Social Storytelling VS Performance Storytelling

By Meredith Maslich

For the past year or two, there has been talk of creating a social storytelling class –a class that focuses on how to tell fun and interesting stories on dates, at dinner parties and on job interviews, instead of on the stage.

My colleague Joe Price and I got as far as having a test class. It went ok, but there was a missing magic ingredient we couldn’t identify, and it just didn’t work.

But every time we mention the idea of a social storytelling class, people’s eyes light up, and they say “YES! I need that!”  And we’ve also noticed more people claiming they are taking our Storytelling 101 class because they want to tell better stories at parties.

So, until we figure out the magic ingredient to making a social storytelling class work, I’m just going to blog about it.

Each week I’ll blog about tips, tricks and methods for finding the right story and delivering the story in the right way, and I’ll intersperse it with deconstructed stories built from every day experiences.

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The most common question on this topic is “what’s the difference between social storytelling and performance storytelling?”

The answer is that there are really only two major differences:

1. The obvious – performance storytelling is done for a formal audience, often one that has paid for the honor of hearing your story. You may or may or may not be on a stage, but you will be entitled to the undivided attention of that audience.

With social storytelling, your audience is whoever you’re with – your date, the other guests at the dinner party, the people standing near     you at the party who are too polite to walk away. You have no entitlement to their attention – it must be earned.

2. Second, social stories are often shorter (sometimes much shorter) than a performance story, and you can get away with a less crafted        delivery, fewer characters and a looser story arc than you need for a good performance story.

The question I’m very rarely asked, is “what’s the same between social and performance storytelling?”

The answer to that question is: A LOT.

Ultimately a good story is a good story, and the basic elements needed to create a good story will remain the same whether you’re on the stage or on a date.

(In my world, I define a “good” story as one that is entertaining, keeps attention naturally, and doesn’t leave people how they’ll get the last five minutes of their life back.)

Building a Good Story:

1.       Set the scene clearly, so your listener can latch right in. “It was 11:55 on a Tuesday night and I was running as fast as I could toward the metro station…” 

2.       Be detailed, because details being every story to life. “I’m dodging people on the street and jumping over homeless people, and my bag kept banging against my hip throwing me off balance.”  But don’t overdo it – use just enough details to paint the picture and no more.

 3.       Create characters, whenever possible. “I kept hearing my boyfriend’s voice in my head ‘if you stay to the end of that show you’ll never make the last train home’”

 4.       Build tension.  The best way to do this is by leaving the ending until the end. That seems obvious, but you’d be surprised how many people use the ending as the hook to get people’s attention: “Did I tell you about that time I almost missed the last metro?”  HOWEVER, be careful you don’t string it out so long that your listener loses interest. Don’t invent tension where it doesn’t naturally exist.

5.       Have a point.  In technical terms, this means have an arc, even if it’s a loose one.  Social storytelling naturally veers more toward anecdotes than fully developed plot lines, letting you get away with a looser arc. Sometimes, if the story is funny or shocking enough, you can get away with very little structure or arc, but, to me the best stories will always have an arc and hopefully some sort of shift or evolution for the main character (usually you). Without an arc you run a high risk of getting to the end and realizing it’s not clear why you told that story. That’s when you end up saying the dreaded “Well…I guess you had to be there…” My goal is to make sure that no one ever has to use that line, or “and so…yeah…” to end a social story ever again.

Let me know your thoughts about the differences, and similarities between social and performance storytelling in the comments! Also let me know if there’s anything specific you want to see me talk about in this column. Together, we can eliminate awkward social storytelling situations.