This structure provides a performance-ready application of the skills explored in Gibberish Job Mime (which you can read about here).
The Basics
One player (A) leaves the space, and while they are unable to hear, the team acquires a specific (and perhaps fictitious) occupation. A scene is played in which the returning improviser must be endowed with this role. While Player A can speak in English (or your native tongue), their fellow performers are limited to the use of gibberish, gestures, and physicality. The scene continues until the previously absent improviser successfully assumes and names the correct occupation or a preset tone limit is reached.
Example
The team accepts “skyscraper crane operator” as the job to be endowed. Player A returns to the space while the host leads a countdown for the action to begin and notes that the players have “four minutes” to complete their task. Player B waits onstage for their teammate, holding a mixed object that the audience assumes is a clipboard. (Player A is understandably much less sure!) Players C and D wait at the ready just offstage.
Player B: (huffing with impatience) “Cashesh oam fanuppo…”
Player A: (apologetically) “Traffic was awful. Sorry I’m late.”
Player B: (assessing A’s clothing and finding it woefully lacking) “Dush? Da sheeky dush?”
Player A: (only partially understanding B’s intent) “Of course I’m going to change. I just haven’t had time yet…”
Seeing an opportunity to help, Player C enters and quickly establishes a locker room and begins to mime getting dressed in their work clothes. Player B looks nervously up into the sky before nudging A to the next element.
Player A: (accepting C’s clue and starting to change their clothing into something currently nondescript) “Watch out. Our boss is in a mood this morning…”
Player C nervously plays with a safety harness, suggesting to A the danger of what is to follow.
Player A: “When you’ve been doing this as long as I have, it gets a little easier. People have been descending into mine shafts for centuries…”
Player C laughs at the unintended “joke” before looking skyward as B had done before them. Player A grabs a hard hat and puts in on, prompting C to do the same with encouragement.
Player C: (knocking on their pretend hard hat before fastening it) “Laveen haneedy.”
Player A: “Our ancestors went into the ground; we soar above it. Is it really that different…?”
The Focus
Find the story behind the endowment game so that you’re not merely wandering from one unsuccessful clue to another.
Traps and Tips
1.) Don’t overload. While it can be tempting to initially swing for the fences and offer the endowee (A) the missing information in its entirety, it’s more fruitful to treat the scene like any other and offer one small piece of the puzzle (or brick) at a time. Player A has a lot to process and will struggle if they are met with an avalanche of competing or clumsy choices. Give them some basic ingredients clearly and calmly before expecting them to identify the entire meal. With that in mind…
2.) Don’t split focus. in addition to the traditional audience, players should endeavor to keep their energy flowing towards the endowee. The most creative endowment will do you little good if it doesn’t occur in view of Player A or gets lost in the clutter. Make sure the guessing player always has a moment to see and respond to each important move (and the steering improviser has a chance to quickly give positive or corrective feedback). The greater audience won’t appreciate inelegant focus battles either and wants to see every delightful moment of struggle and success.
3.) Don’t (overtly) show. As the scene is predominantly played in gibberish, players should lean into demonstrative gestures and subtext infused physicality. Empty gibberish, after all, won’t communicate much of value. While you privilege bolder movement, be cautious not to stray into “showing” territory where you do, or use, or introduce the needed action, prop, or element of the occupation. As with all endowment games, think complementary (rather than parallel) and strive to let the endowee offer up key ingredients. Lead the proverbial improv horse to water but let them name it as water and drink it first.
4.) Don’t wimp. While this is good advice for everyone, it’s particularly important for Player A to move through the action as if they completely know what they are doing. You’ll want to carefully pitch your specifics so as to avoid just making a list of possibilities or asking a series of fear-based questions. It’s a tall order for the endowers to guide the action (while deploying gibberish, no less) if the endowee exudes tepidness. When A offers the mining idea in the above example, C needs to provide a playful correction, but this will often allow for a helpful course adjustment as well (There will be moments when the endowers can’t truly accept a “wrong” idea without detailing the trajectory completely which is akin to wimping in other contexts but here is a little unavoidable – you just want to make these nudges with a sense of playfulness and joy..)
In Performance
Like most endowment games, Occupation Endowment needs a little room to breathe, making it a little more challenging to slate if you’re playing under tight time restrictions. While I teach it at Rollins to reinforce the concept of complementary actions, we don’t tend to play it in our short-form shows (or any endowment game, frankly) as I try to squeeze a dozen scenes and warm-ups into a 50-minute window.
If you’re looking for some more general endowment pointers and strategies, review my earlier Game Library entry on Native Expert. You can find it here.
Cheers, David Charles.
www.improvdr.com
Join my Facebook group here.
Photo Credit: Tony Firriolo
© 2024 David Charles/ImprovDr
Game Library Expansion Pack I
ImprovDr.com 