Develop/Continue
Aim of practice: getting rid of self-censorship, the road to improvisation
Number of participants: 2
Time allocation (min): 10+
One performer improvises a narration of a preselected personal story (for example a childhood memory or what happened on his/her way to the theatre) while the other listens and randomly directs the flow of the narration with the words DEVELOP and CONTINUE.
DEVELOP means the narrator needs to elaborate on the current part of the narrative. CONTINUE is a kind of liberation, where the first performer can proceed with the story. The listener can use DEVELOP multiple times and then the narrator must not stop elaborating on that particular part of the story until the listener has allowed them to continue.
In the game DEVELOP/CONTINUE it is vital to leave enough space for the narrator at the beginning and be patient with the interruption. Another important thing is to feel the right amount of DEVELOPs so the use of the word isn’t too easy to expect. You can go into extremes - playing with the rhythm is essential in this case. Alternatively, it is possible to use this while working on a fixed text (then the foundation for the improvisation can be for example the content of a given monologue).
Example: Once I was taking a train home from school with a friend, we waited on the platform and - DEVELOP - it was one of the three platforms in Český Brod, there were three benches and two clocks - DEVELOP - these big station clocks that had two black arms - DEVELOP - the clock arms were huge and dominated the whole face of the clock, you couldn’t see nothing but those humongous arms, one shorter than the other - CONTINUE - we waited on that platform and the train was coming. Most of the time we took the ordinary passenger train but this time the express train arrived. - DEVELOP - It was the old kind of express, dark green, with doors that opened with a handle. (Etc…)
Number of participants: 2
Time allocation (min): 10+
One performer improvises a narration of a preselected personal story (for example a childhood memory or what happened on his/her way to the theatre) while the other listens and randomly directs the flow of the narration with the words DEVELOP and CONTINUE.
DEVELOP means the narrator needs to elaborate on the current part of the narrative. CONTINUE is a kind of liberation, where the first performer can proceed with the story. The listener can use DEVELOP multiple times and then the narrator must not stop elaborating on that particular part of the story until the listener has allowed them to continue.
In the game DEVELOP/CONTINUE it is vital to leave enough space for the narrator at the beginning and be patient with the interruption. Another important thing is to feel the right amount of DEVELOPs so the use of the word isn’t too easy to expect. You can go into extremes - playing with the rhythm is essential in this case. Alternatively, it is possible to use this while working on a fixed text (then the foundation for the improvisation can be for example the content of a given monologue).
Example: Once I was taking a train home from school with a friend, we waited on the platform and - DEVELOP - it was one of the three platforms in Český Brod, there were three benches and two clocks - DEVELOP - these big station clocks that had two black arms - DEVELOP - the clock arms were huge and dominated the whole face of the clock, you couldn’t see nothing but those humongous arms, one shorter than the other - CONTINUE - we waited on that platform and the train was coming. Most of the time we took the ordinary passenger train but this time the express train arrived. - DEVELOP - It was the old kind of express, dark green, with doors that opened with a handle. (Etc…)
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