The Playground

Fundamentals of Improvisational Theatre

Instructor: Connor Bond

Open Enrollment. All Levels Welcome.

Location: The Grit Gallery
115 Broadway
Newburgh, NY 12550

Standard Tuition: $325

Thursdays · 6:00–7:30 PM
8 Sessions

October 1
October 15
October 22
October 29
November 5
November 12
November 19
December 3

No class on October 8.

Full Course: $325
Bring a Friend: $275 each
Drop In: $40 per class

No improv experience necessary.

COME PLAY.

The Playground is an eight-class exploration of improv, ensemble, and devised performance built around a simple idea: play can be serious work.

Across eight distinct classes, actors will explore how an ensemble listens, builds worlds, creates characters, uses the body, responds to an audience, and transforms spontaneous discoveries into something that has never existed before.

Led by Connor Bond, The Playground is a space to take risks, make specific choices, follow impulses, fail freely, listen deeply, and discover what becomes possible when nobody in the room has all the answers.

You do not need previous improv experience.

You just need a willingness to play.

THE EIGHT-CLASS JOURNEY

Each class in The Playground has its own focus. Together, they form a progression through improv, ensemble building, and devised performance.

OCTOBER 1 · CLASS 01
You and the Audience: On Stage Devices for Play

Explore the relationship between performer and audience through theatrical devices including sound, setting, entrances and exits, pace, interruption, repetition, and surprise. What happens when we become conscious of the tools available to us onstage and start playing with them?

OCTOBER 8 · CLASS 02
World Building and Emoting

Build a world together and allow your emotional relationship to that world to evolve as it changes. As more is revealed, what do you love? What do you resist? What surprises you? What happens when your feelings become as specific as the world around you?

OCTOBER 15 · CLASS 03
Physicality as Language

Before we explain, we move. Explore the body as a storytelling instrument and discover how posture, rhythm, tension, gesture, proximity, and physical choice can communicate before a word is spoken.

OCTOBER 22 · CLASS 04
The Other Person Has the Answers

Get out of your own head and into the room. This class centers listening, response, and the possibility that your scene partner may already be giving you everything you need.

OCTOBER 29 · CLASS 05
Devising Something Never Seen Before

Move beyond simply playing a scene and begin making something together. Through improvisation, theatrical devices, and collective discovery, the ensemble experiments with creating original forms and performance structures.

NOVEMBER 5 · CLASS 06
The Imaginary Set Pieces

Build environments out of nothing. Explore imaginary objects, architecture, space, and physical relationships with the world of a scene, making the invisible increasingly specific and real.

NOVEMBER 12 · CLASS 07
The Mask of the Ensemble

What persona emerges when you enter a group?

Drawing from clown and ensemble exercises, actors explore the idea of the mask beyond the literal object. How does a group change the way you move, listen, behave, or see yourself? What happens when the rest of the ensemble becomes part of your mask?

NOVEMBER 19 · CLASS 08
A Devised Performance Space

The Playground culminates in a shared devised performance space where the tools explored throughout the course can collide: character, physicality, world, theatrical devices, listening, ensemble, and play.

Not a predetermined scene.

Something built by the people in the room.

THREE WAYS TO ENTER THE PLAYGROUND

THE FULL JOURNEY · $325

Join Connor and the ensemble for all eight classes.

The full course is designed as a progression. Each week introduces another way of working, allowing discoveries from one class to inform what happens in the next.

For actors who want the complete Playground experience, this is the heart of the offering.

BRING A FRIEND · $275 EACH

Everything changes when somebody else says yes.

Register for the full eight-class Playground with a friend, and you’ll each receive $50 off tuition.

Use code: PLAYTOGETHER

Both participants must register for the complete eight-class course. Each participant registers separately using the discount code.

WANT TO DROP IN? · $40 PER CLASS

Not ready or able to commit to all eight weeks? Individual Playground classes are also available as drop-in experiences.

Choose the class that speaks to you and come play for the night.

Drop-in registration is available separately through Classes & Events under The Playground - Drop - In.

WHO IS THE PLAYGROUND FOR?

The Playground is for actors, improvisers, theatre makers, and curious people who want to become more responsive, imaginative, physically available, and connected to an ensemble.

You do not need to consider yourself funny.

You do not need to know how to improvise.

You do not need to arrive with the answer.

Come ready to listen.

Come ready to make choices.

Come ready to build something with somebody else.

Come ready to play.

PARTICIPATION

Ages 21+.

Following registration, all participants will receive Fable & Sow’s Adult Participation & Studio Acknowledgment by email. The acknowledgment must be reviewed and signed before participating in the first class.

FOUNDING MEMBERS

The Playground is a Studio Course. Founding Members may apply one $100 Studio Credit toward the Standard Tuition.

Standard Tuition: $325

With one $100 Studio Credit: $225

Founding Member registration is handled directly through the studio so we can correctly apply your available Studio Credit.

To register using your membership benefit, email info@fableandsow.com with The Playground in the subject line and let us know that you would like to apply a Studio Credit. We will confirm your benefit and send you the appropriate registration invoice.

Please do not purchase Standard Tuition above if you intend to apply a Studio Credit.

FOUNDING MEMBERSHIP FAQ

CANCELLATION & REFUND POLICY

We understand that circumstances change and aim to balance flexibility with the commitment required to hold your place in the room.

Cancellations made 7 or more days before the first session receive a full refund.

Cancellations made 3–6 days before the first session receive either a 50% refund or a full Fable & Sow tuition credit, valid for 12 months.

Cancellations made within 72 hours of the first session or after an offering has begun are non-refundable.

If Fable & Sow cancels an offering, tuition will be fully refunded and any applicable membership credits restored.

We understand that exceptional circumstances arise and are always open to a conversation when additional consideration may be needed.

View Full Cancellation & Refund Policy

ACCESS & TUITION SUPPORT

An Ethical Pricing Clause for Standard Tuition

We want artists who feel called to the work to have a real opportunity to enter the room. We also understand that what is financially possible looks different for everyone, and that circumstance should not automatically be a barrier to meaningful training.

If Standard Tuition is beyond what feels possible for you right now, please reach out. When space and the sustainability of an offering allow, we are happy to explore reduced tuition and other ways of making participation more accessible.

There is no need to publicly explain or justify your circumstances. Simply begin the conversation with us, and we will meet it with respect, care, and honesty about what we are able to offer.

Access & Tuition Support is available for Standard Tuition registrations and is based on availability.

To begin a conversation, contact info@fableandsow.com.