“Sound and movement” is a kind of opening. It is notoriously weird and annoying, and is one of those things that seems so useless at first that it will make you doubt whether you should be doing improv at all.However, there are also great lessons to be learned in it—about letting go and letting the animal part of your brain make decisions before your inner judge screws it all up. About hearing and reacting intuitively, versus struggling to figure out a logical move.
Doing a sound and movement and then immediately doing scenes will bring out a confidence in many players that they previously did not have. It will get people out of their heads. It will make them play more physically and less hesitantly. It’s a great thing to do as an exercise to
practice playing more boldly.
“Sound and movement” is a version of “follow the follower,” so let’s explain that first.
Follow the Follower
In “follow the follower,” the whole group stands in a circle and starts in a neutral position.
Then the teacher says go. Everyone should start copying and heightening each other, meaning: whatever you see someone else doing, you start doing, but more.
At first, because everyone starts in a neutral position, you will just be copying very gentle sways and twitches. Then you will amplify those sways a bit—into a more pronounced, exaggerated version. Then people will copy the way you are swaying, but they’ll do it even more.
No one leads. You just copy. Any time you see two or three people doing something, you just start doing it, only more. No thinking, just doing. If anyone makes even the slightest sound or even breathes in a noticeable way, you copy that.
There is a group-wide agreement that you will let the action change and morph easily. Don’t get stuck doing any one thing for too long.
You can make non-verbal noises, meaning no actual words. Commit, meaning you do the physical gestures with full enthusiasm, as opposed to shyly doing them just a little bit. The group can break out of the circle if it naturally happens and start wandering around the room like dust particles, all still copying each other.
Do this for 3–5 minutes.
In general, exercises of follow the follower tend to be a bit similar. You will get tired of them if you do too many within a short period, but they are a great warm-up that forces you to get out of your head, pay attention to others, and give up control. They’re silly in a way that makes you get over yourself so you can do improv.
By itself, this is a good warm-up to do in a class.
Sound and Movement
Now, a “sound and movement” is like follow the follower, but you start with a suggestion, and there’s a bit of structure thrown in.
You get a suggestion, and everyone starts doing a physical activity or motion inspired by the suggestion. Simple and bold is best. If it’s “kettle,” you all start miming that you’re pouring kettles, while making the sound of hot steam pouring out. Everyone copies each other, and, using your “follow the follower” technique, this quickly morphs into an abstracted physical repetition that doesn’t really mean anything.
Whatever it is you’re doing will morph a few times. You’ll be pouring kettles and making steam noises, and then you’re just sort of waving your arms up and down in front of you while making some kind of whooping noise, and then you’re all skipping around the room, and then you’re all jumping up and down saying the word “jump” over and over.
This is where you wonder if you should be doing improv at all. Stay with us, please.
What you’re looking for as a group is for your sound and movement to become something recognizable and real. At the point I just described, maybe it almost looks like you’re shooting basketballs, so someone just goes ahead and makes their motion into shooting a basketball.
Someone else notices and also starts shooting a basketball. And for a few moments you stop doing a “follow the follower” and you’re just doing about 20 seconds of shooting basketballs around. You might fill out the scene. Someone goes under a hoop to catch rebounds and throw the ball back in. You pass to each other.
Then, after 20 seconds or so, you go back into “follow the follower” mode and let it become abstract. Things morph and change until you find another recognizable situation.
Think of your sound and movement as having “hallways” and “rooms.” The hallways are the abstract portions, where you’re just doing follow the follower. The “rooms” are when it temporarily becomes something real.
You do this until you’ve had 3–4 rooms, and then you try to end on the same activity you started with. Then someone sweeps it and you’re done. The whole thing should be 4–5 minutes.
This exercises forces you to stop thinking and to start watching and committing. Get out of your head, watch your scene partners, and make decisions as a group. Yes, your decisions will be simple and big, as opposed to specific and personal—but they’ll be fun and bold. Scenes
Next, you do scenes inspired by your sound and movement.
When I say “inspired by,” I simply mean you take any one of the big physical activities and start a scene with it. Maybe you start by shooting a basketball. Or maybe you just start with waving your arms up and down in front of you, but you make it that you’re swatting away flies, or something else that could actually happen in the real world.
Obviously you won’t be initiating with full ideas, because you’re just starting with a physical motion.
The interesting side effect of this is that people will play boldly and decisively. People who are normally timid will be brave and confident. People who have never acted will enter a scene with real swagger.
The sound and movement will have helped everyone get out of their heads. People will jump off the back line to join scenes. People will make decisions confidently and quickly. And yes, the scenes will also be a bit sillier and broader, but it will teach a young group what confidence and physicality feel like.
I don’t recommend this for a show, generally speaking. It’s too abstract and makes things too silly. Having said that, I was on a team that was having trouble getting along and not committing well in our shows. We started doing sound-and-movement openings for our shows, and they got better. Sure, after a short time the openings got too similar, and we had to move on, but for a burst they did help us play together