Courtesy of LATCo.
Michael Moss (far left, seated) and Betty Mujica-Milano (center, seated) joined up with LATCo. founder T.C. Matherne to ease the improv experience into Baton Rouge.
In improv theater, one of the first principles to master is “Yes, and—”
It’s an attitude of on-the-spot storytelling based foundationally on acceptance and collaboration. Step on stage, and your playing partner falls to the ground, sobbing. Yes, this will be a story of some sort of heartbreak. And—this is where the magic happens!—you go with it, however you’d like, but you go with it. Stand above them and say, coldly: “No Larry, no. I’m sorry. I just will not marry you.”
“In improv, there’s this whole structure of acceptance,” explained Michael Moss, the performance director of the Baton Rouge improv theatre and comedy collective, Leather Apron Theatre Company (LATCo.). “You have an idea, and somebody is going to come out with that idea and support you for it. If I come out barking like a dog, somebody else is going to come out barking like a dog.”
The philosophy fits an improv organization which—only three years ago—had just six members and practiced in the back room of Whole Foods, preparing for a city that hardly knew what improv theatre was.
In 2016, after five years of studying the art in Chicago, T. C. Matherne found himself unexpectedly returned to his hometown of Baton Rouge.
“I couldn’t be without improv,” said Matherne. “The catalyst for [starting LATCo.] was: this does not exist here, and no one else is starting it,” he said. “So if I wanted improv here, I had to introduce it.”
He founded Leather Apron Theatre Company and, appropriately enough, grew the project by word of mouth. When Moss—a local musician, DJ, and at the time, Matherne’s co-worker at Whole Foods—heard about the group, he didn’t know much about improv at all. “I’ve always loved stand up comedy, but was scared to really pursue it,” he said. “Stand up is so much baring of yourself. You’re on stage, alone, and if people don’t laugh, it’s like, oh, you’re terrible.
“When T.C. introduced me to improv, [I thought] oh my God—you know, you get this chance to be funny for people, and there is this whole support structure behind you.”
In the following months, a series of yeses streamed in as more people joined the group’s practices. And when Betty Mujica-Milano—who had been actively performing improv in Houston for a few years—returned home, and eventually made her way to that back room of Whole Foods with her own “yes”— the “and—”s officially began.
“Once Betty came into the picture, it became more than a hobby,” said Matherne. “She’s so smart and professional, she suggested we start doing shows, developing into an organization, She said, ‘This is something we can do.’”
“We don’t want anyone else to have to leave find improv. We want it here." —Betty Mujica-Milano
Moss used his local industry connections to book the group regular gigs at venues around town including Spanish Moon and Driftwood Cask & Barrel. (The former bar is being renovated and the latter is now shuttered, so these days LATCo. fills the house at Phil Brady’s, twice a month.) Once they’d established themselves as a popular entertainment entity within the community, Matherne, Moss, and Mujica-Milano (who now serves as LATCo.’s Creative Director) turned their goals to recruitment, hoping to build Baton Rouge a richer improv scene like those in Chicago and Houston.
“There is so much opportunity [in Chicago], you can kind of just jump in—start taking classes, get picked up by a group or start your own,” said Matherne. “There are shows every night of the week, sometimes three shows a night. So we’re dipping our toes in the water here, being thoughtful and trying to build sustainable growth, but modeling it off of those bigger markets.”
Last year, LATCo. began offering the first of a series of six-week formal classes in improv theatre training, with Mujica-Milano and Moss leading workshops in improvisation fundamentals, collaboration, character development, and more.
Offering these sorts of educational opportunities is a core part of the LATCo. dream, particularly for Mujica-Milano and Matherne, who each had to leave Baton Rouge to pursue their passions for improv theatre.
“People come here thinking they’re getting one thing. They come thinking they’ll become funny, which they do. But in the meantime, it’s like we’re hypnotizing them into learning how to be better communicators and more vulnerable.”
—Betty Mujica-Milano
“We don’t want anyone else to have to leave find improv,” said Mujica-Milano. “We want it here. Michael [Moss] is a perfect example. He is an amazing improviser, and also an amazing partner to collaborate with, and that opportunity would have never presented itself to him, or to our other students and performers, if T.C. hadn’t made a conscious decision to stay and do this here.”
“Where have you been all my life?”
For someone like me, the hardest part of improv isn’t Yes, and—. In fact, standing in LATCo.’s recent workshop, led by guest teachers Casey Haeg and Jon Butts of Two Friends Improv Theater in New Orleans, I felt freed by the exercise of “just going with it.” Like Moss, I found great comfort in the fact that whatever I did or said, these utter strangers were dedicated to supporting me in it—whether that be cuckooing like a bird or walking across the circle to a girl I’ve just met, shouting, “Where have you been all my life?!”
