Date of Award
Spring 2025
Access Restriction
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Fine Arts
Department
Theatre Arts
School or College
College of Communication and Fine Arts
First Advisor
Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr.
Second Advisor
Stacey Cabaj
Third Advisor
Nenad Pervan
Abstract
This research project explores the potential of improvisation as a creative engine for written, feature-length storytelling. Central questions: In what ways can improvisation improve all facets of storytelling? How so? And which category of artist receives the widest array of benefits, including but not limited to actors, writers, directors, designers, and dramaturgs? In the first the chapter, I describe why and how I arrived at my thesis’s central questions, the research I pursued to answer them, and how I concretized a syllabus guided by those central questions and based on that research. Detailing the evolutionary, neuroscientific, and historical basis that undergirds the human need for improvisation, I pursue its applications beyond improv's known uses for the acting classroom and the professional comedy industry. To do so, I break down storytelling into 10 essentials elements: premise, setting, plot, theme, tone, structure, subject matter, dialogue, character biography, and character traits. In the second chapter, I include my weekly journal entries while teaching the class. These entries document the evolution of my teaching style for this subject, the results of different embodied approaches to my central questions, and the valuable successes and even more valuable failures I experienced with this group of 16 undergraduate students. In chapter three, I reflect on these 15 weeks, determine adjustments for future iterations of this course, and speculate on the wider possibilities of this work. In particular, I observe students’ progress with feature-length writing, providing examples of their increased command of the 10 storytelling elements, inspired by solo and group improvisations. I hope this transparent process will prove useful to colleagues endeavoring to teach an improvisation-based class, including my future self, as I continue to expand, which I plan to, my course offerings revolving around this intuitive, unfettered, and (until now) ephemeral art form.
Recommended Citation
Jones, Gregory Charles, "Improv Your Story: The Science of Intuitive Creation" (2025). LMU Theses and Dissertations. 1346.
https://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/etd/1346
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
