The Spontaneity Shop: Performance and training Improvisation company
Home > About > Q And A > Deborah Frances White
- How long have you improvised?
- I started in Australia when I was a teenager. Theatre Sports was a big deal then - on the tele and everything. I was addicted to watching shows, doing workshops and sometimes getting to do shows at La Boite Theatre in Brisbane. I moved to Sydney, London, briefly Israel, New York and then back to London again and that's when I started improvising seriously. (Well not seriously, playfully but you know what I mean.) It's now such a big part of my life I can't imagine not improvising.
- You co-founded The Spontaneity Shop. When and why?
- We were rehearsing and did bits and pieces in 1996 but our first proper Spon Shop show was on 22 April 1997 at The Troubadour. (We're doing a 10 year anniversary show in the same venue on April 21 2007 which is very exciting.) We were doing workshops and shows with London Theatresports which was great but I really had a vision of how things could be (partly due to my time in Australia doing Theatre Sports and partly due to the amazing and inspirational training I had with Patti Stiles and our "secret impro" group which met twice weekly in London). That combined with my obsessive need to be in charge made me think that Tom and I had to go out on our own. In the words of Greenday "For what it's worth it was worth all the while. It's something unpredictable but in the end it's right. I hope you had the time of your life." (Was that quote too long?)
- So what is it that you do now?
- Everything from working in the office to dreaming up shows, TV formats, fun things to do and setting things in motion so they can happen. I love teaching impro and designing new things for our corporate training business and I also get to do fun stuff like meeting TV producers to talk about new formats and how we could make them happen. I suspect one day someone will knock on the door and say that now I'm a grown up I have to be a mortgage adviser but it hasn't happened yet.
- You're also writing a book about improv. What's that about?
- Yes a lovely man from Continuum Books has commissioned a book called The Definitive Guide to Improvisation. Tom and I are writing it together. It's everything from how to improvise, our insights on improv and well known formats to how to start your own group or approach a TV company. It'll have lots of interviews with those in the international improv community and will be published sometime next year. If you don't buy it you're not a real improviser. (That's going to be the slug line on the cover. The royalties from that book are the only pension plan I've got.)
- What's your favourite improv memory?
- Appearing on stage at The Loose Moose Theatre in Canada and winning the Maestro the first night I performed there. I remember playing a high status bitch who revealed that her best friend had invented her boyfriend. I was quite a new improviser so I was constantly surprised that I could do it.
- What's your advise to new improvisers?
- Our motto is "We suck and we love to fail!" If you stop trying so hard to be good, you might be brilliant. Trust your obvious. Be there. Really see what you're doing and believe it. Always Be Changing. But mainly, have fun. If you're having fun there's a good chance the audience is.
- You've also co-written a screenplay. Tell us about that.
- Yes I've written a romantic comedy with Philippa Waller and Monica Henderson called The Wedding Pact. We just sold it to Fox Searchlight and so are cracking open the bubbly. We have some further commissions in the pipeline and no-one is more surprised than we are by this blinding bit of luck! If you're at The Cannes Film Festival I'll be there the middle weekend so give me a call!
- What else do you write?
- I wrote a play which was selected by Christopher Hampton for The Cameron McIntosh new writing festival. I've also written for Radio 4 sketch comedy. I'm currently writing a drama for television. Last week I was overtaken by a snail who's writing his autobiography "Memoirs of a Really Slow Snail". I wish writing was as fun as drinking with friends 'cause experience tells me that I'd do it more.
- What about stand-up?
- I'd been compering improv shows for about 10 years when I suddenly realised I was doing stand-up. I went to the Edinburgh Festival this year and did a solo show called Deborah Frances-White is Phoning It In at The Underbelly. It did really well, I had a blast. This year at The Edinburgh Festival I'm doing a show called Deborah Frances-White's "How To Get Almost Anyone to Want to Sleep With You" at The Gilded Balloon. See the show page for previews in London - you can't afford to miss it if you enjoy being sexy.
- What's your maxim for life?
- Our greatest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our greatest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. (Actually that's Nelson Mandela's maxim but I stole it. If he wants it he'll have to come and get it and you should remind him that I'm powerful beyond measure...)
- How many degrees of separation are you from Kevin Bacon?
- I was in a show for The Royal Court with Jonathan Pryce who was in What a Girl Wants with Colin Firth who was in Where the Truth Lies with Kevin Bacon. In other words I was at his house for dinner last Tuesday. He's a rubbish cook.
- Would you rather accept an Oscar or wield a light saber?
- I'd drop a light saber and slice my own hand off for sure. If you have one keep it away from me or I'll have your eye out. Now an Oscar - I'd carry that round in my handbag, you know, just in case people wanted to look at it. Could I have it converted into a handbag? If so, that would be the greatest handbag in the world. If Carlsberg made handbags...
