one chair next to a white dry-erase board that hung on the wall. The middle of the room was just open space. The colors on the floor, the walls, and the ceiling were bright. We all took a seat along the wall and waited for the teacher to arrive. A few minutes later, she walked in and introduced herself; class was in session. 

First, she gave a little introduction to the course and to The Second City for those of us who were new. Then we went around the room introducing ourselves, talking about our occupations, where we were from, our comedic influences, etc. I was a little surprised to find that I was the only person not currently living in Chicago or the suburbs. I’m also one of only two who are currently undergrads in college. Everyone else is either fresh out of college, in their early 30s, or going back to school after a hiatus. There were two 40+ women, as well. I was also surprised to find that I was the only person in the room who listed Tina Fey as their comedic influence. Honestly, almost everyone listed a different person, which was really cool, because that means we’re a diverse bunch and I like that. 

After the introductions were made, we did a few improv games, which I wasn’t expecting, but I really enjoyed them. One of my favorites was a game where we were partnered up with someone else in the room. The teacher gave us a title (i.e. Tina & The Toy Car) and we had to create a story with our partners. The way it worked was that one person started out with one word “Tina” and the other person would add the next word “had” and we went back and forth creating a story that way. It was a really cool exercise, because it helped us to get comfortable working with others to create something, but it was also a challenge, because you may have wanted the story to go one way, but your partner could throw in a word that would change the story completely and that was fun. We did another game which was pretty similar to that one, but this time each person spoke in full sentences. So I would start out “Tina had a shiny toy car,” and then my parter would have to continue, except we had one rule: after each thing our partner said, we had to say, “Yes, and” then add our next sentence. It was a technique to get us to think about building up, rather than taking down. For example, you might have an idea and you’ll present it to someone and they’ll say something along the lines of “no”. That idea gets shot down and you’re back to square one, but when you present it to someone and they say, “Yes, I like that! And what about adding this?” Then you start to build something, and that’s how ideas become reality. I thought that was cool. 

Later, we did some writing exercises. We made some lists of different categories and then tried to make a sentence or a theme by taking two or three of those words and putting them together. Then, she gave us a topic and we had to write for 15 minutes without stopping. It could be anything we wanted, but we had to keep writing until the time was up. Afterwards, we worked a bit with dialogue. She gave us the beginning statement and the end statement and we had to fill in the middle with dialogue. (i.e. A: Please watch your step! —— B: It wasn’t that expensive.) I really liked hearing what everyone else came up with for this. It was cool to see how other people took it. 

Honestly, I feel like I’ve already gotten my money’s worth from this class and we haven’t even really dug into the thick of it yet. I’ve already learned so much about different ways of looking at things, ways to get my mind into a creative mindset and ready to write and create. I’m already looking forward to what next week will bring! 

I’ll leave you with something that my teacher told us at the beginning of class that I’m going to try to keep in mind from now on, because she’s absolutely right: “Never apologize for your tastes and never apologize for anything you create.”