You're listening to the Broadway Podcast Network. Ryan Reynolds here for, I guess, my 100th Mint commercial.No, no, no, no, no, no.Don't, don't, don't.No.I mean, honestly, when I started this, I thought I'd only have to do like four of these.
I mean, it's unlimited premium wireless for $15 a month.How are there still people paying two or three times that much?I'm sorry, I shouldn't be victim blaming here.Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash save whenever you're ready.
$45 up from payment equivalent to $15 per month.New customers on first three month plan only.Taxes and fees extra.Speed slower above 40 gigabytes.See details.
Hey, what's up adventurers?Welcome back.Are we on?Oh, we're in it.Oh my God.We're live.The world in which our podcast begins is full of people who now know too much about, well, I can edit out the thing about your pee.
You can't edit this part out.It'll just be a mystery.They'll wonder, what was that complex P schedule?They'll know it exists, but won't have any more details.
It runs very similar to the MTA, where it tells you what's going to happen in 10 minutes, but then you're waiting for 20, and then all of a sudden it's a surprise that you weren't expecting.
And sometimes you're confused about which direction it's referring to.
I thought I was going uptown.I was not.Whoopsie daisy.Oh, man.Yeah.Well, we're here.Hey, as promised, it is the bar episode.Welcome.There are a lot of bodies in our podcast studio, I say, with all the finger quotes in the world.
Yeah, it's it's our dungeon master.Connor is here. He was much more excited to stop.Now I want an appropriate woo from everybody.Our tavern keeper, Stomp.Good to hit.Our bar swing, Cassidy.And it's me, Alex. Hot cha-cha-cha-cha-cha.All the swings.
I just want to sip from each of your cups.Yes.Yes.Just a little, a little.
But then you'll have to go to the bathroom faster.
Yes.Yes.Yes.Yeah.So we're here.We're here.We get to talk about bar stuff.It's like we, the four of us don't honestly get to sit around and do precisely this all that much, which is fun.
Have the four of us ever been in a room together before?
Yes, the four of us have.Almost daily, Cassidy.Yes, routinely.We share a dressing room.By definition, and the last of those two words, tis a room we share.
I think at this point in the podcast, it would behoove us all to know that Cassidy's been up for a very long time.How you doing, bud?
I'm feeling fresh and fishy fine, baby. Please don't ask for any follow-up questions on that.
Okay, fishy fine it is.Thank you.Hell yeah.Thank you all for being here.This is just a chance, I guess, for us to talk about what it's like to work from behind the bar and goof around as well.
But before we do that, you two have not been on the podcast before.Both of us?No, this is our first time.This is it.This is everybody.We've had all nine cast members now. The listening public.
Oh my God guys stop making out.
We're looking at it.It was but a gentle touch of the fingertips filled with camaraderie and affection.Is that what the kids are calling it these days?I don't know what the kids are calling anything these days.
Camaraderie.I mean camaraderie.I mean what?
Amazing.Well, let me just say, I'm a fan of your podcast.Oh, hey, thanks.It's not mine.I've been listening to it on my bike ride home.
Hey, it's been a delight.I think that says something if you're willing to listen to your coworkers continue to yammer at each other like maniacs on your way home.That speaks to the general camaraderie and gentle touching of this show, I think.
But before we get into like, Before we really start the heavy packing here, let's let's just could you maybe take a second to like introduce yourself to the this part of our audience?Like how did you when did you get into Dungeons and Dragons?
How do you find yourself at the like at the tavern?Sure. I'm Connor.
I'm a DM here.I joined With a Tavern a little later than these other two adjacent to me, Cassidy and Stomp, and certainly much later than you.I watched Cassidy DM this show over and over and over and over as I was in rehearsals.
Studied their every move. took extensive notes, stole is just shamelessly from them.I started playing Dungeons and Dragons in fourth edition.There was a your eyes widen.
I just I everyone talks so much shit about fourth edition.
Yeah, I don't necessarily understand why I do.I do appreciate the streamlining of fifth edition.But maybe it's because I didn't have the storied history with either Pathfinder or 3.5 or anything like that.
It's 3.5 that like everybody's mad at.Yeah.You hear people like complain about 3.5.But you also have people who love it.Die by it.Yeah.I think it's the best one.Yeah.Because it's crunchy as shit.Yeah.People who really love long division.Yeah.
I want to meet those people.I know we're talking about you right now like an intro but just like the specific like sect of the human population that's like big long division fans.I respect them.Huge long division fans over here.
It's super real.We could also just call them Warhammer people.Like yeah I mean like yeah it's super duper crunchy.People that like love the like war game mechanics of tabletop RPGs.Can I share that I think I would love to be a Warhammer dude.
Dude, I think you would too.I think you'd like it a lot.Like Kill Team is like, you have a ruler out.
Like you're like, there's a little play ruler that it comes with that you're like, you know, you can miss, forget a hex, you can be like a millimeter too far out to like hit a guy.
I, there are parts of my brain that really light up at that.
And anytime I go into a game store or a comic store and they have the big, sort of effectively the nerd version of your grandfather's attic train set, this just takes up an entire back room.
I get very, but I always, I, I, I am clearly a card carrying nerd with, you know, a great deal of comfort in that environment.But I have been so intimidated and I have not been able to go up to someone and be like, hey, I'm trying to play this game.
How do I like what?There's like a monetary investment in there, too, right?You've got to get the set and all that.You have to also not be living in an apartment in Brooklyn.It helps.Yeah.
