This past Saturday, our sold-out house laughed, cried, and gave Ithamar Has Nothing to Say a much-deserved standing ovation. The next day, fourteen students had the pleasure of learning how to use our bodies more in our improv in Ithamar’s Shut Up and Move master class.
We spent three hours working on external, internal, and music-inspired physicality. Here are some of the take-aways from this great workshop. 
- A great way to practice object work is to pretend that you are in either a giant house or a tiny house. This exercise had everyone putting so much more effort into the details of our object work.
- Let every suggestion affect you physically and work first from your body. From there, emotion and point of view follow quite naturally. Be sure to hang on to that physical choice and don’t cancel it!
- Some of Ithamar’s favorite comedians to check out for inspiration for physical comedy are: Roan Atkinson, Carol Burnette, and Gilda Ratner. Looking forward to watching more of their videos!
- It was so fun to allow a random musical piece to inspire a physical choice (and hence emotion and POV). We can practice this when we are driving, cleaning our house, or any time! Once it inspires a POV begin a character monologue. I’ll be doing this on my drive to LA this week!
- Use the spaces you already know (your bedroom, your office, your kitchen, etc.). Whenever possible see a real space that you are familiar with to make environment and object work simpler and more natural. Reach out and keep interacting with that space – there is so much there!
- Spend 20-30 minutes in a public space and take notes about the way each person sits, looks, moves, etc. From there, make choices about their emotions, POV, and so much more!
We all walked and danced out of the workshop agreeing to make and commit to more clear and bold physical choices in our improv. It was an honor to have the opportunity to work with Ithamar and hope to bring him back for an encore performance.
Check out what workshop participants Ozzie, Erica, and Sofia had to say about their experience: