IE Global: 70 Freeze Events Around The World

Improv Everywhere Global

The response to our Frozen Grand Central mission has been unbelievable. The YouTube video has over 10 million views and counting. It’s been covered by The Today Show, Nightline, Good Morning America, and countless news outlets around the world.

Most interestingly, it’s inspired people in 70 other cities in 34 countries to stage their own freeze mission. Thousands of Global Agents worldwide in places like Romania, Poland, Italy, China, Sweden, and New Zealand have come together to make time stop for five short minutes. Below is a roundup of all of the videos we’ve seen of the various global freeze events. Congrats to all of the local organizers, and remember you can get involved yourself at IE Global.

freeze map
Interactive Map of Freeze Events

Afton, Wyoming
Arcadia, CA
Århus, Denmark
Barcelona, Spain
Beijing, China
Berlin, Germany
Berne, Switzerland
Beirut, Lebanon
Bielefeld, Germany
Blacksburg, Virginia (Virgina Tech)
Bloomington, Minnesota
Bogota, Colombia
Boston, Massachusetts
Brisbane, Australia
Bratislava, Slovakia
Brno, Czech Republic
Brussels, Belgium
Calgary, Canada
Chicago, Illinois
Coimbra, Portugal
Constanta, Romania
Copenhagen, Denmark
Dublin, Ireland
Durham City, UK (Durham University)
Edina, Minnesota
Edinburgh, UK
Florence, Italy
Helsinki, Finland
Hong Kong, China
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Lausanne, Switzerland
Leszczynski, Poland
London, UK
Los Angeles, California
Luxembourg, Luxembourg
Madrid, Spain
Manila, Philippines
Mexico City, Mexico
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Montreal, Canada
Newcastle upon Tyne, UK
Nuremburg, Germany
Orlando, Florida
Oxford, Ohio
Paris, France
Portland, Oregon
Prague, Czech Republic
Pretoria, South Africa
Quebec City, Canada
Raleigh, North Carolina
Rome, Italy
San Diego, California
San Francisco, California
Santa Barbara, California
Seattle, Washington
Shanghai, China
St. Andrews University, Scotland, UK
Stockholm, Sweden
Sydney, Australia
Toronto, Canada
Tokyo, Japan
Utrecht, Netherlands
Vancouver, Canada
Vienna, Austria
Vilnius, Lithuania
Wellington, New Zealand
Zürich, Switzerland

Atlanta, Georgia (no video yet)
Riga, Latvia (no video yet)
Malmö, Sweden (no video yet)
Shreveport, Louisiana (no video yet)

Did we miss any? Let us know in the comments.

Comments

  1. Remarkable! I’ve never seen anything so fascinating. The responses of the uninitiated are interesting; they instinctively grasp for any ‘reasonable’ explanation: they’re posing for a picture, staging a protest, etc. Their minds can’t quite wrap around the idea that maybe, just maybe! time has stopped in some manner. It confuses and frightens some, arouses anger in others, and inspires giddiness in most. Then there are the few sad people who simply ignore the phenomenon and slog through like nothing is different- untouched, unmoved, unliving.

    Where do I sign up? I want to be a part of it! :-)

  3. Atlanta, GA was also a part of the synchronized national – or I should say, North American Freeze on the 23rd. Alas, our video crew was trapped in a horrendous traffic jam and arrived too late. We are trying to round up what we can. Over 70 agents participated in an area called Atlantic Station. We were in an open courtyard between numerous restaurants and lots of pedestrian traffic. Go to Improve Everywhere Global and check out the Atlanta section for personal accounts, photos and reactions.

  4. Chicago had a slo-mo/freeze in an Apple store as well – our second official event (after no pants).

  10. I absolutely love these experiments!
    I am going to host one where I live, in our Galleria!
    You are my inspiration!!

  11. Very interesting and fun project… two thoughts:

    First, It would be cool though if the quality of the video was better. The herky-jerky manner of the YouTubes sorta defeats the purpose. The point, after all, is the marked contrast between those who freeze and those not in on it.

