2nd Improv Performance

Tonight we had our second performance with our teen improv group.  The last couple of weeks have been difficult for our group.  I started a job and have been gone for the last three rehearsals.  We had a number of kids say they wouldn't be able to come or that they might not be able to come. 

At 10 minutes before the performance, we had 3 of our teen actors there.  Thankfully, more showed up and in the end, we had 8 performers.  For half of them, it was their first performance with our group.

They did awesome.  We had about 25 audience members (half parents, half not), so it was a small group, but that's OK. 

We played nine games: Film, theater, TV Styles, Instant Replay, 60 second movie, A&E Biography, Forward/Reverse, Two Headed Conversation, Moving Bodies, Living Props, and one more, but I can't remember right now.  I had not seen them perform Forward/Reverse or Moving Bodies before.  They did great!

A couple of problems: During one of the games, two of the actors had their backs to about half of the audience.  They didn't always speak loud enough.  A couple of times, they would curl up in a ball or lay flat on the floor and then talk towards the floor which made it difficult to hear them.

A couple of the games went really, really well and others not so much.  It's all good.  During the film, theater, TV style game, one of the suggestions was Grey's Anatomy.  I don't think the performers had ever seen it before, but one of them starts pointing to his stomach and said, "See my liver?  This is my anatomy."  Good laughs from that one.

We had two kids from the audience as volunteers for the moving bodies.  They actually had to move the actors.  They actors spoke, but they couldn't move unless the volunteers moved them.  It worked quite well.

One problem my little actors have is carrying out a scene.  Even though it is improv, there still needs to be a beginning, a middle and something of a conclusion.  They don't do that.  Sometimes they don't even go with the scene suggestion.  Perhaps we need to practice storytelling - beginning, middle, end...

I think we recruited another kid for the group.  Half of the kids in the group are huge Doctor Who fans.  When this audience member discovered that, she was hooked.  I look forward to her joining us in a few weeks.

We held the performance at the local library in one of the community meeting rooms.  It turned out to be a very good location.  So, overall, it was a great night of funny teens being very funny.