Solo Improv Intensive with Jill Bernard

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Solo Improv Intensive with Jill Bernard

This is something we’ve been wanting to make happen for years. And now it’s finally a reality, thanks to the Improvised Play Festival.

Jill Bernard is not only a fantastic improviser and teacher, but she’s also one of the truly unique voices/minds in improv today. She’s the author of “Jill Bernard’s Small Cute Book of Improv” and the creator/star of Drum Machine, her one-woman solo musical.

We’re super pleased to announce that she’ll be teaching a FIVE HOUR intensive workshop in solo improvisation. We can literally think of no one more qualified to do so. Due to the nature of the work, though, there are only eight spots open, so act quickly.

The price for the workshop is $135 until April 1st. After that it goes up to $150.

Also, for those who wish to participate, the workshop will culminate in a solo showcase the next day at 6pm.

About the Workshop

There are no “schools” of improv – we are each our own school, which means your solo piece is the ultimate expression of that school. Work with Jill to practice the skills that are universal to most solo pieces – character switching, stage pictures, and aggressive choices – and also tease out what will make your solo piece unique. There are unlimited ways to do switch characters, this class will introduce three: the CHARACTER SLIDE, the CHARACTER POP and the CHARACTER ABSENT, depending on whether you’re more interested in preserving time or space – one of which has to be suspended for you to play more than one character. This workshop will give you the confidence required to distinctly inhabit two or more characters. We will also take a critical look at individual solo pieces you create in class.

What makes solo improv special is that everything that is your weakness in group work becomes your strength and everything that is your strength becomes doubly so, because the show is tailor-made to your passions. Solo improv practitioners find it strengthens their group work, as they’ve learned to make offers clearly, and treat them as absolutely life and death.

About the Instructor

Jill Bernard has been performing with ComedySportz-Twin Cities since 1993, and is a founding member of HUGE Theater in Uptown Minneapolis. Her one-woman improv piece, Drum Machine, has been featured in over forty improv festivals. She has taught and performed improv in England, Norway, Australia, Canada, Argentina, Peru, Italy, Germany and over thirty-five of the United States; and also on an episode of MTV “Made.” She is one-half of the duo SCRAM with Joe Bill of the Annoyance Theater. An Artistic Associate of the Chicago Improv Festival, she has studied at the Annoyance Theater, Improv Olympic, the Brave New Workshop and other organizations; and is the recipient of the 2005 Chicago Improv Festival Avery Schreiber Ambassador of Improv Award, and the 2007 Miami Improv Festival award for Best Solo Show.