    Second, the cynical bastard part of me thinks it would be instructive (and fun!) if one of these could be executed somewhere in a particularly christianoid part of America (the deep south? Kansas?). The cries of “it’s the rapture! Praise be!” would underscore the delusional nature of a hopefully receding brand of belief that has been too harmful lately. I haven’t read enough about the purpose of these freezes to know if there is a larger point to be made but if there is, this might be one.

    Otherwise, well done!

  14. absolutely amazing!
    I’d really love to freeze one of the busiest stations in the world, the Shibuya station in Tokyo.It will be massively interesting and thrilling if I could just stop that hectic atmosphere for a minute!

  16. Am I the only one who finds this entirely uninspired? I hope these people are at least using their frozen time to come up with better ideas.

  18. Wow, this was just amazing. Kudos to the people who participated, they really did a great job holding their poses! This was so interesting, and the global response is phenomenal!

  19. I think it’s great that people are able to do this. I don’t know what the overall purpose is, but I do know one thing… Imagine if a group such as this can work together in unison to remain still in a crowd, what then could we do as a whole if we set our minds to it? ANYTHING!.

    Bravo on the work guys. Bravo indeed.

  20. HI just to let you know thanks to your 1st kick, i organized alone a freezing in CENTRal station in Brussels capital of europe…360 people came to poetically freeze.it was a great moment. the video this week.

    fabrice

  21. hi, there, I saw your video yesterday nigth and its awesome, i want to do it here in Bogota, colombia can you help me with the scheme or logistic you used so i can gather the people. thanks And ill wait for your answer contact my at lbcu@hotmail.com

  22. Fantastic original and fantastic responses. It’s interesting viewing all of these together, and makes clear what works well and less well. In general, poses that are actually caught in the middle of an action (mid-stride, laughing at a friend, drinking, kissing, etc) are much more interesting than being frozen simply standing in place, which many people were (although it does seem as though there are far more people drinking and kissing than you would catch in any real snapshot in time in these public places…!).

    There’s also some interesting variety with respect to the ratio of participants to passersby. Clearly, the effect is much more impressive when you have more participants, and if they are frozen in an area that people actually have to walk through, rather than being able to walk around. Also, one of the reasons the original is so good aside from the above points is that they had just a few discreet camera operators, instead of a dozen guys milling all around inside everyone else’s picture.

    Great work everyone, and here’s to IE!

  25. The freeze displays is used in developmental research on infancy. Go to my website and see how infants reaction to their mother holding a “still-face”. As with the adults in Grand Central the infants and toddlers try to make sense of what is going on.

  28. I updated the post to reflect all of the additional freezes, and I decided to just post links rather than YouTube videos. The 30 videos on one page were making my computer freak out.

  29. Hello from Atlanta!

    We had a BLAST in Atlanta ! Really, really interesting how much fun we had – it was totally out of proportion for how much effort it was. After all, how much work is it to be still for five minutes!?!

    We in Atlanta were slightly hampered by the Georgia Department of Transportation deciding to shut down access on an Interstate Highway (of all places) just about an hour before several folks, including our videographers, could drive to our location. (Sorry, Kim!)

    As a result, I think the only surviving video is one that I happened to make using my snap-n-shoot camera. The most unfortunate aspect of the video is that I set up my camera . . .and then I FROZE! So, what you mainly have is video of me, who is (not) cleaning up the Coke that I spilled!

    There are several Agents shown in the background. After about a minute and 15 seconds, you can see a civilian, walking from right to left, who joins a group of agents and freezes for a while. At about 3 minutes and 30 seconds, a civilian observer feels compelled to give a shout-out to our Atlantic Station crowd!

    After the freeze you see one of the other Agents come over and help me to pick up my Coke cup.

    Then my sons, Agent Keye West and Agent Estevan come to help me clean up. They were just off to the right of the camera view, and were holding one of those string-sculpture things, a Cat’s Cradle. They said that while they were frozen a civilian lady came by, pointed to one string and said, “If you pull the string here it will make a knot.” No response from them. “If you pull the string here it will make a knot.” No response from them. Then she poked them in the arm, but they didn’t move!