One of the main requirements says it right there in the instruction.Oh, yeah.I got it.Queens, Staten Island or bust. I think that's fascinating.So I know nothing about the Warhammer universe.
I know the mini painting is about as close as I get, because I love watching people just be that passionate about it.But the way you're describing it, it's like, for me, I keep flashing to like, it's a war film is what's in my head.
And there's just a general with a long stick pushing the troops forward.Be like, we're going to attack this range.Everybody's got a hammer.And I just, I love that idea.
Yeah, I would style myself in the vein of like Animated film starring dogs and this dog is the bookie and he's got the green kind of see-through visor.
I love You know like have the cigarette dangling out of the cigarette holder as I'm pushing as you are prone to do Yes, yeah
That's okay.Never.He never tips the ash.Do you ever watch that?He just lights it.It goes all the way to the filter before he just puts it right out in my Winston Churchill.
He's in there back there putting a safety pins in them.Safety pins.Paperclips.That's what I want.You know, thank you.I have been channeling Winston Churchill in this show for months.
No one has acknowledged my character work. I've just been wheeling myself around, waiting for the compliments.I just really thought you really liked the crown.
Wait, Sergio, you've been wheeling yourself around?FDR cross-reference here.It's okay, I've been Joseph Stalin referencing.Yeah, no. I was trying to make a Joseph Stalin reference.
I was like, what's the thing I could have been doing that would make me the third allied power?But I can't, I couldn't think of anything that wasn't really horrible.
LGBTQIA ally, and I think FDR, Churchill, and Stalin.
You know what's a fun position that we four uniquely find ourselves in?Yes.As echoed by this moment, being on stage and contending with facts.What?Facts.
Things that, you know, so rarely are we forced to reveal the things that we do and do not know in front of an audience of several hundred.
Absolutely.And it's kind of where, to an extent, the improv, I won't say has to die, but it's where you do have facts that you can't just like... Pretend anymore.
You're like although or I mean as some of us also were confronted with what a chalice is the other night Okay, I mean to just absolutely huck you under the bus, please, but you just said that like you weren't even in this show No, I wasn't I wasn't the stories Absolutely, we're sending sending pictures of it to the group.
Okay, you got absolutely It was amazing I'll offer this story
A tale as old as time.Sure.Two words start with the same letter.The brain.Makes them smooch a little.Sometimes make them smooch a little too much and they switch places.
What two words are you referring to?I won't explain myself to you.
Chalice and candelabra. Okay, interesting, because the photo, giving menorah.
Yeah, it was a menorah for sure.A menorah is an ornamental candelabra.
Beauty and the Beast would be horrifically different if Lumiere turned into a menorah.
It would be super different.It's true, the arrangement of the candle holders are all in a single parallel line.
It's a two-dimensional, I'm drawing with a Sharpie, so this was the looted item, someone said chalice, and I was like, great, and I saw the candelabra in my head,
awesome started to draw it got really into it wasn't listening to anything that was happening on stage which would have clued me into the fact that i was drawing the wrong item because everyone was talking about drinking from this thing that indiana jones has to pick the right one of yes right yeah diego was doing you some favors he was saying like oh there's still some juice at the bottom of it should we drink it
Not the blood of Christ.I tune out for that.So I don't know.Oil, I guess, that there wasn't enough of.
And if there are podcast listeners who have not seen the show, but there is a moment where we loot an item and it is the DM's job to draw that item.Yeah.And this is this was that moment.
And in that my the little hamster running on the wheel, powering my brain and nervous system and Extremities has only one thing it can focus right shut down.
I'm drawing that item paying attention to nothing else I mean, that's a my I mean, I've watched you do it I've watched you do it from a TK perspective and I've done it myself with like you watching me do it and we have not gotten to DM and Yeah, I guess we have
Yeah, you watched me.I drew some insane shit for Brianna Erica one time and I can't remember what it was but like You pull up reference crap man, and like I love watching Connor.It's amazing.
Oh, yeah You got a whole method dude because you really do lock it out my apps my asses listen to them the whole time Absolutely, I'm like I was someone whose ass is doing you don't want to do that.
Oh I sit there politely and stare at the players while they just pun their way through what feels like the longest minute of our lives.Connor goes completely quiet and is drawing the great works.
I am staring at three people who are trying to figure out how many different ways they can cram a mac and cheese pun into this moment.
It's honestly impressive sometimes.
That word sometimes is doing a lot of work.No, I know, it's a lot.
It's a tough, it's a weird, I mean, I've been at every single part on the board for that moment, and it's one of the weird, I mean, we can get into these moments of, the moments that you really have to fill on stage that aren't really improv moments.
It's a moment of, for me, it's like, what the fuck do I do for, this 35 seconds while people are going to get somebody from the audience or like the puzzle, the riddles and stuff.
Well, they're like a moment for us to like chat, but it's odd to like, yeah, to fill it out.And like the drawing moment is strange that way, right?Like you, you, it's so, empty.It's so it could be anything.Right.
So, yeah, the players have to like the players are also struggling to make stuff up exactly as the DM is going like a fucking pickle nunchuck.How do I draw a pickle nunchuck?All right.What does a nunchuck look like?I've totally forgotten everything.
I go into a time void.I do not know if it's been 20 minutes or four seconds.It was the moment for me watching the show.One of the moments I was most anxious about.
Really? Yeah, it was one of the things I was gonna ask what everybody's sort of favorite zombie.You want to say hi first?
