As many of you readers know, I am a theatre arts performance major, and if you didn’t know, now you know. This comes with plenty of classes where we spend time using exercises in order to help us understand a better way to act. I have also found that these exercises are also great ice breaker games for when you are trying to get to know someone. Here are a few of my favorite.
Games that are used already to get to know others are usually Two Truths And A Lie, Never Have I Ever, Would You Rather, games like that. The games I am going to introduce to you are games where you use your mind, body, and personality. I also would like to mention that if you do Meisner work, that’s all you’ll need seeing as a bunch of these games and exercises are from Meisner himself.
The first game is one known by many. It’s called Hot Seat. This is where someone puts a chair in the middle of the room. One person is selected to sit in said chair. Then, your group will choose a desired time to keep the one person in the chair. Here, in Bradley fashion, we do two minutes. While in the chair, anyone and everyone who wants to ask you a question can and you must answer. If you are sitting in the chair, you can choose how much you share about the question that was asked. You do this with everyone who you are playing with and by the end of it, you know a little more about everyone in the room.
The second game is called One Word At A Time. This is where you are in a circle with a group of people. One word at a time you all will create a story starting with once upon a time and ending with the end. This story can be as long or short as you want it to be, but it has to go somewhere. You are then shown what people go to first when in a situation like that one, on the spot thinking.
The third game is known as The First Thing. There are steps to this game, but the first part is to have two people stand a little distance away from each other. Have them faced away from each other. Then have both turn around at the same time and have one say what they notice about the other, the very first thing. No thinking and no pre-conceived notions, just the first thing about the other. This will give your insight on what others first see about you and what you tend to notice in others. Remember, don’t be kind like society has taught us. If you first see someone’s forehead, say forehead, it’s the truth.
These exercises are designed to get you to stop thinking and respond as quickly and as you as possible. There is something called the pinch and the ouch. Basically, a reaction or action is going to have its equal opposite reaction. This is going to infer where the scene goes and what happens next, the actor’s journey.
Hopefully you will try these games and see what you learn about people. Also, look up these games because there are plenty of versions to make them harder or more catered to your group.