Boyd Branchd taught me is that there is a fundamental difference between public speaking and improvisational theater.

In public speaking training, we teach students to stand up straight, dress well, rehearse their lines, look out over the tops of the heads of the audience, minimize their disfluencies… in short, every thing we teach students of public speaking is focused on making the speaker look good.

Improv is just the opposite. The purpose of improvisation is to make the audience look good.

No one in the audience cares if you blurt a nonsense word, or if you say “Ummmm,” or if you fall to stand up straight when your performance gives them the feeling of being smarter, funnier, or more attractive. When they have that feeling of high status for themselves, they will forgive all the technical imperfections of the performance.