No, it's chaos and and and we're all here but like what we've all met each other, you know, we're to reintroduce We asked for your story.You said I used to play D&D 4.0 and that was as far as I go.Yeah back to talking about but like
Yeah, would you like to step up and introduce yourself?And I don't know.I mean, you say every night on stage that.
And that intro's not a lie.Yeah, I know.So yeah, hi everyone.Ooh, weird to say that when I'm looking at Cass, who I've known for months.But I'll keep making eye contact.Please do.I'm Stomp.I'm the tavern keeper here now.
Joined the company when they came to New York, which was great.Started as the understudy, and here I sit. And yeah, I've been, so D&D's been peripherally around me since I was a kid, because my dad played.
And back then, that was something my dad did on Wednesday nights with his guy friends and left, and I didn't go play with them.That was his guy's night out.So it was nerd poker.Yeah, it was nerd poker.
And so I, and watching him have the graph paper, and he didn't have a lot of figurines, so the nondescript, that pop tab's gonna be you for a little bit.Yeah, your hand, yes, Cass, you have a question?
My hand is raised, yes.Was your dad a DM?
You know what, we've never talked about.He probably was, but I think at the time, this was my friend Stephen Gladish's dad was running that campaign.The fact that I was able to pull that name out of my hat is impressive.
Stephen and Julie Gladish.That's just a goofy scene.That's very funny.
Yeah, and he did it on Wednesdays.And so I grew up with his monster manual and his player handbook and everything, and I would just fantasy use them in the real life like they were wizarding books, because I was that kid.
And then I found D&D back again prominently when I started working at the Renaissance Fair.So this was seven, eight years ago is when I started playing full-time for myself and started doing campaigns and everything.
But it's gotta be, are they're competing at a Ren Fair?Are there like competing campaigns?
There's at least three to four going on, because nobody, it's weird too, because the Pennsylvania Renaissance Fair, there's a pro company that's like 40 actors live in the back half of the fair, so they bring in all these actors and they're there full time for like four months.
Do they live in the tops of all the buildings?
Some of them, yeah, some of them.
Oh my god, I've wondered.So I used to, in-laws had a house like a mile away.So I've been to the Pennsylvania Renaissance.We were probably there at the same time.
I remodeled the apartment above the place where you can get giant pickles.That's one of the last things that I did.Put the feather in my cap.
Pickles aren't big enough, guys.We need more room for pickles.
No, I didn't remodel the place.These nunchucks are supposed to be a deadly weapon.
And we're using fucking corny shawms?What are we doing?You don't know the stress of having to put curtains- These nunchucks for ants?
We never had pickled nunchucks, but we did have, so there's a, at the fair, Matt Selley, one of my dear friends plays the sausage king of the Shire and he has sausage nunchucks.He's Abe Froman, sausage king.Don't you laugh at me.
Weirder things have happened in this room than that sentence.
I would imagine that all of us, if any of us are on TikTok, served a whole lot of pickle priest this past season.No, just me.He's a guy at the New York Renaissance. Oh, oh, I do know him.
People go and pay like $3 for a pickle, and it is a like three minute interaction where he's like, yes, I will pickle you with this pickle, and here is the pickle that is in the name.
And it's a whole production, and everybody praises it, and he's like, yes, our transaction has ended.Some of the Ren Faire people.
And it caught on, and then people got into it.Some of the Ren Faire people that have broken out on TikTok are very precarious, and I shudder at their existence.
Well, it's just, it's that thing of like going viral, right?And they, I mean, good for them.
Like they found a shtick, but like when you've worked at one for so long and you see how every day is and then like you randomly get on Tik Tok and you see someone who's like doing, doing their, like their shtick and like, Oh, this is, this is clout driven.
Yeah.Good on you.I mean like good on you, but it's very interesting.Wow. But yeah, so then, yeah, D&D through the red.
It's just like, you know that they're walking around like the cock of the walk in Troy, New York, because their pickle shtick has caught on on the internet.
And I love that, but then at the same time, I will roll my eyes out of my head and be like, my guy, we are pretending to be subjects of Queen Elizabeth.Like, we are Americans in the United States clamoring for what?
Also, there's a Wolverine over there.
So we had this thing at the fair, it was like we said, play to the height of your intelligence.
I had a director who'd be like, because people do, they cosplay as whatever they want, which is brilliant at a Ren Faire, but you try to like bring them into the world.
I love a Star Trek OVA team at a Ren Faire, it's like my favorite.
And we have, when you have like stormtroopers come in, this director of mine would always be like, oh look, there goes a soldier of the Holy Roman Empire.
What strange firearms you bear, Traveller.That's so funny.That's great shit.But I, yeah, well, welcome.Here we are.Thank you for having us.We're here.You're good.And I... We're here?You're here.We're good.We're good.
But I think that was gonna be a question.I was gonna say, what's, what are favorite moments of the, like, for all of us behind the bar, what's like your favorite, do you have a favorite moment in the show?Period.It's like to perform.
I, I, we already talked about it.The looted item moment is easily my favorite.
I love it so much.Tell me why.I just think that it's, it's such a silly, silly thing.
Um, it feels like, like the one and only time that like, instead of just getting like a name from an audience member, it's like, it's kind of like a collaboration of like,
let's have a conversation you me 400 people all at the same time let's talk about the silliest thing we can find right now and then I inevitably make a terrible drawing of it and people make fun of me but then like they pretend like they love it and it's it's just like this fun dynamic of just like I don't think they're pretending
Did you do the broken key the other day?Was that you?I just saw the card floating around.
