Improv for Dummies

Rule №1: Always Affirmative

One pivotal rule of improvisation is to agree. You cannot rain on your partners’ parade by saying NO. It’s a strict no-no. For instance if someone points a finger gun to your head and says, “Freeze, I am gonna shoot you”, you cannot respond with “No, you cannot. Those are fingers”. Such scenarios curb any potential of the scene to go wild. Hence, go with the flow and say yes to everything almost as if on steroids and then, use your creativity to take it from there. So, for example saying, “Sure, shoot me with little Juhi’s water gun” would add dynamics to the story for the partners to further build on.

Essentially, use a ‘yes’ to buy time to formulate your reply (or reach out for the canned reply).

Rule №2: Always make a statement

Asking questions all the time puts all the pressure and onus on your partners. Prove your creativity and quirkiness by finding the right statements to make and not constantly challenging your partners. For instance if you keep questioning “What are you doing?”, “Who are you”, “What is in the bag” etc, your partners will have to spontaneously make up answers to weave a story. In other words, no matter what the problem is, be a part of the solution.

If it ever happens that you don’t know, play it ambiguous by taking these words that are used to “hedge” in replies:

Rule №3: Only opportunities, no mistakes:

You can never go wrong with improv. There are no mistakes, only opportunities. If one starts a scene as what he thinks is very clearly a cop riding a bicycle, but the partner thinks that he is a hamster in a hamster-wheel, guess what? Now he is a hamster in a hamster wheel! The players cannot stop everything to explain that it was really supposed to be a bike. Who knows? Maybe it’ll end up being a police hamster who’s been put on ‘hamster-wheel’ duty because he’s too much of a loose cannon in the field. Improve is just a serious of beautiful accidents, leaving no room for mistakes.

For now, master the basics till the next blog come up on thing snot to do! Keep watching this space to master Improv from home based on our learning at MICA!

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