The extensive use of improvisational techniques in rehearsals for chamber theatre productions develops for the performer a strong engagement with the text. The director can channel the movement and gestures that emerge from these techniques into the production itself, with results that more effectively convey the literature than traditional rehearsal methods usually produce. Such a process has benefits for the performers as well as for the production: the performers learn the lines of script without the constant repetition of traditional rehearsals and their improvisations help cocreate--with the director--the staging of the text, thereby increasing their involvement in the production. (RL)