I loved it I thought like the idea of a broken key I would have and it's like I would have drawn a key I guess it was in half or pieces or maybe I wasn't there but like that it was a key with no teeth Tickled me.I just saw the card.I had no concept.
Yeah, that was my fault because they did say they just flat-out said broken key is one of the moments between where Cass was like downstage and like flip it back up to me at the bar and I was like and I just off the top of my head I was like, oh, do you mean it's like when you go to make a duplicate but you've just bought you never finished the steps.
So it's just this Because they had failed
They had failed combat, and so I said, you know, someone give me an item, and they're like, a key, and I was like, great, exciting, but like, you know, what is it about, what's the special thing about this key?And someone just goes, broken.
It's like, great, the broken key.What are we doing here?
I can tell you one I don't like.Wicked shirt.Well, and I say that because the TK experience is so, I mean, for myself, I'll speak solely on mine, I'm a huge fan of every night of the show because I get to watch.And it's brilliant.
And the energy from the audience.And I'm watching two separate performances.I'm watching you all on stage in a one shot that we all have very well memorized.
But I'm watching you all try new things, and watch the players try new things, and then I'm watching the audience enjoy.And it's being my own audience member, while still having my finger on the pulse of when I have to click an election and whatnot.
And it's great, and the show is always so vastly different. I get to genuinely react and laugh.That's one thing I really love about this experience and this show, is that I don't have to stifle it.
There is so much professionalism happening, but they are not asking me to not not enjoy my work, and enjoy the work of my friends.So I am laughing, and I am enjoying it, and it's great.
Genuine breaky moments are some of my favorite things to have on stage.
And that's what I love, because that's, I mean, I grew up with The Carol Burnett Show.That was every morning before I went to school.Watching them break at each other and enjoy each other is paramount to having fun.
The moment I despise is when I have to tell a room full of people, no, you didn't figure that puzzle out and now I have to explain it.
That is a moment for me, the show comes to a screeching halt because there's not a single person in that audience that cares about an answer to something they didn't succeed at.We can't go back and do it again.Here's how it works.
idiots shut up you didn't unscramble the words you didn't do teamwork right you can just you can you feel the ire especially when you know and it's all statistical based they've been chanting c4 together for like I hate when they chant.
I hate when they chant because they chant but then so many don't type it in and then we're in this weird moment of I have 300 people playing, 60 of you got it right, somehow all of you chanted the answer and I still have to say no you failed and I feel like afterward they're gonna follow me to my car.
That's the moment, because then damage is coming and it's upheaval, it's a bad item, and they're going to follow me all the way back to Harlem and be like, listen here, Baldy, I don't think you were playing fair.And I'm like, I was.
I would turn the computer around if I could.But yeah, that moment.I hate that moment.
yeah i mean they don't love failing a ton uh i how about i don't know about y'all but like i actually really enjoy when it's like at the very end you get the language you get to be like the ritual is largely a failure i that sentence is really fun to me to just be like
I was very afraid of failing the audience for so long and I last night maybe was my first true worst outcome killed the wizard abject failure and I think there is something
satisfying about it when it is earned, when the audience is able to see where the failure came from.
And so when I say... Was it narratively appropriate?
Yeah, when they were like, when no one's like, hey, WTF, man, when it's like, Yeah, I see how we got here.You are not wrong.
In fact, we were busy trying to fuck everybody.Yeah.We really should have concentrated on the mission more.
Right.And when it yeah, when it feels like we went on a narratively enriching adventure together.Yeah.That had dire consequences.And we now get to take ownership of those consequences.I think that those failures can feel good.
But I do think it's a tightrope act to walk.
Because you. You have to make sure that you are communicating how equally exciting it is to fail or succeed.That one is not right and one is not wrong.Right.That we are telling a story and this story had a certain color or flavor of ending.
But that the it does not dictate the fun we had along the way.
No.The like. if any show was ever the journey, not the destination, right?And I was talking to Aabria about this when we were talking is like, what a cool thing that we get to do that we get to fail because you can't do that shit.
If you've had people listening to your actual play for like two years, you can't just be like, yep, then the bad bag comes in and all the three characters that everybody's done all this fan art of die and you lose and it's over.
no one will ever listen to you again.It's a really cool thing that you can just come back and try again tomorrow.
And I think to that end, someone who sits and has I feel it, but I have less of a horse in the race on the audience response to the ending.I don't narratively take them on this journey.
I help facilitate their involvement, but I do not, as the TK, you don't really have a narrative thread through anything.You're kind of just, you are the consequence to actions.You present the action and you are all the consequence.
I have to applaud all of you who DM, everyone I'm sitting around.I'll take some applause. I'm ready.Gentlest snaps.I don't want to overload the microphone.Ignore my ego.
But no, really, because you all have a really great ability to adjust the text that you're given to fit that.
I mean, I know that our scripts can update for the ending, but you can feel a little bit like maybe that ending monologue of like the failure, though the game has told us it is an abject failure.Maybe it's not.
Maybe that's not the sentence you want to say to this crowd.
There are a thousand different ways you can say, was largely a failure.
It's just brilliant.Again, it's brilliant to sit on that side of things because I then become the only real person who knows how much care you just did in that moment.
because on the outside, they're hearing it, and they're hearing it, and they're leaving the theater, and they're just, they're thinking that's the show.And I'm sitting there going, nah, they were presented with, I watched this person craft this.
