DRAMA 490C The Ensemble Impulse is a course for students to learn how to create theater and improvise together using the tools of body, voice, and text within an ensemble. Students will explore how to hold their individual artistic intuition inside a larger group and develop their compositional instincts from inside large movement scores, vocal choruses, and scripted scenes. We'll play with the magic that emerges from collective storytelling and explore the conditions when the sum of the whole scene becomes greater than its individual parts. We'll also explore how to approach text not just as a series of ideas but as a living, moving score and how to build dramatic worlds from scratch using improvisation, then hone first drafts into polished performances. For those who enjoy a more embodied approach to creating character and performance, this will be a great fit.