MOMENT! 2022: 10th International Improv Festival Vienna

VIENNA IS BACK ON THE INTERNATIONAL IMPROV MAP!

TAG – Theater an der Gumpendorfer Straße in Vienna produces passionate and entertaining contemporary theatre with a special focus on improv theatre and proudly presents MOMENT! 10th INTERNATIONAL IMPROV FESTIVAL VIENNA 2022: Spontaneous, lively and unique entertainment at world class level!

The festival addresses professional improvisation actors and actresses who are curious about exchanging views concerning theoretical and practical experiences. The audience benefits from vivid performances unique in their matchless constellation of improv pros from all over the world meeting at TAG in Vienna.

ARTISTS LINE UP

Nadine Antler (DE)
Christian Capozzoli (US)
Tom Fischdick (DE)
Christian Frerichs (DE)
Andrew Hefler (US/HU)
Rama Nicholas (AU)
Naomi Snieckus (CA)
Vid Sodnik (SI)

THE TAG SPORT-VOR-ORT-ALLSTARS

hosted by Jim Libby

SHOWS

Thursday Oct. 6th, 2022

Part 1: THE GRAND OPENING SHOW presented by Jim Libby

Life entertains us best.
Let’s face it: life itself tells the most beautiful stories! True life, when given that special frame, is more adventurous, romantic and overwhelming than any fiction or kitsch novel.
In this show the MOMENT! Ensemble presents itself to the audience: Jim Libby interviews the international improv stars to tell a story about their life. The other improvisers associate along this story, reflect, exaggerate and alienate it to create a new and original drama in the truest sense of the word.

Part 2: 4TRACK presented by Christian Capozzoli

The 4Track form demands you rush the stage with confidence and connectivity. Ratchet, bounce and build scenes to a boil, then tumble into an avalanche of distilled and pithy callbacks. This form rejoices bold choices, physicality, and split second agreement and celebration. Create tension, take action, and explore characterization through wants, and spine and choice.

Friday Oct. 7th, 2022

IMPROMPTU SPLENDOR presented by Naomi Snieckus 

Impromptu Splendor is an improvised play done in the style of a celebrated playwright. This award winning show, Impromptu Splendor was first created by The National Theatre of the World (Matt Batam, Ron Pederson, Naomi Snieckus). It ran as a weekly show in Canada for over three years and has toured internationally to sold out audiences. For the Moment Festival the play will be performed by Naomi Snieckus and other company members.

Saturday Oct. 8th, 2022

Part 1: THE SOUNDTRACK OF OUR LIVES presented by Christian Frerichs

They’re back! The fans couldn’t be happier!

Are they happy? What’s their story? Where have they all been…and how?

This show will take you on a musical and emotional rollercoaster, exploring the life of a band and its members in the moment of its comeback, looking at the past, present and possible future.

From the early beginnings to rehearsal room fights, from quiet songwriting moments to screaming fan encounters – The Soundtrack Of Our Lives gives you music…and all the good, the bad and in-between stuff that’s attached to it while writing, performing and living it as a group, over the years.

Part 2: WAKING UP (SCHNITTSTELLE) presented by Nadine Antler

The moment I wake up is a moment of disorientation. Were these dreams real? I don’t know yet: Where am I? How am I? Who is this person beside me?  And I might need some seconds to decide: What has happened before this? What will this day be like? Filled with excitement or fear?

In this show we will explore the precious seconds of waking up, the moment where everything is possible, where past, present and future meet.

Sunday Oct. 9th, 2022

CLOSE TO YOU presented by Rama Nicholas

A fully improvised show about Romantic love, Intimacy, Passion and Sexual Attraction.

Romantic love is a theme we see in cinema, books, poetry, myths and legends. There are love stories everywhere and whether or not we like to admit it these stories intrigue us and draw us in with the thrill of feeling and hurting just as much as the characters do.

And yet, romantic love is a place that improvisers rarely dare to tread.

This intimate show, however, courageously draws back the veil on our secret lives and loves and gives the audience the chance to glimpse love in its rawest form improvised on stage.

Experience the highs and lows. That warm and fuzzy feeling only a new love can invoke, candid conversations about sex, the ups and downs of lasting relationships, the passion, the craving, the break ups, the broken hearts and the electrifying tension of desire…

Like all great love stories – CLOSE TO YOU will leave you wanting more.

Monday Oct. 10th, 2022

THE AFTERPARTY presented by Andrew Hefler

It is all fun and games until you play for keeps. How do you see the other? How do you perceive yourself? Do you drop your guard and allow yourself to be seen?