“People’s biggest fear is being judged for looking stupid,” said Mujica-Milano. “In my classes, I’ve got to reassure people that this is a group activity, and everyone will benefit from it if everyone can just let go for two hours. And in the end, when you learn to not worry about how other people see you, that gives you so much freedom in the world.”
Lucie Monk Carter
These days, LATCo. holds performances at Phil Brady’s on the first and last Wednesday of every month. This month, they’ll also close out the inaugural New Orleans Improv Festival September 27–29.
Surrounded by people who have literally paid to exercise the art of “letting go,” I imagined myself in a sort of silo of silly, protected from the rules of behavior that regularly govern my daily movements in the world. And my walls came down pretty easily. But in breaking them down, I came to realize how many I’ve actually built up.
“Vulnerability training is something that we’re all really missing,” said Mujica-Milano. “Our society doesn’t encourage vulnerability, doesn’t encourage openness, doesn’t encourage seeking out new opportunities.”
During the workshop, Haeg and Butts repeatedly emphasized that improv involves “muscles,” instincts that you have to work out and develop; habits that you have to break.
The thing is, explained Mujica-Milano, this muscle building develops skills that are beneficial beyond the improv stage—skills that can actually deeply enhance one’s life. “People come here thinking they’re getting one thing,” she said. “They come thinking they’ll become funny, which they do. But in the meantime, it’s like we’re hypnotizing them into learning how to be better communicators and more vulnerable.”
The workshop I attended was designed for Levels 2-3 improvisers, and many of the participants had already received some form of training. The disparities between my “muscles” and theirs were evident—particularly the “don’t think, just do” bicep. You see, following the crowd in ridiculousness is one thing. Going with the flow, saying “Yes, and—” to someone else’s concept—no problem! But putting my own ridiculousness out there—without the benefit of prior planning and coordination to ensure that it will work, that it will be funny—was frightening.
“As adults, we get so used to not failing,” said Matherne. “A huge part of improv is being okay with failure, pushing past that fear—because otherwise you won’t try anything.”
“You won’t know if it works until you do it,” said Mujica-Milano. “Throw the spaghetti on the wall, and just see, because somebody might come out and make it shine. And if it doesn’t work, you know that for next time. As much as improv is triumph, improv is also failure. And that’s okay.”
Pushing boundaries
On a Saturday evening, settled into a corner at Phil Brady’s, I watched as Moss sat in a chair, his right hand making wide circles around his crumpled face. Mujica-Milano jumped in, “Baby, no no no no the lipstick stays only on your lips.” Moss let out a sobby, exasperated, teenage girl whine, and Mujica-Milano grabbed his shoulders and said, “N—nevermind sweetheart. Forget what I said. You look beautiful.” From there the scene expanded and contracted to a story of prom night, parents very desperate for an evening away, a 10 Things I Hate About You paid-date scheme, and some spicy grannies. The bar was practically vibrating with belly-laugh after belly-laugh.
“What's really funny is being real, getting stripped down to feeling comfortable to say your truth, knowing the team is going to support you." —Betty Mujica-Milano
Anything can happen in improv—that’s part of its intrigue. The art form removes all pretensions of planning and craftsmanship. But it’s no free for all. The success of an improv performance relies—more than most arts—upon human connection. If there is no connection between players, there is no cohesion, no story. And likely, no connection to the audience, without which there is no art.
Lucie Monk Carter
Actor T.C. Matherne (pictured at far right) founded Baton Rouge’s Leather Apron Theatre Company in 2016 because, even though he loved his hometown, he “couldn’t be without improv.”
A successful performance in improv theatre—trademarked as a source of laidback, almost casual humor—requires immense, intense work on the self and the self’s relationship with others. Performance is no escape from reality, no severing of ties with one’s own inner character. Rather, it’s a constant exercise of pushing one’s creative boundaries—in real time, on stage, in coordination with one’s fellow performers. It’s no joke.
“People come into improv thinking, ‘Oh, I’m going to be a space alien from Mars whose eating a chocolate bar, like that’s going to be funny,” said Mujica-Milano. “But no, what’s really funny is being real, getting stripped down to feeling comfortable to say your truth, knowing the team is going to support you.
“And from there, hilarity literally ensues.”
In the real world, we all play our roles. And standing in a circle of improvisers, mimicking and responding to their on-the-spot storytelling, gradually finding my “Yes, and—”s, I realized how comfortable I’ve gotten in mine. I realized that if I exercised the right muscles—stepped outside the bonds of comfort and self-consciousness more often—I might find new, more liberating ways to live my truth. And maybe I’d even get a few laughs out of it.
Leather Apron Theatre Co.
