IMPROFEST workshop: Scene Brain, Story Brain, Game Brain - Joe Bill

This two-day workshop will help improvisers understand the differences in how their brains work when they are playing improv scenes vs improv games. We’ll cover how the harmony of the Engineer and Jazz Musician sensibilities in your head can be vital in playing Scene, Narrative, Games (and “Game of The Scene’, if applicable). There are psychological differences that happen when we play for comedy as the goal vs. when we play for comedy as a consequence of emotional and psychological connection. I’ve studied psychology and behavioral neuroscience for more than 30 years and in this
workshop, I aim to help everyone at any point in their improv life, to understand how to ground themselves immediately in an improv scene, in ANY context. There is some deep cut neuroscience nerdery in this workshop but I will also help you get out of your head, gain confidence, and feel more connected so you can just PLAY!

Bio:
Joe Bill is widely regarded as one of the best teachers of Improvised Storytelling and Scenic, Longform and Duo Improvisation in North America today. He is one of the founding members of Annoyance Theater Chicago where, for 12 years, he performed in and/or directed more than 60 different shows. Joe is ½ of the first touring Improv Duo in North America, BASSPROV, created in 2000 with Mark Sutton. They are still performing at Festivals and theater engagements globally 24 years later. Since then Joe’s been touring all over the world teaching, directing, and improvising with several other amazing Duo Partners like Patti Stiles (Our Play), Jill Bernard (SCRAM!),
Stacey Hallal (Stacey and Joe, We Slept Together) Lee White (Paradigm), Heather Urquart (Blues Hammer), Felipe Ortiz (Les Disciplinos) and David Razowsky (Razowsky and Bill), ALL in different, original formats and styles.

He's touring his solo scripted show, written as he successfully took on and survived surgeries and chemo associated with 3 different cancers from late 2022 to early 2024, Joe Bill: Surviving Consciousness, (Lessons learned from Cancer, LSD and Michael Jordan) all over the U.S. and the world. In April 2024 he debuted it at the Auckland Imrprov Festival in Auckland, NZ. He has since performed it at Festivals and Theaters across the USA and made his first recording of it at Unexpected Productions in Seattle in January 2025.

He is the creator and host of Story Chain, a virtual (and now sometimes live!), 90- minute, international story sharing event that he developed in 2020 during the Pandemic. He was the Director of Corporate Training at iO Chicago for 15 years and started training and performing there in 1985. He was a Guest Artist in Residence at The Second City Training Center and Conservatory where he taught intensives in Duo Improvisation and Improvisation for Actors for 10 years.

Joe has taught and performed on every continent on earth, except for Antarctica which remains on his bucket list.

The workshop is a part of Improfest 2025, a theatre festival focusing on improvisational theatre. The festival invites improvisers from Sweden and the rest of the world to give performances and offer workshops in various locations in Sweden during the period May to August 2025

(Workshopen kommer att hållas på engelska då Improfest är en internationell improvisationsteater-festival med inbjudna improvisatörer från hela världen.)