Ok, I have two jobs. I teach, and I direct.
When I teach, I’m working within certain constraints. I have two hours a week with 6–8 students in a classroom. I’m supposed to set them homework, and but in the end, as long as I give them the skills to get a good grade in their English Literature examinations, I get free rein on the syllabus.
Which means within this context, I can adapt or change according to the personality of the students and what I think they need. I think with any kind of improvisation, you look for structures that help you. Sometimes you establish rituals that allow people to know what they are doing. Other times you will break establish patterns because you need to vary their attention span. Sometime you adapt to achieve a certain goal. For example, for a while the students were coming in late, so we went through a cycle of practising past papers in the first 40 mins, so if they arrived late they would have less time to complete the task. Once that habit was established, ok, I can change the game again. let’s read a play for the first half of class.
In my other job as theatre director, I pretty much get free rein on every single aspect of the production. Obviously there are constraints when it comes with working with venues, funding bodies, etc; but I see them as choices I can take. Sometimes the venues will forbid you to do certain things (my favourite is a theatre venue contract that will not allow you to abuse animals or waste food); and other things you have to fight for (we want to move the seats, play with fire, etc), but anyway, if a venue or funding body is too restrictive, then next time I’ll just walk.
In my creative work there’s a lot of improvisation. I mean this literally. And I’m constantly adapting the script/production to what the actor’s have to offer. However, like any improv, you have to set rules for yourself; otherwise it’s just mush. So the creative project is constrained by a certain fixed point you want to explore, or certain rules that you set yourself.