1. GENERAL HEADING: Improvisation
2. TITLE OF EXERCISE: "Real & Imagined Activities"
3. GOALS: Public Solitude & Given Circumstances
4. NUMBER OF STUDENTS: One student at a time.
5. EQUIPMENT AND SUPPLIES: N.A.
6. CLASS TIME NEEDED: 5 minutes per student.
7. STEP-BY-STEP DESCRIPTION: Inform students of this exercise in advance and make it an assignment. Each student must bring a "real" activity to class. Eating a salad, painting their nails, shaving their face, ironing a shirt, shaving their legs, etc. Then have one student at a time get up before the rest of the class and "truthfully" complete their activity. Have the other students observe closely.
After 2 or 3 minutes change the given circumstances. The student shaving is 15 minutes late for a crucial interview. The woman shaving her legs is going to meet her lover. The student eating a salad has not had food for two days, etc.
8. POINTS FOR OBSERVATION, DISCUSSION: Illustrate the notion of public solitude. Are students "performing" or being real? Is someone blushing? How does changing the given circumstance impact upon the activity?
9. SOURCE/REFERENCE: Adapted from Sonia Moore's Stanislavski Revealed. (NYC: Applause Theatre Books, 1991).
10. ADDITIONAL READING: N.A.
11. VARIATIONS: The next class period have the students repeat their
activity, but this time without any props. They must imagine the activity
and recreate it exactly.