Читать книгу Ting Tang Tommy - Simon Godwin - Страница 29

Finally in this section, I would like to share with you the King of Team Games. If there is one game to take from this book, I would like it to be this one. It’s like a rich, delicious stew with all your favourite ingredients. It’s so versatile and open to so many different ages and levels of skill that everyone seems to be playing it. Indeed, it conforms very well with the theory put forward by the historians and great game collectors Iona and Peter Opie. They argue that, as games become more popular, they begin to attract additional rules, become more elaborate and the length of time needed to play them increases. I believe that this game is relatively recent and has been around in this form for no more than fifteen years or so. It’s now very common and, as the following explanation demonstrates, it is still growing and developing.

I learnt the Hat Game when I was touring Russia with The Winter’s Tale. A crowd of us were killing time in a dingy hotel in Minsk when someone suggested this game. There couldn’t have been a better place to learn this epic, three-stage event and I’ve been hooked ever since.

Begin by giving everyone a pen and a sheet of paper. Everyone tears up their paper to make seven smaller pieces and writes on each a different name of a well-known public figure. The papers are folded and placed in the hat. You will have plenty of names. The group is then

divided into two equal teams.

Team A nominates a member of their team to start. They are given a minute—timed by someone on the opposing side—to take names out of the hatand describe the people on the card without saying their name. Any name that is correctly guessed the team keeps, so by the end of the minute they have collected a nice pile of names. The hat then passes to the other team who repeat the procedure. The hat goes back and forth until all the names have been guessed. At the end of the round, each team counts the names they have won, records the total and the papers are returned to the hat.

Round two works on the same principle except that now the names are described using three words only. For the game to work you must be very strict. ‘Ums’ and ‘ahs’ are counted as words. If someone says ‘um, ah, celebrity’ then that’s all they’re allowed. No more can be said until the name is guessed. The team may spend the entire minute trying to guess just one name. The stakes are high! As before, when all the names have been guessed teams tot up their total and all the names go back into the hat. Now is the final showdown. In this round players must act out each name. They can break the name down into syllables, as in Charades, or do a silent impression of the character; becoming for a few priceless seconds Winston Churchill, Marilyn Monroe, Amy Winehouse etc. As acting takes longer than speaking, the time is normally extended for this round, with everyone being given two minutes rather than one.

When the hat has been cleared for the last time, the three totals for each round are added up and the team with the largest number wins.

Stop Press. At the time of writing there are rumours of a fourth round. I have never attempted this but my brother, who is a film director and therefore much more glamorous than me, spent New Year playing the game with some members of the Hollywood crowd (the game’s popularity is spreading). They introduced him to this innovation which, he assures me, provides a surreal and hilarious new twist.

So, for the first time in print:

Players once again remove the names one by one. Now, however, rather than using words or actions, players must make a single sound. This sound must embody the essential characteristics of the name on the paper. It might be a low moan, a triumphant roar, a nervous giggle or a stifled sob. Sounds like a challenge, doesn’t it?