Last night was the first workshop for my new improv show. I think it was a great success. People were nervous beforehand, including me, but actually everyone came out firing. There was an awful lot of talent on display.

The theme for last night was basic improv skills. I tried to stress the need to be ordinary, to be boring, to do whatever it takes to remove the burden of trying to be funny because that is what cripples people on stage. My motto is always "Try to be fun, don't try to be funny." And anyway, funny starts with fun - can you see what I've done there?

So I appointed "boring monitors" whose task was to shout "Boring!" when people weren't being boring enough. If people were being too crazy, taking too giant a leap they got heckled for trying to be too funny! The point is that I don’t want things to be boring come showtime and I don’t want to replace or crush people's creativity. But I want to establish first of all that boring is good, once you feel liberated enough to go out and be boring then you can be truly liberated to say anything.