Melanie

The Melanie game was also developed by Del Close.

At the start, a single player stands in front of the audience and takes a suggestion. From it they develop a monologue rooted in life experience (often the audience's). A group of players then performs different scenes that explore the meaning of the suggestion. The group scenes and the monologues begin to weave into each other — the speaker of the monologues serves as a kind of surreal master of ceremonies — until a general truth about the players and the audience comes to light.

The first person to bring this form to the stage as a soloist was named Melanie (hence the name) — she was also a great storyteller. Closely related is the "successor form" Armando, a very similar form invented by Armando Diaz. Because of their different personal styles the two forms differ slightly, but laying out the differences would be a long story in itself.

Sources

http://literatten.bplaced.net/impro/tip-improformen.html