I know exactly what those bones were, because we stare at them every day.And I think it is just, it's brilliant, and it's fascinating to watch.
I really, I am very envious of the Tavern Keeper position to be able to watch the DMs like self-edit, and move a story along, and know a beat that needs to shift.And you, all three of you do it spectacularly.
Yeah, thank you.So I mean, thanks.
Absolutely.All right.How's that go for you guys?How do you feel?Do you feel when you are self editing and moving stories along and moving pieces around confident and secure?I'll take a stab at that.
That's creating a great edit point for me to pee.
You guys will talk shit about Connor while he's gone or
Nah, I gotta work with him for like 30 minutes.
Yeah, go for it.Man, what a stinky guy.
Describe the stench.Describe the stench in detail for the listening audience.What does Connor Mark's smell like?If you were to get a big whiff of that Mark's funk.
It smells like if you put a stinky sock in like a trash can.
Have you ever seen that meme of that child?
And then you dream where you, and then you had a, but you didn't, but then you didn't, but you were, today.
Sorry, I was just pulling some stinky socks out of trash cans.
You wanna take a stab at the question that I forgot what I answered?I'll take a stab at it.That was a sentence I said.
For me, and I'm sure anyone who considers himself a storyteller has a different experience, there is something so non-empirical about the experience that you cannot do the arithmetic to arrive at the mathematically correct
way to structure the sinusoidal roller coaster of an adventure, that it really is just a gut instinct of feeling in the moment.
And again, for me, having the little, you know, one skittle rolling around my skull that I call a brain, I don't often remember exactly what has just come before or the exact trajectory or map of the story that we've been telling.
But I do have a feeling of it, this kind of ectoplasmic residual sense of what we've done and where the story wants to go.It sounds a little woo woo, the story piloting me versus me piloting the story, but.
I mean, to those of us who watch you a lot, I would assume that you have a very... I mean, it feels to me like you're locked in all the time.Sure.
There's things you're doing, like foreshadowing with characters, and I feel like you manage to pull in the stakes that the party establishes and translate them into the NPCs in a way that I am always trying to emulate.It is very cool.
I mean, I try to let go and let tear as well, pretty much, because that's not my strength.My strength is references and dumb jokes and one-offs and impressions.But yeah, I don't know.
But I think you're selling yourself a little short there.I think to that end, it's the idea that we can't do this show with a preconceived notion. Right?
We're literally fighting chaos.
We're literally fighting chaos.But to that end, we know Carriers of Chaos in its entirety.We know how it's going to... There's A, D, whatever.
We know what the sandbox looks like.We know the structure of the sandbox and the rails.
For anyone listening who maybe has never heard this before, improv does not inherently mean funny, improv is just listening and responding honestly without knowing what you're going to say.
So I don't think it was hippy-dippy at all, I think that's just very honest, you can't have a preconceived notice.I mean, at the end you have the bones you can fall back on, but all three of you listen so beautifully to the players.
And to the wonderful individual over here, our Alex Murray, who is also a player, you all provide such wonderful stuff for the bar that it's just, it's gifts.
And when you listen and you can hook in, you making a, the player, you making a strong choice, is the greatest gift you can give to the other side of the bar.Because the open-ended ambiguity of it all, that's when it gets a little muddled.
But if there's a specific thing, ooh, that parameter is gonna, it's gonna cook something brilliantly. And every election's nine or seven seconds.
Oop, there you go, that's the tidbit I can give from my... I suppose I mean less that my intention was not to talk down to myself.And in fact, if I were to risk the opposite and buttress myself up a bit.There you go.Buttress away.
Yeah, that we've all been doing this, not only in this show, but in our lives and careers for quite a while now.I think that
I don't know who is the chicken or who is the egg, but there is a clearly compelling draw towards storytelling, either because we have that in us or because we were drawn to it and it gave us that extra little spark.
You know, if the players make strong choice X, I'm not doing the inner math to say, well, at this point in a story, in order to balance that, I need to make a choice that goes in Y direction.It is very much a vibe.
It is a feeling of like, how does my body as a storyteller.
Respond yeah, and trusting that those instincts are whether they're correct or not doesn't matter just trusting them and going with them and correct is a weird thing to get into with improv right like correct is other than no, but right other than no and
And to answer your earlier question... I haven't seen you in 20 years.No, you've never seen me.Okay, that's wrong.
You've seen the facade I put out there.
See, now that you're improvising... The question you asked earlier of moments that we really do or do not love.
This is sort of a new moment for all of us.This is a slow macro development that the show is taking as we are starting to, with all of the NPCs, wander further and further off leash in a way that I love because I find it to be so surprising.
And that is where I have a lot of fun playing with poking.
And, you know, if the story that the players have been telling is a story of this, then when I interrupt them or when I join them as an NPC, it's very fun to think, OK, if they're telling a story of grief or loss or mourning, how can I, as this character in a very indirect, circuitous way, prod that or light a little fire under that or do something that agitates that story?
Yes, for lack of a better answer to that.Like, this is the thing that I'm talking about that I really have, like, watched you do a lot that I'm like, oh, this is so good.
And it's just like, it's great to see like a mouse guard pop up and without like directly doing it, just say some stuff about like, you know, being your truest self and then watching like a bird paladin crumble.
