by moppezzo

This past Sunday I had the pleasure of watching true experts doing an incredibly hard improv challenge: make a movie for 28 minutes purely off the cuff!  What talent!!  It was very Karate Kid wax-on-wax-off-ish to watch the interesting insights we have observed and learned from the class activities actually pay out in spades.

First of all, no one said no. One character (Elf) had determined at the outset of a scene he was a grieving elf at his mother’s grave, but another actor onstage (Wizard) had asserted that Elf was an evil troll. Instead of holding onto his elf identity, Elf and the other characters on stage, took the troll assignment and ran with it: Ok, so I’m not a grieving good elf son, so then I’m an oversensitive troll who discovered his heart.

Empathic Listening = huge. Seven people on stage, all trying to put together a coherent scene, participate, but not step on each other’s toes? A true game of “Yes, Yes, Yes” in action. Everyone accepted everyone’s bids, eye contact was always strong, pickup of declared motives was rampant, and nobody seemed to be lost in the circle looking for some acceptance.

Physical awareness was amazing, and it clearly mapped out the scene and intentions for the audience. You could actually see people fighting while swinging from trees, and nobody let go of one branch, so the image was never shattered. When one actor shook the tree, the other actor immediately shook in reaction. If someone was a dwarf, they were looking up, while the tall elf beside them would always look down, even though they were standing side by side at eye level. Really clever physical awareness of their own body, of objects that do not exist that they carry, but also awareness of other bodies, and their objects they are holding onto or reacting to. Holy working memory!!

Finally, there were no scene stealers. You would expect it’d even be easier if just one person took the reigns, sort of like Betsy with the Improv ball, just lightly batting it to the person next to her. Instead, though, if a scene faltered, a person did not just stand up and alert everyone to a common goal, but instead all worked together to build up a structure they all contributed to.

Anyway, not an entirely profound blog. But I gotta say, it was great to see how all the skills we build manifest in some highly talented improv theater!