Gorilla Theatre

How to Explain It

"In Gorilla Theatre, the audience directs. If you see a scene and you know what should happen next, come up and tap out a performer. Step in and take their place. The scene continues. Anyone can jump in at any time. The stage belongs to everyone."

Gorilla Theatre develops directing skills that are rarely addressed in standard improv training. Most improv education focuses on performing, leaving the directing function to be learned through trial and error. This format provides a structured environment for practicing real-time direction.

The format also teaches pitching, a skill that extends beyond improv into professional presentation and idea advocacy. Directors learn to read an audience, frame an idea compellingly, and sell a creative vision in a short window.

The competitive element must be managed carefully. The forfeit should be embarrassing but not humiliating, and the voting should feel consequential but not cruel. The goal is productive pressure, not anxiety. Johnstone's philosophy treats failure as a gift: the losing director gets the biggest laugh of the night.

The format works best with experienced performers who can respond to direction quickly and with performers who have some directing experience. Introducing the format to newer performers as a workshop exercise (without the competitive element) builds the directing skills before adding performance pressure.

The pitch is the format's critical moment. Directors who pitch clear, compelling ideas generate audience enthusiasm that carries into the scene. Vague or overly complex pitches lose the audience before the scene begins. The best pitches are simple enough to explain in two sentences and ambitious enough to make the audience curious.

Directing in real time requires a different skill set from performing. Directors must watch the scene from the audience's perspective, identify what is working and what is not, and make adjustments without disrupting the performers' flow. Effective side-coaching is specific and actionable: "slow down" or "look at each other" rather than abstract notes about tone or energy.

The competitive element should enhance rather than dominate the show. Directors who play only for laughs to win the vote produce shallow scenes. Directors who pursue ambitious, risky work and succeed create the show's peak moments. The forfeit provides a safety net: even failure has entertainment value.

The ensemble's responsiveness to direction determines the format's quality. Performers who resist or ignore their director's coaching undermine the format's premise. The ensemble must commit to executing the director's vision, even when the direction is unconventional.

Gorilla Theatre puts the audience in charge. Directors pitch their boldest scene ideas, the audience decides which ones get performed, and the director of the worst scene faces a forfeit. Every show is a high-stakes creative competition in which artistic ambition meets audience judgment, and someone always loses spectacularly. Created by Keith Johnstone, the inventor of Theatresports.

Keith Johnstone created Gorilla Theatre as part of his ongoing exploration of competitive improvisation formats. The format emerged from the same creative impulse that produced Theatresports and Micetro Impro: the recognition that competition and audience judgment create a productive pressure that drives performers to take bigger risks. Gorilla Theatre specifically isolates the directing function, giving it the visibility and accountability that Johnstone believed was essential to developing strong improvisational directors. The format takes its name from the gorilla costume worn by the losing director in Johnstone's original productions, a forfeit that embodied his philosophy that creative failure should be celebrated rather than feared. The format is documented in Johnstone's Impro for Storytellers and has been adopted by companies worldwide, often with local variations to the forfeit system.