Invisible Theatre & Improv

What is the difference between Invisible Theatre and Improv?

*Invisible theatre gets people talking

*Invisible theatre involves more people than just the actors, as in, it has to incorporate people who "aren't in on it"

*They are both partially improvised

*Improv doesn't need a "social purpose"

Wait, so what is Invisible Theatre exactly?

*below is a Google Books version of The Rainbow of desire: the Boal method of theatre and therapy

It describes invisible theatre on PAGE 184 as consisting of:
"rehearsing a scene with actions that the protagonist would like to try out in real life, and improvising it in a place where these events could really happen and in front of an audience who, unaware that they are an audience, accordingly act as if the improvised scene was real. Thus, the improvised scene becomes a reality."



How have I applied this?
For our assignment in the cafeteria, we staged a sort of improv scene where Andrew dropped his tray and some of us laughed at him, getting other unknowing audience members to laugh too, but one of us "stood up" for Andrew. The idea was not to be "sensationalist" as Jennifer puts it, but rather to get other kids in the cafeteria talking about what happened and whether or not it was right for some of us to laugh at Andrew. What we did in the cafeteria was basically modelled after the above description.