Better Than Bingo Improvisation Group

The “Better Than Bingo Improvisation Group” will present an hour of improv at 1 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 7, at the Oak Park Arms Retirement Community, 408 S. Oak Park Ave. The group is from the Life Long Learning Center.

Improv is highly interactive with lots of audience participation.Improvised performance is as old as performance itself. The original performers were storytellers. From the 16th to the 18th centuries, Commedia dell'arte performers in Italy improvised based on a broad outline.

Some people credit Dudley Riggs as the first vaudevillian to use audience suggestions to create improvised sketches. Modern theatrical improvisation is generally accepted to have taken form in the improvisational acting exercises developed by Viola Spolin in the 1940s, 50s and 60s, now known as Theater Games.

Spolin influenced the first generation of Improv at The Compass Players in Chicago. Her son, Paul Sills, along with David Shepherd, started The Compass Players and following its demise, Sills began The Second City in Chicago.

The Oak Park Arms is a rental retirement community which provides independent and assisted living apartments and a full schedule of activities and services. Furnished apartments are also available for a short-term stay - a weekend, a week, a month or longer.

The workshop is free and open to the public. For more information, call Jill Wagner at 708-386-4040 or visit http://www.oakparkarms.com.