"Ask Fors" are requests for suggestions from the audience. Improv actors receive some of their best material when the crowd shouts out simple, zany, and/or creative ideas.
Typical Ask Fors include questions such as, “Can I get a location?” or “Can I get an occupation?” However, they can be much more unusual and inventive. Once the audience suggestion is accepted, an improvised scene can begin. Performers utilize the audience’s “ask-for” and do their best to generate characters, conflict, and laughter.
Would you like to create some Ask Fors of your own? Try this: Write a list of words from A to Z. (Ex: Animal, Body, Career, Dinner, Etc.). Then, create sentences or questions which ask information from a potential audience.
Here’s my list of Ask-Fors:
An animal you would not expect to find in an apartment?
A part of the human body?
A poor career choice?
A historical figure you would like to invite for dinner?
A celebrity you would not want to meet in an elevator?
A product known for false advertising?
A board game?
The worst location for a resort hotel?
A brand new invention?
The punch-line of a really corny joke?
A person you would not expect to be a karate instructor?
A foreign language?
The first thing you would buy after winning the lotto?
Fill in the blank: “I am a professor of (BLANK) – ology.”
A person you would not want to meet at a nude beach?
A phobia?
A topic for a pop-quiz?
An unlikely subject for a rap song?
A really cool super power?
A title of a television show?
An occupation that requires a uniform?
The wrong place to take a date on Valentine’s Day?
A place you would not expect to find a weather man?
Something you would not find in an X-Ray?
The name of a yoga position?
The name of the new exhibit at the zoo?
