The Improv Life: This Guy Said What I’ve Been Trying to Say All Month
Wooooo!!! 18 blogs so far in Sept, baby! I’m learning so much about writing, content creation, communication, and connecting with people.
I’m thinking about what would be good blog ideas relevant to a blog about improv and sketch comedy.
One thing that’s keeping me creatively is engaging with art and media I really love. I’m listening to music I love, watching TV shows I love, you get the idea.
Part of that is to keep me stimulated and excited while thinking about the themes and messages in those works, while also thinking of the methods they used to communicate their ideas to their audiences.
All that to day this: you gotta consume stuff you love to stay inspired creatively; hell, swipe from them directly if you must. In fact, you should be taking as much as you can from that inspires you to create your own.
But movie director Jim Jarmusch says it way better than I ever can.
“Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is nonexistent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery- celebrate it if you feel like it. In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: “It’s not where you take things from- it’s where you take them to.”
Admittedly, I’ve never seen any of his movies, and I confused him with Milos Foreman for a second, but the dude is spot on – be inspired by what you love and see how you can make it your own.
The book “Steal Like an Artist’ expounds on this topic in a way that’s easy to understand, so I encourage you all to read it.
So like go consume the art that feeds your soul; it’s what will inspire you creatively too.
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