COMPOSER-SONGWRITER
 
Silent Tree Music 

A DAY AT THE IMPROV
with  
DWIGHT SCHULTZ

From my experience, Dwight Schultz (The A Team, Star Trek:
The Next Generation) was good at teaching, at least the
Acting I course he taught during the summer session of 1970:
informative, interesting, enthusiastic, experiential.
Having just transferred from Salisbury State College,
a smaller, more rigid school, I felt somewhat apprehensive
about calling a college instructor by his first name,
as I recall Dwight had requested.

I think it was Dwight who got me to really be aware of being
in each instant, each moment, "in the now"
(a slightly critical point in improvisation).
Not using hyperbole, one of the most outstanding experiences
of my life occurred in that class during an improv exercise.

Briden Fitzgerald (a beautiful, energetic red-head) and I were
to create a situation in which we each had opposing motives &
objectives, carrying them through to some form of completion.
My objective was to commit suicide by pushing myself off of a
high bridge. Hers was to keep me alive.

From the training I received from Dwight, as homework,
I went into my memories and drew and expanded
upon an experience in which I had been in a car accident.
Building upon feelings of guilt, sadness, remorse, self-loathing,
internally I became someone who had killed an entire family
via drunk driving, except for one critically injured young girl.

This became extremely real for me, not only internally, but
what I thought I was actually experiencing in the "real" world.
I saw the steel girders, cables of the bridge supports, the road
grime & dust on the concrete decking of the bridge behind me.
I could feel the roughness of the concrete ledge on which
I was sitting, the cold of the girder against my back.
I could see the green paint chips flecking off the railings,
revealing a different shade underneath. And way down below,
the white-caps of the water of Baltimore harbor.
(I just noticed that I do not remember feeling the wind
which would have created those white-caps.)

So, there I am, sitting on this bridge, feeling like crap,
determined to end it all, going over my last regrets, when
this busy-body passerby comes walking along behind me
on the sidewalk of the bridge and starts talking to me.
So distraught, I paid no attention to her being gorgeous.
She was more of a momentary annoyance to me at most.
I don't recall too much of the conversation,
but it soon became apparent that she was trying to talk me
out of jumping. That was not going to happen.
My mind was set. I was adamant. No turning back whatsoever.

Realizing her efforts were losing, she called to a fisherman
walking along the bridge, complete with 3 fishing poles,
tackle box and a soft, brimmed hat perforated with lures,
to assist her in saving my life.
Then it got really physical as they were wrestling with me,
trying to pull me back to safety.
From my point of view, the time to jump was now.

Reality check:
There was no fisherman or any of his paraphernalia.
Briden had grabbed another student from out of the class
to help her.

There was no bridge or water.
I was sitting on top of a typical (not-so-sturdy) school desk
in a classroom at Towson State College
(now Towson University).

Mr. Schultz had to actively get involved to get us
to stop "acting" before somebody got hurt.
He gave "A"'s to both Briden and myself.
The "fisherman" probably got extra credit.
The entire class was enthralled.
Not sure if that was our final exam or not, but for me,
no other exercise in that class came nearly as close.
Dwight gave me a "B" for the entire course.

I guess I should have thanked him for stopping us when he did.
No telling how my mind would have reacted to hitting the water.

I wish all my memories were as clear & lucid as of that improv.
Not sure what impact that experience had directly on my life.
It is one of my fondest memories & definitely a high point in
any acting I have done, a strong demonstration to me not only
of my own capabilities, but of those of the human mind & spirit.
I would like to think that that improv also had a positive effect
on my writing, if not from anything else,
than from being experiential and "in the now".

- Mick Terry
1-6-04

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Copyright © 2004  MICK TERRY  All rights reserved
[ Reprinted here by permission of the author. ]
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