Performers from around the world collaborate with GW students for the D.C. 10th International Improvisation Festival, which began Wednesday and runs through Dec. 12. The festival features more than 75 dancers, musicians and actors who improvise their performances while on stage.
“(Improv) is fascinating to the audience because they feel that they’re an immediate part of what’s happening,” said Maida Withers, the festival’s director and a GW professor of dance. “It’s fresh to them, but it’s also fresh to us in some way. Sometimes in dance that is very well-rehearsed, the audience may be extraneous, but the audience in improvisation understands that their presence is important.”
The D.C. International Improvisation Festival is the only festival of its kind, and most events will be at GW’s performance venues, including the Dorothy Betts Theatre and the Building XX Dance Studio. Withers, who organized the festival from its beginning, coordinated nine performances and four workshops. She has recruited this year’s international performers from the Netherlands and Russia to dance with GW students and other local artists, and teach free workshops to any interested students.
“It’s nice to think that a person came from across the world to teach you a workshop, and you don’t even have to pay for it,” said Wendell Cooper, a senior dance major. Cooper will perform with other members of the GW student improvisation group Washington Free Collaboration.
The 10th year of the festival features some changes to the traditional program. For the first time, actors were invited as performers. Syliva Toone, director of the Syliva Toone Artists’ Repertory, will perform with her troupe in a Sunday performance. She has also recruited Kenny Raskin, a clown from Cirque Du Soleil, for a performance and workshop.
“Kenny is not like the red-nosed, big shoes type – he’s a physical comedian,” Toone said. “GW has been generous in giving me space for Kenny; I couldn’t have afforded him without GW.”
The GW Theater and Dance Department and the Student Activities Center sponsored the festival.
Another improvisation will feature seven GW students in a pre-concert performance Friday and Saturday in the Marvin Center Great Hall called “The Fallen.” The students have organized what Withers calls a “structured” improvisation, which is characterized by both prepared elements and improvisation to the theme of war and its casualties.
“I don’t think improvisation necessarily means that you find the movement in performance,” said Withers. “You may know the movement beforehand, but you can find the choreography in the performance.”
Other elements of the festival include theme or location driven improvs. “Catscratch Theater Metro Series – Green Line Project,” will take place on the green line train starting Wednesday evening in Anacostia.
“They work with a found audience,” said Withers. “I don’t even know if they get permission, I think they just get on.”
“Because of the guests that have come, I’ve made artistic relationships,” Cooper said. “I was invited to go study with Magpie, the company that is coming here from the Netherlands, as my study abroad.”
Toone said, “I think that what Maida created is a place for me to go and bounce off of another artist, and it’s something very significant.”
For a full event schedule, visit www.improvfestival.com.
