Rails Comedy's Game On: Using Characters to Discover and Play Game with Kate Symes on Apr 09, 2025 at 7:00 PM

Improv Workshop • SOLD OUT

‍📕 Through a series of guided exercises and scenework, you’ll learn to:

‍Build specific characters with clear points of view.
Use your character’s traits, motivations, and idiosyncrasies to uncover game opportunities.
Play character-driven games with clarity and consistency.
Seamlessly collaborate with scene partners to heighten and explore comedic patterns.

🍎 Prerequisites

Completion of two or more long-form improv classes from a theater’s core curriculum, particularly one class focused on character. This workshop is ideal for mid-level to advanced improvisers who want to hone the skill of developing believable characters onstage, but newer improvisers can benefit as well. Please reach out to classes@railscomedydc.com if you have any questions about whether this workshop is the right level for you.

🎟️ Registration

Workshop Registration: $60
This workshop is limited to 10 students max

📗 Instructor Bio‍

Kate Symes has been performing improv in DC since 2010, and she started teaching and coaching in 2011. She has taught all levels of students the principles of improv: support, agreement, listening, and exploration. She is passionate about helping students find their sense of self-confidence, rediscover their ability to play, and take the skills they learn in the classroom into their daily lives or onto the stage.

She started her training at the DC Improv and continued on to complete the curriculum at Washington Improv Theater (WIT), complementing her studies along the way at Studio Theater, Second City, Upright Citizens Brigade, Magnet Theater, and People’s Improv Theater. Kate is a former member of many fantastic improv teams (full CV here), and she was most recently in WIT’s productions of POTUS Among Us and the White Elephant Holiday Blitz show. Now many of her improv friends have grown up and moved to the suburbs, or they get tired at 9 p.m., so she doesn’t perform as regularly as she once did, and sometimes she thinks she should do something about that.

Kate has also coached and directed several teams and shows, including The Fourth Estate, a WIT Directors Series show that ran throughout winter 2019 to sold-out houses and acclaim from the performers’ parents, and Madeline, a WIT house ensemble known for its long-running hilarity. Kate wrote and directed a web series called The Newsroom, hosted a late-night-morning-talk-show called Wake Up Late with Denny and Kate, and has been featured on several podcasts nerding out about improv. She also teaches yoga and meditation, and has a corporate day job in her spare time. Check out all her offerings at https://www.katesymes.com/.

🍸 Location

🎭 The workshop will be at The DC Arts Center, 2438 18th St NW, Washington, DC 20009
🚗 Parking garage nearby
❌ This venue is not wheelchair accessible
👧 Age Requirement 18+

📋 Policies

All sales are final. Refunds and exchanges are offered only when a workshop is canceled or rescheduled.
If you have questions, please email classes@railscomedy.com

📣 Register today!