How writing is like improv

I just finished reading Malcolm Gladwell's Blink. It's a highly quotable book, one of those books that tempts you to drive your companions nuts by saying, "Hey, listen to this." Which is basically what I'm doing.

The book quotes Keith Johnstone, who's apparently a trendsetter in improv theater:

"If you'll stop reading for a moment and think of something you wouldn't want to happen to you, or to someone you love, then you'll have thought of something worth staging or filming."

Then he goes on: "In life, most of us are highly skilled at suppressing action. ... Bad improvisers block action, often with a high degree of skill. Good improvisers develop action."

So that takes me back to what I've been saying about my difficulties in creating action in stories.

One of the ways good improvisers create action, by the way, is by what Gladwell calls the "rule of agreement" -- if one actor suggests something, the other actor has to go along with it.

There's a rule like that in brainstorming, too. And now I wonder whether it ought to work with writing as well?