And you have to figure out how because you can't say you can't show up at some house and say, oh, you're telling a story about self-actualization.Here's my experience with self-actualization.You have to kind of sneak it in there.Yeah.
And it's very rewarding for me.
I really enjoy that quite a bit.It's rewarding.And also, the more I do it, the more I'm there.It also informs your character more.Right.Well, you're like, all right.It just gives you something.
It gives you less to have to make up, which is great when you have to make up so much. And I would be curious to hear your thoughts.
My kind of ethos around this role, at least as a dungeon master, but I think in many ways referring to the bard generally, I consider myself there as a gift basket for the players that I'm really just trying to enrich and enliven their ability to be funny, their ability to go on a journey.
And so all of these NPCs, there are opportunities to use a new character to shine a spotlight on them or to give them a gift of something to munch on later or push them off a cliff that they then have to contend with.Figure out how to fly, dude.
Or don't.The DC on that push is a 20.
Yeah, Connor, I just want to I really want to commend you on on I think I just I have really enjoyed watching you in this DM position because I think you you really took the role of DM and like turned it upside down and I've loved watching how you play with it and your ability to just kind of sit back and listen and and be so much more reactive as opposed to generative as the NPCs is just it's a very thrilling thing to see and and I think that
When I first started in this position, I kept the NPCs on a very tight leash.And I was like, I want to be word perfect.And I want to honor the script perfectly.And improv is for the players.And I just read the words.
And seeing you just be so free with it has kind of like, I'm like, oh, maybe I would like dip my toe into the pool of like, oh, let's try and just, and just exist in the moment and see what happens.
And I still think I still think I'm like, kind of like shimmying my way in there.But it's just, it's a very exciting thing to see and to do.
Well, that's incredibly kind of you.You make my day.Thank you.You can get lost in it, though.
Oh, yeah, you could absolutely like for that's when you all get me doing a little finger twirl.We got to keep it moving.
Watching you do it there.
I get my heart. Or Saf just likes to, with me, just takes the, just holds up the timer.
And I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That is for sure the, for me, the most stressful part of the job is time management.
It's so much easier now that we don't have, I mean, it's about to get hard again with Travis, and then it's gonna get hard again with Erica, but my God, it's so much easier when like, I think my first one with Brea, I like, we were going into like,
the frickin' wizard's hut, and we had like 17 minutes left, and I was like, excuse me?
This, I don't, alright, everybody sit down, and then you just start, I just, I lose my mind, I don't know about y'all, I can't think of anything other than like, get there, get there, get there, get there.
Because all I want in this world is for Sam to not be mad at me.There's nothing I can do.I just wanna stay out of trouble. I'm just trying to do a good job.
Talking about shining a light on the players and what it's come around to do, how about in combat?Do y'all get geeked up to win in combat?This is a thing for me that's very strange.
As a Dungeons and Dragons player, I want the urchins to fuck them up.Interesting.But as a collaborative person on stage, what I want is a good story.What I want is a good thing.I mean, this is different for you, but it's this strange thing.
I guess the larger question, too, is in moments in the show that are pointedly adversarial we are fighting y'all like do you find yourself to get caught up in like the adversarial nature of it or do you manage to sit back
Let's talk to our resident psychopath and serial killer over here, angling for a TPK every single night.
Hello?Okay, first of all, that's called committing to the bit, learn it.Second of all, I actually, I don't, stop, don't roll your eyes at me.
No, the committed to the bit got me.Please continue, murderess.
Okay, I think I love saying that I love to be adversarial, but I think, in all sincerity, I don't really feel that aggressive against the players on stage.
I'm fully just down to let the dice do what the dice do, and then just goof off around the surrounding circumstances.Because if there's one thing I have learned that does not work on stage, it is
trying to put on a character or trying to like do a thing.If you're reacting to something inauthentically, it just, it doesn't work.It doesn't work in the story.It doesn't work with the audience.It doesn't work for yourself.
You just have to be in the moment and just be yourself and just be present.And so like when combat's happening and I roll like shit and I miss everyone, then I just kind of, I'm like, all right, I'll just miss all of them, I guess.
All right, moving on.I gotta know. Do you have a thought?
I'm just thinking about how, ipso facto, authentically, you live in the truth of wanting to destroy everyone else on stage with you.
And it would be inauthentic, you know, not to reveal too much, but I'm balancing everything you're saying with the reality of getting text messages from you after the show that just either brag about how many people you killed or are genuinely furious that you did not kill more people.
I pray that those are just regarding the show. Perhaps I am at fault for not seeking further clarification.
And suddenly I will be recoloring all of our interactions moving forward.I do not feel at all that way.I do not look to come out on top.I think it's
It's you lose a little wind in your sails at playing the playing D&D as a human being with your friends playing D&D or in our version of it on stage when it feels like the DM is putting on training wheels and you're like, yeah, all right, come on.
You know, like we clearly just beefed it.I don't think we should be getting out of consequences, please.
So that is there, and I do respect that, and I cede to that.But, yeah, I'm not trying to beat up everybody.
I fight more often than not.For me, personally, my adversary opponent arrives when house opens, and they just don't know we're about to fight until about an hour and a half into the show.
And then it's me and the 300 of those people sitting out there in the dark.And that is, I love that, though.I love fighting with them.I love fighting with the audience.