    Here’s the vid:
    http://www.filemojo.com/l.php?flink=0205337106987521&fx=

    YOU ROCK, BETHESDA!

    Agent Jokester

  34. These last weeks we planned to play a giant “1, 2, 3, Soleil!”. Don’t know the name in english but it’s a game where you have to freeze each time when a leader counts up to three. Rest of the time you try to reach him as quickly as possible…
    When we saw the Grand central video, we all thought “that’s THE idea”.
    Two weeks later we did it. We were 70 of us in our small city (20 000 people) Lannion in Brittany, France. Great time.
    http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=x_1JCeVJMJk

    ready for the worlwide one.

  40. Love this concept.

    If everyone could even do this individually, even if just in their mind stress levels and diseases would dramatically drop.

  42. It’s not “Miami, Ohio”. It’s “Miami University, Oxford, Ohio”.

    There are towns named Miami in this world, but that is not one of them.

    That said — Go, MU!

  45. Hey, this is great! Congratulations…
    we would love to do it in portugal as well….how can we sign up?

  48. Some students of the “Simon Bolivar” University, here in Caracas (Venezuela) did it too. Here is a link for the youtube video:

  50. About the grand central freeze thing. Some of the kids at me school including myself have thought of a funny idea to pause for a few minutes at our school. We need to get more people to agree.

  53. Hi! we are making our own freeze in Barcelona, we really loved the Grand Central one and hope this one turns out great! we will post the video on you tube right after. It will be march 21st, Plaza real in Barcelona. Cheers!

  58. 1. plz add Lausanne, Switzerland

    http://youtube.com/watch?v=3d0o7fMXFMg — official video

    2. plz add Berne, Switzerland (a little bit different…wow!!!)

    we’re already planning the next mission…sth different that has never been done before….

    finally, witzerland is moving! I love you IE! ;)

  59. I think that the Grand Central Freeze was the most amazing thing! It was like a work of living art and seemed to have a big impact on viewers.

  63. Hey, i love these freeze things, i think they are awesome….i would love to conduct one in Melbourne Australia.

  65. thats going to happen in Toulouse , France too on april 15th. there is a group created in facebook and every body is informed by that ^^ i hope itll work ^^
    “ON TUESDAY, APRIL 15TH AT PRECISELY 6:30 PM, we will be aiming to create a mass freeze for 3-5 minutes. That is going to happen at PLACE DU CAPITOLE in Toulouse.
    For those who arent in the know about freezing… Its simple, you just stand still, holding your pose whatever you were doing when the mass freeze starts… should that be kissing your girlfriend/boyfriend or scratching your arse ;)”
    http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=8488759593

  67. Love the freeze prank…!
    Wondered if it was possible to get agents from around the world to freeze in every capital at the same time, in spite of time differences. This could be cool and really make people think.
    It is just a thought…

  72. This is pretty interesting and cool.
    I live in Orlando, FL. You should come here and do this at Disney World. That is the perfect place for some thing like this.

  76. March 27, 2008 … Quebec City, Canada, Place Laurier Shopping Mall Centre (Biggest one in Eastern Canada) 300 ppl and more did it!

  80. this is absolutely AMAZING!!! I totally love this concept and seeing people react is pretty much the best part!!! Keep up the good work everyone!

  87. would like to participate in any future events.. what a great thing. you are amazing. I live in Vancouver BC but have lived in several US states as well

  92. Another city joins the freeze:
    on April 1st, a downtown square (Namesti Svobody) froze in Brno, Czech Republic. A video:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wt9HPwGuZOs

    oh, and btw: the correct spelling of “Prague, Czech Republic” is like that, not “Prauge” (but that’s just my nitpicking).

