In the business that makes up my other life, we teach clients how to promote and facilitate creativity in teams by employing the same techniques improvisation theaters use to entertain their audiences. To design this training module, we did a lot of research about improvisation which changed our understanding of this art form. Foremost was the knowledge improv is not always improv. A typical performance is half rehearsed skits and half ad lib based on audience input (e.g. “Give us an occupation.”) It was the origins of the prepared material which I found most interesting. In many cases it is a honed version of an improv experience which drew a positive response from the audience.
I thought about this approach to performance art twice this week. First, while watching clips of Donald Trump at campaign rallies in Florida and Pennsylvania. Second, during an exchange between CNN’s Jim Acosta and White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders at Thursday’s daily briefing. In the first instance, it is clear Trump has become a one-man improv troupe. The first time he did the “I could be presidential but boring” routine there may have been a level of spontaneity. But when you see the same bit night after night, you know that is no longer the case. And I understand why his fans at each of these rallies continue to laugh. In effect, it is no different from when you and I watched a Johnny Carson Tonight Show anniversary special and could not wait for the replay of Ed Ames throwing that tomahawk. In other words, a Trump rally may as well be called, “The Donald’s Greatest Hits.” When is he going to do Lock Her Up, Rigged Witch Hunt and of course Build That Wall?
Even if you consider his behavior at these events “unpresidential,” one can argue any campaign rally is half politics, half entertainment. After all, Trump’s reincarnation following the collapse of his real estate business was based on the phrase, “You’re fired!” It would not surprise me in the least if, during an episode of PBS‘ Finding Your Roots, host Henry Louis Gates, Jr. revealed Donald had been adopted by Fred and Mary Anne Trump after he was abandoned by his true father P. T. Barnum.
If only we could sit back and enjoy the show. But yesterday it took a much uglier turn. On Thursday morning during an interview with Axios‘ Mike Allen, first daughter Ivanka laughed when asked if she believed the press is the enemy of the people as if she could not understand why anyone would even ask the question. Caught off guard, without the benefit of Daddy’s coaching, Ivanka replied, “No, I do not.”
CNN’s Acosta, the target of recent personal attacks by Trump and his mouthpiece Sean Hannity, could not resist the opportunity to ask Sanders whether she sided with her boss or Ivanka.
It would be a good thing if you were to state right here, at this briefing, that the press — the people who are gathered in this room right now, doing their jobs every day, asking questions of officials like the ones you brought forward earlier — are not the enemy of the people. I think we deserve that.
Did Sanders answer the question? Did she even look Acosta in the eye? No. Instead, she began reading from a prepared statement. What used to be a Q&A between the press and the White House spokesperson is now something entirely different. It is a hybrid of the two sides of improvisation. The question is ad libbed. “Give me a topic.” But the response is not an extemporaneous answer. It is a well-honed, pre-rehearsed statement.
Sadly, this was just the final act of a matinee performance of White House schtick. The press briefing began with statements by the five senior representatives of the U.S. intelligence community confirming the Russian threat to our election system was real, it was on-going in 2018 and they were committed to doing whatever was necessary to prevent a replay of 2016. We were told Trump personally asked them to appear at the briefing. In the post-briefing analysis, MSNBC’s Nicole Wallace (former advisor to George W. Bush) asked the panel, “Is there any chance the president will undercut his director of national intelligence, CIA director, FBI director, NSA director, secretary of homeland security tonight at his rally in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania?” The pundits’ response, “Why not. He’s done it before.” Right on cue, just hours after his security team affirmed Russia’s attack on American democracy, Trump whined his efforts to build a relationship with Valdimir Putin “are being hindered by the Russian hoax.”
It’s quite clear Trump and his minions, have adopted a bastardized version of Helen Keller’s adage, “We can do anything we want if we s(ch)tick to it long enough.”
For what it’s worth.
Dr. ESP