A Glossary of Improv Terms:
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Accepting: Embracing the offers made by other performers in order to advance the scene.
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Advancing: The process of moving the scene forward.
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Ask-For: The question asked of the audience in order to start the scene.
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Beat: The unit of action in a scene.
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Blocking: Rejecting information or ideas offered by another player. There can also be the physical representation of blocking the view of a performer from the audience. In either case blocking is usually not a positive thing and can make it more difficult to advance the scene. See also "Masking".
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Breaking the Routine: Interrupting an action with another action in order to advance the scene.
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Cancelling: Making previous action irrelevant. Once cancelled it's as if it hasn't happened at all. Usually a bad idea.
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Charm: The quality that makes an audience enjoy watching a performer.
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Commenting: Stepping out of the reality of a scene by saying or doing something that refers to the fact that it's a scene being played.
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Complementary Offer: An offer that meshes well with what's alreeady gone before (and usually enhances it in some way).
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Conflict: Many (but not all!) scenes are about a conflict of some kind , if there is no conflict then the scene may becoming boring fast.
Context: The broader setting for the scene (political, social, etc)
Corpse: To break up laughing during a scene. Usually not a good thing to do.
Denial: "see blocking".
Driving: Taking over a scene and not letting other performers influence it's direction.
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Endowing: Assigning attributes to another performers character.
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Explore and Heighten: To take an idea and see where it leads exploring its natural consequences while simultaneously raising the stakes.
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Extending: Taking an idea and letting it become the central them of the scene.
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Focus: The audience's attention should only be in one place at any given time; that place (or person) is the "focus" of the scene. If more than one thing is going on simultaneously, the focus is split. Experience improvisers will usually share focus where inexperienced ones will not.
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Gagging: Trying to make a joke or doing something that doesn't flow naturally from the scene. Never a good idea to do.
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Gibberish: A made up nonsensical language.
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Handle: The premise for a scene or game.
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Hedging: Making small talk instead of engaging in action.
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Heightening: An improv concept describing how performers add information to build upon what was built before.
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Information Overload: Introducing too much information into the scene, making it difficult or impossible to to ever find a satisfying conclusion to the scene.
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Instant Trouble: Making an offer that introduces a problem or conflict but that doesn't relate to the narrative of the scene prior to that point.
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Interactive Theatre: Any form of theatre in which the audience is not a passive performer. Encompasses a range of different styles, ranging from "spot" improv to loosely scripted stories such as murder mysteries or faux events. (e.g. Tony and Tina's Wedding)
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Masking: Standing in place where you can't be seen properly, or in such a way as you're hiding behind someone else or some important action. Should be avoided!
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Mugging: Making silly faces instead of responding truthfully. Generally frowned upon.
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Naming: Identifying characters, objects, places and so forth in a scene.
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Narrative: The story told by the scene. Most scenes have a clear beginning, middle and end.
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Objective: The thing that a character in a scene is trying to achieve.
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Offer: Any dialog or action that advances a scene.
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Offer From Space: Dialog or action that is bizarre and appears to come from no where.
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Physicalization: Turning intent into action and movement.
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Point of Concentration: what the scene is about.
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Post-Show: Discussion: of the show by performers and crew after the performance.
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Plateau: A period where a scene is not advancing.
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Platform: The who, what and where of a scene. The success of a scene usually depends on having a solid platform.
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Playlist: The list of ask-fors or handles to be used in a show. Also called a "running order".
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Pimping: Playfully getting another improviser to do something difficult or unpleasant which you wouldn't probably do yourself.
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Raising the Stakes: Making the events in the scene have greater consequences for the characters . One technique for advancing the scene.
Reincorporation: Bringing back a previous line of dialogue, or action, idea from earlier work. stand up comedians refers to this as "callback"
Setup: Explaining the handle of the scene to the audience before the scene starts. Also involves doing an ask-for. The performer that usually does the setup should not be the one to start the scene.
Shelving: Acknowledging an offer but failing to act on it.
Space-Object: An object that's used in a scene but doesn't really exist "mimed out".
Status: A characters sense of self worth.
Stepping Out: A performer making a comment out of character breaking teh reality of the scene.
Synthesis: Combining two dissimilar ideas into one. for example taking two audience suggestions and combining them into one.
Talking Heads: a scene that involves a lot of standing around or worse sitting in which little to no action takes place.
Transformation: Turning something into something else. one character into another, one object into another , one environment into another.
Tummeling: Bantering with the audience during set-ups.
Uber-Mime: Overly elaborate mime that is so detailed it is usually hard to follow.
Waffling: Failing to make decisions. Talking about what you are going to do instead of doing it.
Walk on Walk Through also "cameo": The act of walking into the scene making a strong offer then leaving the scene. Usually but not always done when a scene needs a boost.
Wanking: Doing something cute and silly that makes the audience laugh but doesn't do anything to move the scene forward.
Wimping: Accepting an offer but failing to act on it altogether. Similar to "shelving" but in shelving the performer usually wants to come back to what ever was shelved later on in the scene.
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