Today, July 29th, is Say Day, a tradition celebrated across the improv community. The canonical link detailing Say Day went to The Improv Network wiki, which has closed, so we’ve pulled the text forward from the Internet Archive Wayback machine to keep the words of Bill Binder available across the internet:
From Bill Binder; July 28th, 2015:
Last January, we all lost Jason Chin. It was a devastating blow to our community. Even those who never met him knew of his love and complete devotion to making improv beautiful. Hundreds, if not thousands of improvisors have been made stronger through his teachings and his friendship.
In the days that followed, at a celebration of his life, T. J. Jagodowski and Charna Halpern agreed that it is all too uncommon for us to remind each other how much we mean to each other, how infrequently we say how much we appreciate each other. What a wonderful thing if we could take just one day out of the year to say those things to each other. That’s how Say Day came to be.
And that day is tomorrow. why 7/29. Simply because a quick glance at a phone revealed that 7-2-9 spelled out S-A-Y.
Many theatres have embraced Say Day. We do too. Tomorrow will likely be a busy day for many of us, but I hope you all take the time to reach out to your cast mates, your teachers, your students, the people doing the business ends of your festivals and venues, your coaches, your families and everyone else who has influenced your life for the better and given you the wonderful gift of growing in improv. Time to say “Thank you”.
Jason Chin has left us. He’s one of the many people we never got to say how much he meant. I hope tomorrow (and beyond) we take the time to say it.
From all of us here at Highwire Improv – thank you for your participation, your support, your laughter, your kindness, and your presence in our lives. Make today (and every day) a Say Day.
P.S. if you’ve never seen it, Jason’s entrance video is an all-time great improv moment:
