The Cutting Room

The Cutting Room is a fast paced, fantastical, wild roller coaster ride of a show. This show combines short form and long form in one frothy mix. The scenes and stories can take place anywhere in this world or in any world in any galaxy. If espresso was an improv show, this is what it would be, so drink some coffee (iced or hot) and come see our show!

The Cutting Room, created by Scotland’s Peter Aitchson, combines long form, short form, grounded scene work, and stories, to create a fast-paced show that also has a heart. The way the form works is that there is only one way to edit, change or end scenes, and that’s for one of the cast members to say, “Cut to…” and then they give a description of where the next scene or the next moment takes place. It can be as general as “Cut to Susie’s apartment” or as detailed as “Cut to a symposium of funeral directors gathered together in Las Vegas and the air conditioning has broken down.”

The first half of the show is world building by creating different locations, places, and worlds. The next quarter of the show begins to find patterns of connections and returns to previous places, locations, and characters if the actors want to, while still having the freedom to introduce new characters, locations, places, and stories. The final quarter of the show brings together in different scenes the strongest characters, themes and worlds until they often are all in the same place. The show ends at a peak moment or a high energy moment or a big reveal, and then the whole cast shouts together, “And cut!!!”

The Cutting Room has been performed in India, New Zealand, Scotland, Taiwan, USA, and Vietnam.