Forms

A daisy-chain of two-person scenes — Player B carries into a new scene with C, then C with D, until the chain completes a circle back to A.

A single scene, single location, continuous real time — full show length with no external edits.

A monologist tells true stories from an audience suggestion; the cast improvises scenes inspired by the stories — often cited as UCB's most influential imported format.

The foundational long-form improv structure — a single audience suggestion explodes into three beats of three scenes each, bookended and separated by group games.

Keith Johnstone's pro-wrestling-inspired competitive improv — two teams, judges, point cards, and the threat of honks for bad scenes. The template for 99% of modern improv competition.

UCB's flagship weekly show — a celebrity monologist tells true stories and UCB all-stars improvise scenes off them. Longest-running improv show in the world.

A fully improvised Jane Austen novel, in period costume with live music, based on a made-up audience-suggested title.

A two-person longform of two fishermen talking in a boat — Joe Bill and Mark Sutton's long-running conversational improv show that grew out of a Screw Puppies sketch.

Two improv teams, a timed set each, and the audience secret-ballot-votes the winner. The champion returns next week. UCB's weekly gauntlet.

Multiple two-person scenes happening simultaneously in the same physical space — characters know each other are there but can only talk to one partner.

A weekly live improvised soap opera running continuously since 1991 — recurring characters, ongoing storylines, live music, and an annual 50-hour Soap-A-Thon marathon.

An improvised disaster film — audience picks the disaster (earthquake, alien invasion, flood) and a location; cast introduces doomed characters before and during the catastrophe.

A two-person organic-form improv duo show by Colleen Doyle and Jason Shotts — descendants of the TJ & Dave / Bassprov conversational tradition.

An improvised noir detective story — hardboiled voiceover narration, chiaroscuro lighting, femme fatales, rain, cigarettes, betrayal.

Keith Johnstone's director-focused competition — three players take turns directing each other, and it's the director (not the players) the audience judges.

The weekly showcase night for a theater's 'house' Harold teams — two or three teams perform Harolds back-to-back, often ending with The Dream.

A full-length musical with live band — overture, book scenes, solo numbers, duets, 11 o'clock number, finale — all improvised from a made-up title.

A full-length fully improvised Shakespeare play — rhyming couplets, Shakespearean archetypes, iambic pentameter — from a one-word audience title.

A dreamlike montage of free-flowing scenes that bleed into each other via transformation edits — 'not a form, a philosophy of play.'

A series of seamless transformation edits in one macro-location — the camera follows characters as they move through a shared world.

Keith Johnstone's 'round-robin' elimination format — up to 20 players compete scene by scene, lowest audience scores dropped, until a last-improviser-standing winner.

A rapid-fire series of loosely connected short scenes springing from a single suggestion — the default long-form at UCB before Harold.

A full-length improvised whodunit — characters gather, blackout, a body, a detective, red herrings, and a reveal all generated live.

An umbrella form — an improvised full-length story with protagonist, inciting incident, rising action, climax, denouement. Often structured via Hero's Journey, Story Spine, or Love/Hope/Death.

No structure, no edits — two improvisers walk on stage with nothing and deliver an hour of grounded, character-first 'instant plays.' TJ Jagodowski and David Pasquesi's signature form.

A monoscene variant set inside a vehicle — characters can't leave, all interactions happen in the fixed space of a car/bus/train for the show's duration.

An early Annoyance-school ensemble improv piece that paired scripted and improvised segments — the incubator for Bassprov and other two-person forms.

A fully improvised Hamilton-style hip-hop musical about a historical figure of the audience's choosing — Baby Wants Candy's hit spinoff.

A Harold performed entirely in blackout — no visual edits, no movement cues, audio-only improv.

A long opening scene (6-8 min) is mined for thematic and commentary scenes that peel back what the opening was 'about' — Close's most cerebral long-form.

An improvised documentary — talking-head interviews to an invisible camera, B-roll scenes, a narrating documentarian, all generated live.

An audience volunteer describes their day (or a dream they had); the cast improvises a surreal reenactment/extension where natural events become magically charged.

A four-phase ritual opening for Harold — 'It Is / You Are / Thou Art / I Am' — that elevates a mundane suggestion to near-religious importance before any scenes play.

A real audience member is interviewed on stage about their life; the cast improvises the milestone events from their past as they hear them.

Improvised scenes inspired by that day's news — a revival of the WPA Federal Theatre Project form by way of David Shepherd and the Compass Players.

Performers sit in a horseshoe having a real conversation about a suggestion until someone breaks into the center and initiates a scene.

An improvised feature film — three painted locations, title sequence, genre conventions, and cinematic edits (jump cuts, POV shifts, montage).

The default Harold opening — word association from a suggestion, looped three times to generate scene premises before any scene is played.

A grounded monoscene at the center with fast cut-away petals — flashbacks, cutaways, commercial-style riffs — that return to the central scene.

A solo-performer Harold — one improviser plays every character across all three beats and group games.

Mick Napier's signature-scripted-feeling improv form — an invisible language between performers produces a fully improvised show that looks as tight as a scripted one.

Three unrelated short plays woven together — three suggestions, three casts (or rotating), three arcs braided into one 30-45 minute show.