Life, Values & Legacy: Our Chat with Russ Gooberman of Studio City

Russ Gooberman shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.

Good morning Russ, we’re so happy to have you here with us and we’d love to explore your story and how you think about life and legacy and so much more. So let’s start with a question we often ask: What’s more important to you—intelligence, energy, or integrity?
For improv, I used to most value intelligence and quickness. I still do — all of the best players are very smart people. However, recently I’ve veered heavily towards commitment to character, which I would label ‘integrity.’

One of the goals of my workshops is to take players out of their heads. Well, someone might ask, “Where can I go for ideas, if not my head?” My response is that having ‘ideas’ on stage often get in our way. To conjure an idea, one has to recede from the audience for a moment, into the mind’s eye. I prefer ‘discoveries’ on stage — observations made in real time that are immediately justified into the fabric of the ongoing play.

Often, these discoveries or observations just come from the gut — a quick read, a feeling. Hoping for ideas to enter our head interferes with the process of listening to our guts. In the Viewpoints parlance, this inner-listening practice is called ‘kinesthetic awareness.’

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I’m a teacher in LA’s longest running improv theater, Burbank’s LA Connection. Though LAC is a ‘Whose Line’ style short-form theater, I’ve spent most of my training in the IO/ Second City lineage of emphasizing grounded scene work and three dimensional characters.

In the interest of creating richer, more emotional resonant improv, my troupe recently put on a production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream and are currently working on a take on Brecht and Weil’s Threepenny Opera.

Threepenny, by the way, was the second ever production put on by David Shepherd and Paul Sills’ Compass Players in Chicago – considered to be the originators of American improv. So we’re interested in following the history of improv as an artform, down to its roots.

Appreciate your sharing that. Let’s talk about your life, growing up and some of topics and learnings around that. Who were you before the world told you who you had to be?
Someone who bounced around quite a bit after college. Someone who flirted with law school but found it fatally inauthentic. A digital nomad who worked in tech for over a decade, studying search algorithms.

I didn’t fully commit to the artform until I spend a few months living in NYC’s Chelsea doing Iyengar Yoga, working at a startup and taking improv 1 at Magnet Theater. Upon returning to LA, I fully committed and went through the program at IO – hanging on for a few years on various house teams, before joining house teams at Second City, The Pack Theater, ACME Noho, The Clubhouse, The Fanatic Salon and virtually every other improv black box in the city.

I”ve also spent a lot of time studying with some heavy hitters of the artform, including Dave Razowsky, Jeff Michalski, Jane Morris and Jaime Moyer.

Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
After every bad show? Not quite. One of the reasons that I love baseball so much is because it’s a failure-oriented sport. The best hitters in the world, fail in 6.5 out of every 10 at bats. In improv, you really do have to get a bunch of bad shows out of your system before you start generating good ones with any regularity.

While I don’t actually want to quit — I am a fierce critic of myself. I made a deal with my staunch inner critic — as long as he (She? Who can say?) stays out of it during shows, I will listen to the critics’ insults after the show is over.

I think our readers would appreciate hearing more about your values and what you think matters in life and career, etc. So our next question is along those lines. Is the public version of you the real you?
No! The private version of me is an intellectual introvert who spends most of his time reading, gaming and watching his three kiddos. The public version of me often just gets to play freely — and is eternally grateful for the outlet.

Thank you so much for all of your openness so far. Maybe we can close with a future oriented question. How do you know when you’re out of your depth?
That’s where I live. An improviser thrives on just a little bit of uncertainty. Too much certainty is boring. Not enough is too vague. On stage, I strive to consistently swim just a bit out of my depth.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://russgooberman.com/portfolio/improv-coaching/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/russgooberman/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/improvnexusla
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@RussGooberman

Image Credits
Just The Funny (Miami)
from Midsummer on Magnolia (at the LA Connection)
from Hamlet on Melrose (Rosencrantz & Guildenstern)
Eggman from Sonic the Hedgehog
From Harry Potter Live! at the Broadwater with Breadstick Bodega