Quick Description
Improvisers create a scene using words supplied by the audience.
How to Play
Players ask an audience member to free associate words and images for 30 seconds.
The improvisers then create a scene incorporating as many of the words and images as they can.
Notes
Get the list of words and images before you reveal what you’re going to do with them.
After the scene ask the audience if the improvisers left anything out. You might be surprised that they’ll remember everything.
The challenge may be to create a scene from the material, not simply use the words and images.
Variations
- Have people write down words and images on index cards or slips of paper as they come into the theater and pull them randomly before the scene.
- Write down the suggestions on a big flip chart (or white board or ….) so the audience and players can see which words have been used and which haven’t.
- The groundbreaking improv troupe The Committee performed in the 1960s in San Francisco. This is where Del Close started exploring the format called The Harold. The walls of the stage were covered with chalk board paint. At the beginning of a show, Del would ask the audience to tell the group what they wanted to see on stage that night. He would write the ideas, game and words on the walls with chalk. It provided a reference to inspire the players. Source: Committee member Jim Cranna during an interview with me at BATS Improv in San Francisco.
Origin
Where does this game come from? We don’t know. Seems like an extension of a story telling activity to teach reincorporation. [See Impro by Keith Johnstone.]
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