EDINBURGH FESTIVAL 2009 - BWW Interviews: The Team From SHOWSTOPPER! THE IMPROVISED MUSICAL

How is everything going?

Adam: Great!

Lucy: Last year we were in George 2, which holds about 80 people; this year we're in George 4, which holds about 270! We've sold out every night so far - we keep thinking we're going to have a dip, but we've been OK. People are telling us they've seen it four times, so it looks like we're getting a bit of a fan base.

Are they new fans, or people who saw you last year, or people who have seen you in London?

Adam: I think some people have heard about us from last year.

Lucy: It seems to be popular with American students! We're doing three Critics' Shows [where journalists pick the storylines], with national press people, and the audience seem to like those the most, though we do less...

Adam: In some ways that's harder for us, though, we're doing the same as we normally do, but working backwards. It's weird.

You've been performing at the Leicester Square Theatre recently.

Lucy: Yes, and that continues in the autumn. It's an odd space to play, because we can't see how the audience are reacting. Often it depends what's been on just before us. When we did our show with Matt Lucas as the guest star, that was a good atmosphere. It's tricky, because we're not miked. We've been doing some shows at the Greenwich Theatre too. The space there suits us - it's like an amphitheatre almost, and we can go into the audience and play with people.

Adam: In the autumn we'll be at the King's Head, we'll have a regular show at the Drill Hall, as well as the Leicester Square Theatre and at Greenwich.

Lucy: We love the King's Head, they've been really good to us.

Adam: We need to play a bigger space commercially speaking, but we don't want to lose any of the venues we play now. It's difficult to find the right space for the show - too big and we need to mike it up, too small and it doesn't work commercially.

It sounds like it's becoming a full-time job...

Adam: It's not so much about it being full-time, more about bringing it to a wider audience. It's such a versatile show.

Lucy: We've done birthday parties where the protagonist is named after the birthday person! I'd like to do a radio show...I can see us all standing at mikes, but other than that, it would be like we do it on stage now.

Adam: We're always in the process of looking for new people, by the way!

Lucy: We've all been working together for four years, and doing Showstopper for a year and a half, so it's difficult for someone to come in.

How do you find new people?

Lucy: Usually through friends. One of our new people has seen our show and decided that's what she wants to do.

Adam: We had a recruiting spell a couple of months ago, and for the first time we had submissions from agents.

What does training for the new people involve?

Adam: Everyone new needs to have a level of flair to start with, otherwise there's not much that we can do. They don't have to have the same set of skills as us, they just have to have the potential to get the team narrative going, and an innate musicality. Ones who have that, we'll bring them in and see how we go. The best way to do it is to make them the lead character, because then you'll know. It's so hard to practise. Everything I know about impro, I learnt in front of an audience live.

Oliver: You might be able to sing, dance, unicycle and juggle - but you can only find out that you can do all four at one by doing the show!

Lucy: It's also looking at the calls that get shouted out - "Sondheim!" or "Jason Robert Brown!" - well, what does that mean? What are they expecting? You need to tick a box straight away. So we talk about what makes a composer distinctive and get that down. At festivals, you get people from other shows shouting out their own names... We get "Cheese" shouted a lot.

Oliver: Why would someone go to a show and shout out "Cheese"? Many of us teach somewhere or other as well, and there's such a renaissance of the improv art form over the last few years. We're not a show in isolation, though we do something that's particular to us.

Adam: Ten years ago it would have been unheard of that you'd do improv at drama school, and then set up an improv company. In terms of drama school, it's either not been taught, or it's been taught by people who don't do it. Then outside drama school, where are you going to go to do it? It's not in popular culture at all.

Lucy: It's huge in America and Canada. It's such a wonderful, liberating thing. There are times when we all join together and we - I don't know, it's almost like it's out of our control, we're that relaxed with each other. You reach a level of consciousness when you work with each other so much.

What's your favourite show you've done?

Lucy: It's rare that everyone will enjoy it as much as everyone else, and it's not necessarily the size of the part you have either.

Adam: One we did recently, I couldn't believe we'd improvised it. It was incredible.

Lucy: I liked our first show in Edinburgh last year with Mike McShane. Obviously we couldn't do it without the audience; they're such an important part of the show.

Are there ever audiences that you can't get anything from?

Oliver: Once or twice.

Lucy: Private parties.

Adam: Sometimes they stand there stunned.

Lucy: And sometimes you walk out and they're cheering from the start.

Oliver: Sometimes they don't know what they're going to get, but we get them by the end. I think people expect it to be funny-funny, but we like to think, well, what if we can do a good show that will really move you? What if we can make you cry?

Lucy: Occasionally people get a bit funny about what we do. One girl the other day was complaining that the show was "obvious".

Oliver: People get a sense of ownership about the show; of course we can't take on everyone's suggestions every night and people get disappointed.

Lucy: It's not human nature to share, but that's what the show is about. I love the ephemeral thing - the show is here for one night. That's why we don't record or put any of our stuff on the internet, because we don't want people to look at it. It's not for us to judge - it's for the people who were there at the time.

Adam: It's of the moment.

What's the worst thing that's happened to you mid-show?

Oliver: It's kind of an impossible question, because there's no wrong or right. If something goes wrong, you absorb it, you flow round it, like a river around a rock.

Lucy: Depending on the space you might not be able to hear the others, so you just ooh and aah instead. Other than getting calls like the infamous Abba number last year...I did a really bad Gilbert & Sullivan number once. I've always been a bit terrified of G&S, because it's very fast, very wordy, and I just went for it.

Oliver: Ah, but the audience love to see you fail as long as you do it with complete commitment!

Lucy: It's a great way to get them on side!

Showstopper! The Improvised Musical welcomes Mike McShane as special guest at Musical Theatre @ George Square on Friday August 28.

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