Taking Care of the “Now” With Jonathan Pitts

Taking Care of the “Now”

If you take care of the “now” in any improv scene, the future always shows up as a great scene. If you don’t take care of the “now”, the future never shows up and the scene spins into quicksand. Using a deeply intuitive scenic process learned from the late Martin DeMatt, one that focuses on listening and responding, the students learn how to take care of the “now” by becoming fully invested in it. They also learn how to let go of worries about where the scene is going and instead learn to understand where the scene is right now.

About Jonathan

Jonathan Pitts is an award-winning international improv theatre artist from Chicago with over 30 years’ experience. He’s a creator, director, improviser, producer, and teacher, and he’s also the Founder and Executive Director of Chicago Improv Productions. 

He co-founded the Chicago Improv Festival and produced it for 20 years. He created and produced the College Improv Tournament for 10 years. He was Teen Comedy Fest’s executive producer for 7 years. He’s also the founder and producer of Chicago Podcast Festival for the past 2 years. 

He has taught and performed internationally in 12 countries, as well as all over America. He’s performed in over 1,250 improvised shows. He has created the improv shows, “The Make ‘Em Ups”, “The Oracle”, “The Silent Movie”, “Solo Plus One”, “Stopwatch”, and “Storybox Unscripted Theatre”. 

He taught at The Second City for 16 years and he’s a contributing writer to their book on improvisation. He taught story-based improv at Piven Theatre Workshop. He’s also taught at 25+ American cities at regional improv fests and improv theatres. 

For 3 consecutive years he was selected by New City magazine as one of “Chicago’s Top 50 Theatre Players” and he’s been interviewed about improvisation in books, newspapers, online posts, podcasts, radio, and TV.