Music in The Second City

Theatre Arts
Mike Descoteaux '98
Head of the Music Program
The Second City

The house lights go down and the music goes up. The audience becomes quiet. The actors in the wings plan to make things up as they go along, and the director couldn’t be happier. This is a typical production at Chicago’s world-renowned improvisational comedy mecca, The Second City—the training and performance center that is alma mater to hundreds of comedic greats.

Behind the piano, sparking the creativity, is the head of Second City’s music program, Mike Descoteaux ’98. His role is a hybrid. He sings, writes music, and plays a host of instruments, but won’t call himself a musician. “If I were a musician,” he laughs, “I’d have to practice a lot more.” As a teacher, a director and a collaborator, he says, “spreading the gospel of improv is the best part of what I do.”

The Second City was founded in Chicago in 1959, its name a self-mocking nod to the idea of New York as the country’s first city and Chicago as the nation’s underdog, the second city. “This organization is aligned with the city politically and socially,” Mike says. “Chicago is a sophisticated, worldly place, but it also has the laid-back feel of the Midwest. It’s casual and open, but with smart, metropolitan ideas and a keen knowledge of what’s going on in the world.”

Keeping up with current events and popular culture is fundamental to improvisational comedy, which relies on spontaneous creation and speedy reactions. Mike explains, “Using improvisation we can respond to things that are happening right now—to what’s going on in the headlines.” Successful improvisers have a sharp intellect and know exactly what they’re satirizing, what’s fresh and up-to-the-minute. At the same time, they can’t take themselves, or their subjects, too seriously.

Mike studied theatre, music composition and voice at Northwestern University, and spent much of his senior year working professionally. He traveled the country with Child’s Play Touring Theater and shortly after that signed on with Second City, recruiting and training music directors and presenting improvisation workshops worldwide.

“We conduct workshops with four-year-olds, autistic children, CEOs from major corporations,” Mike smiles, “and the workshops aren’t that different. Basic improv skills are essential for our globalized world where we’re all connected, and where many jobs can easily be outsourced. You need to be able to offer skills that no one else can. In that context, the ability to communicate effectively, to think outside the box, and to say yes to others’ ideas keeps you in the front of your field. [Improv] has become a transferable and valuable skill.”

Mike and other Second City staffers do residencies in schools, since many schools can’t afford full-time, in-house art, music or theatre teachers. “Working with teachers in all kinds of curricula is so gratifying. The mandatory testing brought on by the No Child Left Behind Act has forced teachers to teach to the tests—cramming numbers and facts without much attention on the learning process. We can’t just be learning facts—we have to be flexible. We have to have imaginations. Our work on improv facilitates all of that.”

Last February, Mike and Erica Elam, a fellow Second City collaborator, spent a week at Milton teaching master classes, conducting improv “jams” with students, and connecting with faculty members. Active in the performing arts during his Milton years, Mike credits Milton’s faculty with giving him carte blanche to explore his interests and talents. “Milton was all about the process,” Mike says. “It wasn’t about ‘What box can I put you in to make you succeed career-wise?’ For my senior project I wrote and produced a musical called

The Fundamental Skip, and it was amazing how [the School] facilitated it. [The department] made the theatre available, Debbie [Simon] directed it, the orchestra played the music, we had a recording session with Mr. Whalen on bass, and Dar [Anastas] hung the lights. The School bent over backward to make it happen. Milton primed me for this field—it wasn’t a stretch for me.”

The improv community has grown exponentially over the last 15 years, but it is still relatively new. The field is growing and affecting the way television shows, sitcoms, films and other performances are created. A typical Broadway musical takes six years to stage—from the time it’s written, work-shopped, and finally performed. An improvised musical, Mike explains, can be in front of an audience within six weeks. “The goal is to get a younger, more vibrant audience into the theatre, and you can’t do that if you’re talking about something outdated. We want to respond to what’s going on now, creating a musical with a vibrant, breathing, socially conscious audience in the seats.”

Mega-Mega Land, an original Second City musical revue, is a recent satirical treatment of “big box” stores and their effect on the economy and different social groups. The show was what Mike describes as scripted improv. “People think that ‘scripted’ and ‘improvised’ are contradictory terms, but when you’re at your desk writing, the moment those words come out of your pen, that’s improvised. What we do is kill the filter. We kill the ability to erase. If there’s a mistake, we commit to it and turn it into a gift. Often that becomes the best part of the show.”

As part of his work at Second City, Mike writes about two songs per day, which is enough to create a musical a week. Outside his full-time work, he writes music, directs shows and performs with Baby Wants Candy, an award-winning improv music group. Chosen by the Johnny Mercer Foundation and the American Music Theater Project as one of the top 12 up-and-coming songwriters in the country, Mike recently spent a week collaborating with some of the country’s best young artists and professionals. This work is his career, he says, but it’s also his passion and guiding philosophy. “Improv has so many applications—not just in business or entertainment, but in how to live your life. Great improvisers listen, accept, agree, help. Therefore, they’re not only the funniest people you know, they’re some of the best people you know.”

Erin Hoodlet

 

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