Yeah that's I was I think sort of the last sort of thing I want to get into while we're all here but yeah I don't know I had one last thought on the like I have every once in a while I'll go I think the last one or two shows ago I mean I don't do it as often as y'all do but uh like I was behind with with Stomp we were behind like you know we're we're crouched under
Listeners, we don't get to leave once we come on the stage.Once the dungeon master and the TK are on the stage, but when house opens, you're there till intermission.
Yeah, we don't disappear in like a trap that hydraulically lowers us.That's just creaky knees getting me to the floor a couple of shows ago.
I don't remember who it was, I think it was with you, Connor, but I made a noise that was palpably loud before the music started when we were getting down to it.It was like, tonight's quest, carriers of chaos.
Connor, Connor, Connor comes around, I just go,
One of my favorite moments of the show to come around and see the manner in which stop is lounging behind For you hip abductions the other day we were Lego produce
Stomp and I, when we first started back in April, would work out during the video.
We would do push-ups the entire video.
Or we would plank the whole time.Bonkers.I don't know why we would do that.I don't know why we did that, because then I would stand up and be like sweating out of breath.
I'm like, the world in which our tale begins is almost just as picturesque.
Like falling over, trying not to pass out.It's really nice, I promise.
I think I just jumped back there one time a couple shows ago, and I just looked at somebody and went, hey, let's beat up on them tonight.And some was like, yeah, okay.
And like, not adversarial, not like I want to win, but I was just like, let's see what happens if we really wail on these guys tonight.They've had it too easy.We've been on the easy path for like three days in a row.
And I was like, let's give them something to fight.
And really all we can do if we look at each other and say that based on how the game is designed and wanting to have something for the audience, that's just our but our intent can only go so far, you know what I mean?
Dice will dice, and if the audience is involved and they're actively engaging in, let's say I do treat it like a video game, and maybe we're not on easy, we're on intermediate or adventurer mode, even then, if you're still engaged, you take on the computer, baby, you'll still get me.
Well, there was I think that was the show that there was a fight where someone was like, let me do this as a this check.And I just went, no.And they were like, I was like, that is not a performance that is acrobatics.
And they did it and they rolled and it was plus zero.And they were like. Nope, nothing happens.And then somebody else came up with a card to like, make it work.And it was like, you know, the pressure made diamond, but I don't know, not adversarial.
But I think we've got just a few minutes left and enough time for us to talk about the fourth player.Like how is dealing, have y'all, have the two of you had to deal with like rooms full of people before?
Stomp and I both came up doing standup a little bit. Which is like what that is, like crowd work.How much crowd work had you guys done?A little?
Sure.In a formal setting?Yeah.Maybe next to none, which if I may. in talking about favorite moments.Yeah.That first time that you solicit a name from an audience member.So much fun.
I don't know if I love it or if it has just become symbolically significant, but it stands.I might be misusing the word litmus test.In fact, I'm almost certain I'm misusing the word here or about to misuse it.
No, I think I think you're going to nail it.I don't even.
Well, thank you for your confidence.
This moment right now is a litmus test for your litmus test metaphor.
That when I first started rehearsing and was about to do the show, you know, I had watched Cassidy be so clever and charismatic in those moments.And it is
as unpredictable as a moment can get in the show because you are you are throwing something into the unknown even outside of the bounds of the structure that the performers have sharing a language you're throwing it to someone outside of that world and anything can happen oh yeah and so
Leading up to my first show.I remember being the quote good student that I always Neurotically endeavored to be I started trying to brainstorm what?What things someone could possibly say in the ways in which I might have a quippy response now?
They're way crazier than you are prepared and what I found and it has informed my philosophy about the show is that I When I try to lean on that crutch, I really acquitted myself of an opportunity to listen and to be present and to be authentic.
And that as soon as, as long as I was relying or trying to subtly angle something towards a pre-programmed response, I was not available to whatever delightful surprise could happen in that moment.And so as
And and I am proud of this and I do feel like it encapsulates the relationship that I'm now coming to have with the show.The more I was able to learn to trust myself, trust everyone that's on stage with me and really.
say vulnerably, hello random person, I don't know what you're going to say, but I know that if I really just ask you a question and I really just listen to your answer, then something organic and unique and delightful is going to come out of that.
And it has been a constant training to deprogram myself from the anxiety of that unknown.
There's a thing that an acting teacher of mine loved to say, which I'm sure is echoed by a lot of folks, capital F out there, leap and the net will appear, leap and the bridge will appear.
I live for that moment because it's, for me, that's the first time they really get to know the tone of how the bar is going to respond.You know, onboarding is great.
Onboarding, for those of you who have maybe seen the show once, a handful of times, maybe you've gleaned this, onboarding, that's the canned part, right?That's the guaranteed almost like 15 consistent minutes.Sometimes.Sometimes, sometimes.
Or, you know, Maddie may open the beer differently.Or things literally explode. But for the most part, though, that's like, because it's perfunctory.But in that moment, when we finally break that wall, they also learn how the DM responds to bullshit.
They get to see a little bit about how the tavern keeper responds.
I think they get also the true, they start to really see the real inside of the relationship of that duo, because every configuration of the bar is so brilliantly different that it's maybe very subtle,
they all start thinking about how they're gonna interact if they get looked at or called on to.Instantly.
It's just, it's fantastic.And like, I miss that.
And that's absolutely like, the fair kid talking and being, you know, when the gates open at 10, not being away from people for like 13 hours and being in character and interacting and then a little bit of that drag background that's, you know, getting to have that bite with people, but a bite in a way that's endearing and they still wanna,
They want to be, as someone looked at me, they said, your brand has turned into, I'm a bitch, somehow we're all okay with that.
