Exercise: Full-Class Tableau

If you’ve got a large group of drama students but not a lot of time, try these two quick full-class tableau exercises. Students will work together to create full-class tableau scenes as fast as they can. The first exercise challenges students to collaborate with each other in a timely manner, and the second exercise requires students to practice their quick-thinking improvisation skills.

In these scenes, students may not use any props, costumes, or furniture pieces (no chairs, benches, or rehearsal blocks) to create their frozen tableau scenes. They can only use their own bodies and imaginations.

If possible, have a device available to take photos or videos, so you can capture your students’ work and have them look at what everyone is doing. Alternatively, if you have a classroom with a large mirror, have them perform the tableau scene facing the mirror so they can see what the full scene looks like.

Exercise 1: Small Groups, Full Scene

1. Split the class into groups of 4–6 students.

2. Assign a full-class location prompt, such as the beach, a restaurant, or a playground.

3. Each group will have three minutes to plan a different section of the full-class tableau. For example, in the beach scene, one group of students might be sunbathing, one group might be swimming, and one might be playing volleyball. In the restaurant scene, one group might be a family out to dinner, one might be the chefs in the kitchen, and a third might be washing dishes. Work quickly; there’s no time to argue about roles.

4. Each group member must participate in the scene, but not everyone has to be a human character. In the playground scene, you might have one group who decides to portray a dog walker with a bunch of dogs — the students in that group can each play a different dog. Or in the restaurant scene, you might have one student in a group play the table and two students play chairs.

5. At the end of the three minutes, give students one minute to arrange themselves on one side of the room in a way that makes sense, and take their frozen tableau poses. Give them a cue (“3, 2, 1… Freeze!”) so they know when to hold the pose. Have students hold the tableau scenes for at least 10 seconds, so you can take photographs and/or students can see themselves in the mirror.

Exercise 2: Add Three

1. Have students stand in a large circle.

2. Assign a full-class location prompt.

3. Select three students to go into the middle of the circle and start a tableau scene depicting an aspect of the location. For example, in the playground scene, these three students might start by pretending to play hopscotch, jump rope, or leapfrog. (You might wish to encourage these first students to select poses that are easy to hold, as they’ll be holding their frozen poses the longest!) Hold these poses for five seconds.

4. After five seconds, while the current three students remain frozen, choose three more students to jump into the centre of the circle and add on to the scene. They can either join in the current scene, or do something adjacent to the scene that is still related. For example, one student might join in the leapfrog chain, while the other two pretend to ride bikes nearby. Once all three students are in place, have the group hold the pose for another five seconds.

5. Keep repeating this process, adding three additional students and holding the poses for five seconds, until all the students are in the tableau scene. Have students hold the final tableau scenes for at least 10 seconds, so you can take photographs and/or students can see themselves in the mirror.

Tableau Tips:

• Blinking and breathing is always allowed in tableaux.
• Think about levels in your poses — high, medium, and low.
• Where is your audience? Remember to cheat out and avoid turning your back to the audience area.
• Focus on details, especially facial expressions, reactions, and eye focal points.