I got this email from Liz Hughes:
Hey Ben,
I went to the Impulse Theater (an Improv theater) this past weekend for my birthday with my fiance. It is in the basement of the Wynkoop Brewery downtown. It was hilarious. I was reminded of Stephen Valdes´ post about improv and it’s similarities to our classroom. Gosh, it was awesome. Anyway, at the Impulse Theater, they do this thing where the ongoing improv scene gets manipulated by the director. The director, at will, shouts out, REVERSE!, and the actors then continue the scene in reverse…and then FORWARD! and REVERSE…you get the picture.
At the theater, it is hilarious….but these actors are genius. When the dialogue is reversed along with the movements it is hilarious. It would be tough to do this just like it in our classrooms, but today, in my classroom, the energy in our story was fading…so I threw in a REVERSE. I then made this weird sound that reminded me of a tape rewinding, and made the actors walk backwards, sit down…and then stand-up for the re-enactment. It was awesome. All the energy was back.
Just a little bit to add to the bag of CI tricks. The kids had a ball. And so did I. And nobody knew they were learning!
Oh! and we should get a group together to go to The Impulse Theater. $18.00 a ticket.
Liz