In this workshop, Cale Bain and Kate Coates from Improv Theatre Sydney (ITS) will take you through their approach to two person scene work. Slow down! Do less! Chill out! This workshop is perfect for folks with fundamental improv skills who are looking to connect with their scene partners more easily and find out what's really going on.

About Kate

Kate is an improviser, actor, comedy writer and sketch comedian who has trained with Impro Australia, Improv Theatre Sydney, iO and Second City in Chicago.

As a company director, teacher and member of the ITS ensemble, she performs regularly in ITS The News and the ITS Soap Opera at Giant Dwarf. She won the 2015 inaugural ITS Smackdown competition at Giant Dwarf, the 2013 Fresh Cranston Cup, the 2015 Cranston Cup and the 2016 Theatresports Nationals Competition at the Enmore Theatre. Representing NSW, she won the National Theatresports Titans competition in the 2014 Adelaide Fringe Festival and performed in the Australian Theatresports Challenge for Amnesty International.

She is the director and host of Improv Theatre Sydney’s weekly student show ITS Sandpit. Previously she has produced the First Thursday Impro Club and Tennis Improv (formerly Full Body Contact No Love Tennis) at The Roxbury Hotel as well as Lybrary Impro. She runs improv workshops as part of IA’s Theatresports Schools Challenge and has taught Theatresports and drama across many schools including Kambala, Sydney Girls High, Pymble Ladies College and Reddam House. She formerly taught the autonomous wom*ns Theatresports jams at USYD.

In addition to improv, Kate is a solo sketch performer, making her debut with Guys, I’m Okay (Sydney Fringe, Fringe World, Sydney Comedy Festival) and touring Australia with her 2017 follow-up, Blerp.

About Cale

Cale Bain has been performing improvised comedy theatre since 1988 and has taught, workshopped, directed, produced and performed shows around the world ever since.

He trained through the Second City Theatre Company in Toronto. Since moving to Australia, Cale has directed and produced Theatresports® to sell-out audiences at the 1700-seat Enmore Theatre through Impro Australia, where he also has had the role of director of training, performed in the Sydney and Melbourne comedy and fringe festivals as well as the Perth Fringe and Canberra’s Improvention. Cale also started Sydney’s first longform improv show, Full Body Contact No Love Tennis that lived for some ten years (also known as Tennis Improv). Cale was the improv director for Foxtel‘s Whose Line Is It Anyway? Australia.

In his other life, Cale is a media academic, investigating the confluence of journalism and comedy, teaching media and communications studies. Cale’s philosophy on improv is relationship focused, and he feels strongly that the core principles we use in improv can make our everyday lives better.

Most recently, Cale has received two grants through the University of Technology Sydney. With his colleagues, they were awarded an opportunity to bring improv to the entire communications first-year student body, so as to increase engagement. Subsequently, the same team was awarded a Social Impact Grant to work with the refugee community in Cisarua, using improv to combat the mental health stresses that would accompany not knowing one’s statehood. The team has since returned to Cisarua and continues a relationship with the community.

Cale is one of the founding directors of Improv Theatre Sydney.

The Brisbane Improv Festival will adhere to all current COVID restrictions and requirements. More info