An Evening of Improv

John Inazu and Tane Danger.

If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to be a guest on The Theater of Public Policy, John Inazu recently wrote about the experience for his Substack, Some Assembly Required. He also included some of examples of his thought process and messages and then showed clips of how the improv team used the ideas as inspiration.

Tane and I began the evening dialoguing for about 30 minutes about themes from my book. The Theater of Public Policy followed up our discussion with improv, bringing the concepts we discussed to life. I then answered some questions from the audience, and the improv team closed out the evening with a final round of comedic portrayals.

I am a professor and a lawyer. I try to throw in a humorous story or self-deprecating joke where I can, but my content is not usually mistaken as uproariously funny. That means any effort to translate it into a humorous register has to be really good. The Theater of Public Policy was really good.

Tane and I covered a lot of ground in our first segment. At one point, I emphasized the importance of attaching empathy to people not abstractions. The improv team satirized the absurdity of empathizing with a symptom (stomach pain) rather seeking to understand the underlying cause in the person experiencing pain:

The show was part of the 18th Eugene McCarthy lecture on the St. John’s University campus September 19th. If you’re interested in watching the entire performance, you can do so here.