Object work is something I’ve found incredibly difficult as an improviser. It takes a lot of work and skill to create an imaginary physical environment in the midst of your scene, interact with that environment realistically, and continue to do so consistently until the scene is over. But when it’s done well, object work totally engrossing and pulls the audience into the reality of your improv scene.
Object work, also called “environment work” or “space work,” is the act of creating and interacting with non-existent, imaginary objects and/or an imaginary physical environment while improvising. Object work replaces the need for the physical props and sets of a traditional theatrical performance.
There are lots of resources out there that provide improv games and exercises to practice object work, but when practicing my own object work, I’ve found it especially useful to look out for common mistakes that can make our object work seem unrealistic or distracting. Without further ado, here are 6 top mistakes that people make when doing object work in improv.
Object Work Mistake #1: Using Your Hands as Object Stand-Ins
How do you actually hold a phone? I’m guessing you grasp it with your hand cupped in a kind of c-shape. But when onstage, it can be tempting to default to the fake hand-phone we’re all used to: curling your middle three fingers in with your thumb and pinky sticking out to talk into.
We do the same thing with lots of objects: we routinely make finger guns, finger scissors, etc. But in improv, such hand-gesture objects can be jarring.
Mistake #1 is using your hands as object stand-ins. Instead, use your hands as if you were actually holding or interacting with a real physical object, rather than creating a mimicry of the object with your hands.
The Upright Citizens Brigade Comedy Improvisation Manual gives a great reason for this: it undermines your commitment to the reality of your scene. When creating objects in a scene, “your goal should be to make them as real as possible” rather than giving into cartoonish caricatures.
Object Work Mistake #2: Not Leaving Enough Space for Objects
I got this tip from the Improv Cincinnati blog, and it’s made a big difference in my own object work: leave enough space for your imagined objects.
Whenever I am using an object, like a broom or a shovel, something I close my hand around, I will leave space for the object. It seems like a small thing (and it might be depending on your hand size), but the action allows my brain to continually perceive the object as real. … By maintaining that encapsulated negative space, you create a bit more reality for you and allow for even more discovery.
Improv Cincinnati Blog, “On the Importance of Object Work”
This applies to objects that you are not holding as well. If you’re stacking boxes, make sure you’re accounting for the sapce each box would take (so you know when yo move on to the next stack because your first stack has gotten too high). If you’re setting a table, consider how much room each place setting would take.
Thinking consciously about the negative space each “object” occupies will help keep you more aware of it in your scenework.
Object Work Mistake #3: Using Real Objects Alongside Imaginary Ones
Normally, there aren’t many real physical objects onstage during an improvised scene, except for a couple of chairs. However, one often has several physical objects on their person: a phone, a wallet, keys, loose change.
While it may seem natural to use these real objects in a scene where a phone or wallet (for example) is required, this can actually be really distracting. That’s why mistake #3 is using real objects alongside improvised objects in a scene.
You don’t want to use both real and mimed objects in your scenes (e.g., a robber using a mimed gun to take a real wallet). It’s jarring. Once you see one real object in the space, it sets up the expectation that everything should be real, which is an expectation that you cannot fulfill as an improviser.
Matt Besser, Ian Roberts, and Matt Walsh. The Upright Citizens Brigade Comedy Improvisation Manual. p. 31
Bottom line: When you pull out a real phone or take off your real jacket, that’s bound to draw the audience’s eye, which distracts them from everything else you’re doing in your scene.
Object Work Mistake #4: Talking About What You’re Doing
How often do you talk about doing laundry while you’re doing laundry? Almost never, beyond, perhaps, briefly complaining about the activity or asking whether you can put a certain type of fabric in the dryer.
But many improvisers start a scene engaged in object work, performing a specific activity, and then begin their scene by talking about what they are doing. That’s why mistake #4 is talking about what you’re doing.
Talking about your object work is an issue because it removes focus from the relationship between your characters, which is what will drive the scene forward.
In their book Truth in Comedy, Charla Halpern, Del Close, and Kim “Howard” Johnson claim that dialogue in a scene should be about your relationship with your scene partner(s), not about the activity or object work you’re doing. Of course, the object work will affect the dialogue in the scene, but ideally, the connection between the scene’s “verbal and visual levels” will come later.
Talking about what you’re doing is also unrealistic, which can pull an audience out of the reality of your scene, and it can be mind-numbingly boring. No one wants to listen to a father and son talk about weeding for 15 minutes. But a father and son who happen to be weeding while skirting around the son’s feelings of abandonment for his often-absent father? That’s fascinating.
Object Work Mistake #5: Not Being Specific
Specific objects are more funny (and provide more information about the who, what, and where of your scene) than general ones.
In addition, gifting yourself and others with specific objects can actually help you get unstuck and move your scene forward. Specifics give the characters your create and your scene more dimension and make it easier to connect your choices to future scenes in a longform. Otherwise, you’re at risk of becoming what Mike Myers called “Vague-Man” (Truth in Comedy, p. 106).
Specific choices can also help the realism of your object work by enabling you to better visualize the activity you’re doing. Don’t mime brushing your teeth. Think about how you actually brush your teeth in real life. Imagine your toothbrush, your sink, your toothpaste, your dimly lit bathroom lighting, and smudgy mirror. Then, brush your teeth.
Even when you don’t articulate a specific object choice in your dialogue (naming the brand of toothpaste you use for example), making specific choices when visualizing your objects will make your actions more real.
Object Work Mistake #6: Making Self-Deprecating Jokes about Mistakes
Mistake #5 is to not to crack jokes about object work mistakes at the expense of your scene. That doesn’t mean don’t acknowledge them, but that you should commit 100% to the reality you’ve created in your scene (rather than pulling the audience out of that reality with a self-deprecating joke).
Sometimes, it will make sense to correct a minor mistake as soon as you realize it; other times, you may be able to integrate a mistake into the reality of your scene, acknowledging it without detachment.
This mistake has a story behind it.
One of the best improv performances I’ve ever witnessed live was by a group called Parallelogramophonograph (PGraph), who performed a narrative longform at the Denver Improv Festival in 2019. Early on in their set, the improvisers (who were playing characters out on the American prairie, traveling west) established that they were gathered around a fire. Later on in the scene, one of the improvisers accidentally stepped through the fire.
This could have damaged the reality of their scene and their object work. As I saw it, they had three choices:
- Ignore the slipup and hope the audience didn’t notice (or wouldn’t remember it as the scene continued)
- Call out the mistake for a laugh (detaching themselves from the scene)
- Integrate the mistake into the reality of the scene and make it seem purposeful
They took option #3. As soon as the improviser walked through the fire, the other players gasped in shock. The man who stepped into the flames paused, then intentionally stepped back into them, then out, then in again, commenting in puzzlement that the flames were cold. This allowed another player to change to the scene to the control room of a virtual reality experience, where several business execs and IT specialists were controlling the prairie reality from the previous scene.
The rest of the show involved the “real world” and the “VR world” interacting with each other and bleeding together. And all because they didn’t let an object work mistake go unacknowledged or simply crack a passing joke about it.
Ignoring mistakes can often be distracting (maybe not if it’s minor, but if it’s a big mistake, it will be). And, making snide comments about your (or your scene partner’s) mistakes can make you seem detached from your scenework and pull the audience out of the reality of your scene.
Integrating an object work slipup into the reality of your scene won’t always work so seamlessly, but I was so impressed by how these improvisers remained committed to their object work. Even when they slipped up, they committed to the choice they made, doubled down on it, and opened themselves up to new possibilities for the scene.
But, if you can find a way to integrate mistakes and make them seem purposeful, doubling down can be a really viable option.