    You there! Freeze! ;)

  96. reference : http://paepae.exteen.com/20080407/20-freeze-5/page/1

    Freeze Siam Center, Bangkok, Thailand
    20 April 2008

    Mission Briefing 15:00 (+7 GMT)
    Mission Start 16:00 (+7 GMT) or later

    Place of mission :
    Siam BTS Sky train Station between Siam Center and Siam Paragon

    If has acident move to
    Front of MBK Shopping mall
    National Stadium BTS Sky train Station between MBK Shopping mall and Siam Discovery.

  100. They are planning one in Ames,IA on this Saturday April 12th during their veisha festival on central campus

  105. Hey !
    We had a freeze on April 4 in Nuremberg, Germany.
    There were around 50 of us in front of a church in the city.

    It was great to see the reaction of the people. We are planning on other missions in the future.

  107. there was a freeze event at the pavillion, kuala lumpur malaysia yesterday. check it out yourselves. it’s become a phenomenon that’s driving me sick.

  108. it’s not a bad thing, really. i just feel literally sick whenever i watch any freeze video now and then. i’m not saying it’s a negative thing. sure, it unites people.

  110. Name???????????????
    Host???? FM THEATRE POWER

    FM Theatre Power, a Hong Kong local independent troupe, organized “Frozen Times . Square Reborn” in HK’s landmark–Time Square on 20-3-2008.

    Over a hundred people “freezeed” in this busiest spot to feel the fresh air of Hong Kong Public Space .

    This inspired HK Legislators and Councillors to join our action. FMTP organized “Councillors Version” of Frozen Times.Square Reborn on 11-4-2008 and aroused public’s interaction with these official leaders through arts

    LINK:

    http://www.fmtp.net

  111. Hey guys! i love the video, and i just wanted to let yall know, the southfield middle school 8th grade drama class did a great 5 minute freeze in Shreveport, LA, and there are plans in the works for another one in shreveport, and probably one in Baton Rouge. Thanks for the idea!!!!!

  112. How can anyone complain about global warming when there’s all this freezing going on around the world?!

    I mean, we really need to work out a way to sort this out – giant industrial heaters in public places maybe?

  113. Are we gonna have antoher one in montreal soon, maybe in the playoffs. It could be soooooo nice in front of the Bell Center..think about it

  115. this is the video os thefrozeen in bogota, colombia, hope you enjoy it, we’re going to do another one with more people and not raining days!!”

  117. I am a 4th grade teacher in new york city and my class has been working with Arts Connection which involves how english language lerners learn through dance. one of their dances involves a four step process, walk, freeze, melt and run. we have been trying to show them the video of grand central but the schools block the you tube site, is their any other way or any other site that we could see this on on if we could possibly get this on dvd. thank you for taking the time to read this.

  118. ehem..for all due respect dat called us flashmob or sumtin…
    here’s one gud deal in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia..
    in conjunction towards World Earth Day 20.4.2008..(today)..
    guys, corporations, music scene n company yet to be THANX later..
    we r in freeze Unison at 8pm in Sunway Pyramid (mall)..
    acts n symbols which gonna show dat we loves our world will b ‘FREEZE’…
    n wud b published soon..
    wait yeahh…. ;)

  119. There was one freze also in Toulouse, France…As the one who organized it weren’t really aware of the real spirit of it and much more of the hyped one, there is lot of freezed people and this is not the discrete thing you made, but still, it’s a freeze event.

    Here is some video : http://tinyurl.com/6aat54

  121. Remarkable!, I want to be a part of it but here in Lima, where can I meet more people from Peru? I sign up but there isn’s any from here :( Anyone who is in charge here, let me know how please!

    Impresionante! Quiero ser parte de esto pero aca en Lima, donde puedo conocer mas gente de Peru? Me inscribi a la pagina pero no hay nadie de peru :( Quien organize uno, aviseme por favor!

  125. The grand central station freeze inspired a lot of high school students here in Augusta, GA to do the same five minute freeze in a Wal-Mart. We had around 300 hundred high school students meet, walk-in in groups of about ten, and froze on a certain name over the intercom. It was an overall success, with video footage I might add.

  126. We just had a freeze mission in Singapore on the 17th of May. (: However, the video is still in the process of editing.

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