The Improv Telephone Game

"JAYNE ENTWISTLE: I'm Jayne Entwistle with expertvillage.com. ANDREW STUBBLEFIELD: And I'm Andrew Stubblefield. Welcome back. JAYNE ENTWISTLE: We're teaching you today about improv, the basic rules and structures. We just covered an idea of give and take, how important that is on stage. In fact, Andrew, I would say that's important in life. ANDREW STUBBLEFIELD: For sure. I mean you don't want to just be taking all the love from your partner and not giving it back. JAYNE ENTWISTLE: No. So on stage, it's really important to have a nice flow, back and forth. The attention is on this person, the attention is on this person. We're going to play a game now called telephone. And how this works is we're each going to be talking on the phone to somebody different. Normally, we would get who we're talking to from the audience, and we're going to give an example of how we can give and take in this little exercise. So Andrew, why don't--you be talking on the phone to your accountant. ANDREW STUBBLEFIELD: Okay JAYNE ENTWISTLE: And who should I be talking on the phone to? ANDREW STUBBLEFIELD: How about to your father? JAYNE ENTWISTLE: To my father. Okay, so-- ANDREW STUBBLEFIELD: "Ah, yes good afternoon. I was curious, have you sent in the tax papers that I was asking about? Oh, okay great, great. Um, so how much money am I getting back? Wow. That's a lot." JAYNE ENTWISTLE: "Dad. Dad, did you send in my student loan papers? I know it's a lot of money, but I need to get those papers in otherwise, I'm not going to be able to start school this quarter." ANDREW STUBBLEFIELD: "Well, I mean, I don't understand why I'm getting audited. I mean this is ridiculous. I mean you're my accountant, you're supposed to be prepared for this stuff. I mean this is absolutely outrageous." JAYNE ENTWISTLE: "Dad, I can't believe you're getting audited. What happened? That's crazy." ANDREW STUBBLEFIELD: "What do you mean you're taking in account my school loans? I mean, this is ridiculous, like that was like 20 years ago. Roger, Roger, you have to help me here." JAYNE ENTWISTLE: So this was an example of give and take. We both shared the space. We incorporated aspects of each other's conversation by listening, and give and take."