The Afterparty is an improvised ensemble play in one act that reveals three different relationships all separately returning late night from the same party. Unpacking perceptions, stories and desires the wee hours catch up to us and right along with them, some truth.

Created by Nora Palkovits and Andrew Hefler, this show premiered at the VIA conference in March 2019 and has been performed in Budapest, Istanbul and Warsaw.

Tuesday Oct. 11th, 2022

Part 1: CHAIRS presented by Vid Sodnik

The essence of the format is playfulness and looking at the space and objects on stage and going through different options with setting up a scene. We play with different compositions as well as with rhythm of scenes.

In this show we use chairs and tables as inspiration to set up a scene. The audience will see a variety of scenes inspired by the position of the furniture. In between scenes the performers explore in mid-dark different options of setting up a scene. When the scene is set, the lights go up and the scene starts.

The performance Chairs, which has been designed by members of the international collective Ohana – Vid Sodnik and Gerald Weber and perfected by IGLU, looks for inspiration in the positional layout of the performing space. The rhythm and the content of scenes are dictated by the layout of stage furniture. Let’s imagine that stage props are not merely there as a requisite to help the content, but are its main creators. Let’s imagine that everyday objects are not only tools of our lives but their main determiners!

Part 2: BLACKOUT presented by Nadine Antler

When people are tied together in one place for an indefinite period of time, everything is new territory. There is room for warmth and community. New, unexpected connections emerge. But in the same way, old wounds can open up when tension can’t make its way out. Who are you when you are forced into a place and a community, when routines, rituals, and mundanities are taken from you? What is important to you then, and how important are the others? In this improvised play, every personal decision becomes a decision for the community.

WORKSHOPS

3 hrs WORKSHOP for BEGINNERS
3.30 pm – 6.30 pm
Fees: € 50 / Workshop

A CAPELLALADEEDA
with Christian Frerichs
Friday Oct. 7th, 2022

Your group has no musician but you still want to perform musical improv on stage? You want to experience your improv singing voice in a unique way? You love A Capella music? Well, then come along and let our voices sing, ring and improvise together!
 

AERODYNAMICS OF YES
with Christian Capozzoli
Saturday Oct. 8th, 2022

Get familiar with the Aerodynamics of Yes techniques of improv. This is a course designed to help performers build upon prior improv training. It sets out to create a bedrock foundation for you as a self reliant, team-playing, fun-chasing improviser. This is for improvisers that want a refreshing new slant on the way they play. Learn to advance and expand your ideas and weave them into rewarding scenes and narratives, with pronounced games.
 

SPONTANEITY
with Vid Sodnik
Sunday Oct. 9th, 2022

In this workshop we’ll play together and fail together. Pushing yourself to the edge of your abilities makes it possible to surprise yourself and your partner and that’s where the magic happens. You want your audience to feel that you and your partner are creating everything right in front of their eyes. All the risk-taking and „mistakes“ make it real. We’ll work on different ways and techniques to stay spontaneous and make the scene turn to the unexpected. We’ll try to push ourselves outside our comfort zone, patterns and usual character choices.
 

LISTEN. FOCUS. INSPIRE!
with Rama Nicholas
Monday Oct. 10th, 2022

In this workshop we will explore what it feels like to truly listen and be heard. How our scene-work and team-work can improve exponentially using these 3 simple things – listening, focusing and inspiring. We will explore what it takes to inspire each other by being curious and learning what our scene partner needs. We will be unlocking doors to your creativity you never knew existed and have a lot of fun doing it.

FIGHT FOR NORMALCY
with Andrew Hefler
Tuesday Oct. 11th, 2022

It is often the case that impro actors feel immense pressure to be interesting or funny or weird to make scenes watchable. This is rarely a good approach. Too often in improvised work actors get nervous or overexcited and take things way outside and get downright wacky. This, while liberating, exhilarating or otherwise has the ability to confuse or frustrate viewers and other players ultimately trivializing or leaving the scenes meaningless or worse yet senseless. This course explores and exercises are skill set as actors to dare to be normal, balanced and functional in scenes setting them up for far greater risk and reward while giving the viewer real likeable, believeable characters to pull for. It works through my principle of two actor = 1 beast as the temptation for crazy actions is to magnetise or lure other players to follow suit often leading to mindless dribble. Here through authentic normalcy we are liberated to more truthfully and starkly portray truly risky or odd moments from lives of characters or offbeat people on stage.

3 hrs WORKSHOP for INTERMEDIATE/ADVANCED IMPROVISERS
3.30 pm – 6.30 pm
Fees: € 50 / Workshop

BREAKING ROUTINES, MANIAS, OBSESSIONS & EXTREMES
with Andrew Hefler
Thursday Oct. 6th, 2022

If people have inhibitions, fears or social issues off stage they tend to take them on stage too. This is normal, but it does impact some of the variety of choices we make to represent lives on stage. Getting out of your head and getting into broader range of physicalities and voice through exaggerated expressions, gestures and commitment. I will start with your default expressions and features and we will begin to grotesquely aggrandize them, working opposite them, or randomly altering them. Using some of the traditions and techniques from trans mask with the actors face using some of the traditions and techniques from trance mask with your own face as the mask we will begin to coax out other characters that are residing in there. We will cover some of the spectrum. Also looking at new wants to play and minimalistic expressions all the way to the extremes. With these new characters come new wants and convictions and they bring with them the baggage of taboo topics racier themes and even downright bad behavior on stage with consequence. This course will give you tools to get your play out of safer trivial areas into depicting relevant issues, through exciting and unique characters with conviction.
 

TRUTH, EMOTION AND REACTION
with Rama Nicholas
Friday Oct. 7th, 2022

In this masterclass workshop, we will explore stories using truth, emotion and reaction through specialised exercises and grounded, naturalistic scene-work. Working with these themes, we can explore our own personal, dynamic emotional range as improvisers and performers.

We will also be exploring truth through our own personal stories finding connection, trust and shared experience within the group.

There will be an emphasis on slowing down, building trust, really connecting with and listening to your scene partner. Reacting not only to verbal offers but understanding body language and physical offers.

I will help guide the group by directing scenes and giving feedback to help collectively understand what the story needs. We will explore and create juicy, dynamic stories and support each other to make the boldest choices possible. Whether our scene-work is serious or comedic, our aim will be to truly inspire each other and our audience.

5 hrs WORKSHOP for INTERMEDIATE/ADVANCED IMPROVISERS
1.30 pm – 6.30 pm
Fees: € 80 / Workshop

TRUTH IN IMPROV
with Naomi Snieckus
Saturday Oct. 8th, 2022

This workshop is for experienced improvisers who want to dive deeper into the art of long form improvised acting. With grounded improv, we will focus on more authentic, truthful acting, characters and relationships to tell stories with not only our words, but the moments between the words.  What stories come out when we slow down, look at our scene partner and breath?
 

ENSEMBLE PLAY
with Christian Capozzoli
Sunday Oct. 9th, 2022

Cut through the chaos of group scenes to create clarity, confidence and power. The Ensemble play workshop is rooted in celebration. Learn to rejoice and support bold choices with split second agreement and attack. Play lean, so scenes are always in a state of being or becoming, moving from a solid to a liquid to a boil of tension, action and dynamism. Push past fear and judgement and give over to the group to create a culture of yes where even the most ordinary choices can become extraordinary scenes.

3-day WORKSHOP for ADVANCED IMPROVISERS
SCHNITTSTELLE – The International Showcase Ensemble

TAG and Nadine Antler will cast a group of advanced players who’ll have the possibility to train with Nadine Antler during the MOMENT! Festival 2022 and perform WAKING UP on stage on Saturday Oct. 8th, 2022.

When we observe people on the street, on the bus, in waiting rooms, we often know intuitively what their relationship is like, whether there is an argument in the air, whether there is the greatest familiarity or whether the person sitting in front of us has just fallen in love. In most cases, we don’t even need to understand what words are being exchanged. We are masters at reading between the lines.

But how is it that this ability often evaporates on stage? We create artificial situations, miss important body language and vocal cues, and often intellectually concoct a story that we laboriously agree upon.

This workshop is about learning and trying out techniques to get out of the head and into the emotional relationship, from producing to reacting, from the „good idea“ to the authentic emotional response. This workshop is a training to hear the unsaid, to be with yourself and with your partner and to create true relationships on stage. With truthful listening and authentic re-acting, the scenes unfold effortlessly in front of us.

Oct. 6th – 8th, 2022

Fee: € 190

Training Sessions:
Thursday Oct. 6th, 2022, 11.00 am – 3.00 pm
Friday Oct. 7th, 2022, 10.00 am – 3.00 pm
Saturday Oct. 8th, 2022, 10.00 am – 3.00 pm

Exclusive Special!
TAG and superstar Rama Nicholas offer an exclusive additional workshop the weekend after the MOMENT!-Festival:

CLOSE TO YOU
Saturday 15. October 2022, 10 am – 4 pm
Sunday 16. October 2022, 10 am – 4 pm

Fees: € 250 / 220 reduced fee
Level: advanced (at least one year experience)

All the details and application: WORKSHOP CLOSE TO YOU