Improvisation session 09/01/2015

09/01/15

So today we made a start on our Improvisation unit.
We started off the session with a warm up set up of a variation of games. The games were mostly reaction games. Having a good reaction can be handy whilst improvising because you will be able to react fast to what somebody else does or says.
One of the games was were the class would stand in a circle and Daniel in the middle. Daniel would ask us questions but the person who he looks at and asks will not answer, the person on their left would answer instead, however they could not say the words "yes" or "no"; If these words were said that person would be out of the game  also if the wrong person answered they would be out. This game was very tricky because it kept your brain active, you had to stay focused the whole time otherwise something would go wrong and you would be out.
We continued on the lesson with Daniel explaining to us what improvisation is.

Improvisational theatre, 
often called improv or impro, is a form of theater where most or all of what is performed is created at the moment it is performed. In its purest form, the dialogue, the action, the story and the characters are created collaboratively by the players as the improvisation unfolds in present time, without use of an already prepared, written script. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Improvisational_theatre

Daniel then explained an improvisation game/task to us all. This task was:
-Two people started off having a conversation about the first thing that comes to mind until the work 'STOP' is shouted and both people have to freeze, 
- From our freezing positions we have to create another scene in juxtaposition to the last.
- Same sequence continues until Daniel shouts another word "SWITCH" and one person out of the scene sits down and another member of the class stands up and joins in.
-This same process continues until Daniel gets bored of the game.  

This game showed us how hard it is to think on the spot and make up something completely different whilst being rushed.
It also taught me that to keep the flow of a scene while imrpovising is not to block another person talking such as;
person 1:hi how are you?
person 2: good
This makes it hard for the conversation to continue because person 2 has blocked person 1 in this convo. Person 1 should have said something like;
person 1:hi how are you?
person 2: I'm good thanks how about you?
This way the conversation can continue and thing could become a lot more interesting.