KISS!, an improv society, hosted “All-Skate Night” on Tuesday, Oct. 18.
These events are workshops open to all majors and students with any level of experience with improvisational acting, or improv. KISS! — which stands for the Kennesaw Improv Society, Stupid! — is a student-run society.
“I am not a dictatorial adviser,” said Jamie Bullins, faculty adviser of KISS! and coordinator of the design and tech program for the Department of Theatre and Performance Studies. “I want their opinions to be what drives what they’re doing, so I kind of just guide that.”
Each meeting is led by a different pair out of the group’s 12 members. Sophomore Alice Garriga and senior Nathan Brosy, who are both theater majors, led Tuesday’s event.
“We’re trying to get everyone, not just theater majors, involved in the arts, doing something fun outside of a ‘Theater in Society’ class,” Garriga said. “It’s a good, safe space for people where you can come to have fun and just relax.”
There is also an educational element to “All-Skate Nights,” and the members use the events as a recruitment tool.
“It’s an outlet for people to learn improv while we’re also learning it from our coaches,” Brosy said. “It’s also a great way to get kids involved early on, because we have to cast future KISS! ensembles every spring.”
There are five “All-Skate Night” events this semester, and each one is centered around a different theme or skill related to improv. Many of the improv games they played at Tuesday’s event included movement and pantomime.
In the game “Three-Line Scenes,” the first person begins by doing an action, and the second player has to come up with a line, to which the first person responds. The second person says one more line to wrap up the scene.
Brosy asked several people to restart their scenes after giving some coaching, which gave the event an educational tone while still maintaining the chaos and hilarity for which improv is known.
Two rules that Brosy and Garriga emphasized throughout the workshop were that no one could start a scene with a question or make an active attempt to be funny. Every time a student started with a question, they were asked to start over and turn their question into a declarative sentence. This helped in continuing a scene and took the pressure off one’s scene partner.
Both KISS! members maintained the position throughout the workshop that improv is not about trying to be funny. It’s about being honest, they said, and letting the humor come from truth.
The members were constantly telling students to use “the first thing that pops into your head.”
At each “All-Skate Night,” the experience levels of the attendees vary. While several are third- and fourth-year students, many are freshmen completely new to improv.
“We had, like, 10 new people tonight,” Brosy said. “We have to be very conscious of that, but we also try to challenge people throughout the year.”
Both members discussed the growth they have seen in the students who attend the events throughout the year as well as in themselves.
The next “All-Skate Night” will be Nov. 8 in the Onyx Theater. KISS! will perform its fall showcase Nov. 11 and 12, also in the Onyx.
The group performs off-campus as well, and its Facebook page, (Kiss!) Kennesaw Improv Society, Stupid, has more information about all upcoming performances.