Influence 2

The past couple weeks Craig and I have got into conversations after shows with students or audience members, they usually ask how long the team has been around. When we say 18 years they'll invariably ask how long each of us have been on the team. Craig always over shoots how long I've been playing with Schwa, last night his first guess was 8 years(it's been 2 and a half). He's one of my closest friends and it feels like we've been playing together for a long time.

For the first couple years we knew each other Craig was my teacher and coach. I looked up to him and modeled a lot of my improv after what he did, sometimes lifting moves, characters, and initiations whole cloth. Time past and we became regular friends. At this point I'm sure someone watching would be able to see Craig's influence in my playing style but not nearly as prevalent as it use to be.

Yesterday both Schwa and Prime were really fun, solid shows. Craig and I usually dissect them afterward, these conversations use to mostly entail him telling me his impressions of the show, now it's much more of a discussion with disagreements and different angles on certain elements or scenes. Divergent ideas on success and satisfaction.

In a way Craig is my longest running collaborator, we've had a creative relationship of some kind since he taught my level 3 class, my improv may not directly mirror his any longer but he was my main source of inspiration and guidance for a long time. Now as friends with a substantial history we perform together and discuss improv as equals. It's one of the great joys of my life.