Oh, it's every really good New York bartender that I've known can look at somebody and just be like, shut up.And they're like, huh, thanks.Sorry, I needed to be told to shut up, you're right.Yeah, it's amazing. Well, yeah.
Well, anybody got a final thought they want to say about audience work or being a DM or TK in general?I'm sure we'll all talk about it lots more, but thanks for getting us all here as a jumping off point.And bar 101 for our listeners.
To the audience out there, as you continue to, and I hope you do, as you continue to come back and see us, and you continue to go to improv shows everywhere, I implore you with this, don't try and be funny, we'll do that for you.Oh my god.
And that sounds so hateful.And maybe I meant that.It's not what we need from you.
We don't need jokes from you.We're going to do jokes.
We used to say that in my improv troupe.We were asking for suggestions.We would always say, we're going to ask you for things.Don't try and be funny.We will do that for you.
Because if you try to game us, we are going to get stuck in a very unpalatable experience.Versus if we're like, can I?
Hebria Iyengar is going to fucking get in your ear and lecture your ass off the stage.
I know you all have heard me say this, I laugh at mundane and I laugh at specificity.So when we get some of those suggestions in the book, and there was one that was like, denim, moist denim, but not from water, something far worse.
But it didn't tell me what it was.That was the suggestion.And I, intermission just was a timeless experience for me.So I think like, I just, yeah, I love, I love the audience.I love when you all are here, thank you.
Just, you know, we got it, don't worry about it. You paid to be here and they pay me to be here.So let's.
Hell yeah.Well, thank you.Thank you, audience.Thank you.Yes.Thanks for coming.Thanks for listening.Yeah.Thanks for listening.Thanks for listening.Thanks for sharing.Thanks for interacting.If you want to do all of that more, join the discord.
There's a link right in there.We're talking about all this nonsense and like we're listening and bringing that into these recordings and stuff.So come hang out with us. It's all sorts of fun going on in there.Come see the show.We're doing it.
Travis McElroy is going to be here over Thanksgiving.
Holy crap.That's going to be hard for me to be cool about.I'd be so crazy.Yeah, it's going to be so fun.And it's going to be a blast.
And even when there aren't super duper famous middle brothers here, like we're all here being hilarious and amazing and having fun. six days a week.
So, you know, come chill, come hang out, have your suggestions ready now with all this new advice that you've got.And yeah, real quick, you want to just say your name, socials, all that?
Yeah, I'm Cassidy Sledge.You can find me at Cassidy Sledge on Instagram.
I'm Connor Marks, Connor underscore Marks.
Oh, you're done?I thought there was going to be more.I actually have to look at my ad real quick.I don't know.I was so nervous.No.Hi, everyone.I'm Alex Lompoli and the, oh goodness, that's my story.Oh, it's going to play music.Cut this out in post.
What is my ad? Oh, it is just A. Stompoli.I wasn't sure.I wasn't sure.Hi, everyone.Alex Stompoli.Yeah, just go to the Instagram at A. Stompoli.There's the woefully un-updated website, alexstompoli.com, just so we have that in the bag.
Yeah, might as well get them in there.
It says, pardon our pixie dust.We're still construction.I just stopped.For like, got a little man with a construction shovel. Just so I don't lose the domain.Geocities.com slash asunfold.
Much like the Space Jam website, I haven't updated since 1999.
I refuse.All friggin' Comic Sans font and neon day glow.I'm a Helvetica boy.Hell yeah.Yeah, you would be.
It's like Times New Roman, but a bit pithy.
I don't need a syrup.Oh, I'm at our Alex Murray.Follow us at the 20 sided tavern.Come hang out.We love you.And until next time, ale.And well met.
There's going to be one, maybe two pee breaks for Connor, and I'm so sorry to fuck with our flow.That's all right.
The part of the day, your flow, chug fluids, pee like five times before the show, and then do not drink anything for the rest of the night.
Your flow is part of our flow.The flow in us salutes the flow in you.It's all good.
Can we mic the bathroom door?
Yeah, yeah, we'll let him go to the bathroom and then we'll just slowly through the ceiling like we're in Mission Impossible.
Just stick his microphone in.I would love to see you in a skin-tight bodysuit dangling down from this tiny little bathroom.
Which has nothing to do with what you just talked about.I would just love to see you in a skin-tight bodysuit.
Full stop, skin-tight bodysuit.My imagination can only go so far. I also like the idea of like... The BB-EG tonight is like... R. Alex Murray Skin tight!
Gimp suited Heist rigged R. Alex Murray
I don't know about you, but I personally feel like the world could use a lot more kindness right now.
Hi, it's Robert Peter Paul, your friendly neighborhood VPN host of The Art of Kindness, a podcast that spotlights people in the arts who make the world, well, you guessed it, kinder.
From icons like Carol Burnett, whoop, I blacked out, to Tony winners like Stephanie J. Block, to Olympians like Laurie Hernandez, we've featured so many wonderful guests from all corners of the biz to give you intimate conversations and kindness tips.
I'm thrilled to say we're returning for a fourth season, whoop, whoop, this World's Kindness Week, with guests like Ian Armitage, Judith Light, Betty Who, Corbin Bleu, and more!So please join our kindness community over at vpn.fm slash A-OK.
And I do hope you're doing as A-OK as you can.Let's build a kinder world.Aww, audio hug!
Sign in
