Improv Acting Birthday Party Games

by Sonia Hall
(Michigan)

Improv acting birthday party games can be so much fun because everyone drops their inhibitions and opens their minds to whatever silly and off-the-wall ideas they have.

Improvisation games, also called theater games, are taught in acting classes and drama clubs. They translate to birthday parties easily!

My favorite improv games I've played at my birthday parties are Bus Stop, Whose Line is It, and Freeze. They are all theater games and tons of fun!

Bus Stop First, I loved playing a game called bus stop. The premise is at any one time a person is sitting on a bench waiting for a (fictitious) bus to come, only to have another person sit down next to him or her and do something so off-putting that it makes the first person leave. Then the cycle begins anew.

Sometimes, the goal is clearly to highly irritate the person for irritation’s sake. When I was sitting during the game, the person who came up next to me would look straight forward with a blank expression on his face, then, for about three seconds, turn to face my ear and scream at the top of his lungs and repeating.

Next, one could bother the character the person is playing. As I was sitting, another person sat next to me and pretended to know all of my personal information, “Are you Joe R. of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, social security number 19...”

Finally, both characters can work together to make fun of a third person. When the second person to sit on the bench pretended to be my acting instructor and began a clearly boring speech about the merits of acting, the first person ran in fright from the bench. There are many directions this game can take.

Whose Line is It? Next, I have had an absolute ball playing the game whose line. For this game all players contribute a couple of random phrases into a bowl or hat. Then, two or three players take a line without looking at it and begin a scene of everyone else’s choosing.

At certain key points during the scene, players allude that they’re about to read their line, calling the line anything from, “advice my mother gave to me,” to, “a secret I need to tell you,” to, “an inscription on a locket from my love.” This line is almost always a non sequitur, and it’s the job of the players to work the line into the scene anyway.

Freeze Finally, I’ll explain a third game called freeze. This game begins with two people doing a scene. It is important in this game for the players to fairly frequently make large, exaggerated body movements that relate to their scene. When this happens, an audience member can yell freeze, take the place and body position of one of the players, and reinterpret it to create a new scene.

For example, if someone was on their knees praying, someone could switch with that person and change the kneeling behavior to be a person proposing. In conclusion, with an open mind and an ability to laugh at oneself, a birthday party with improvisation games can plenty entertaining and save you some money.

Categories: Kids Party Games, Teenage Party Games, Adult Birthday Party Games

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