The key rule of improv is always to say ‘yes, and…’

So Rufus Hound couldn’t have chosen a better moment to pop the question to actress and comic Sally Hodgkiss – at the end of a 50-hour improv marathon .

The pair joined the event– aptly based around a wedding party – for its final leg at Wilton’s Music Hall in London on Saturday afternoon, and Hound has described how he felt moved to go down on one knee by the emotional events on stage.

But his gesture initially confused his new fiancé as she hadn’t realised he had come out of character – making an especially baffling, as they were playing sister and brother.

Hound, 45, wrote on X: ‘In the past two years @sallyhodgkiss has redefined how completely loved or seen I ever believed someone could make me feel.

‘We talk and nourish each other in a way that's almost unbelievable to me. Last night, I asked her to marry me.

‘We were privileged enough to take part in @theimprovathon @WiltonMusicHall , a show in which brilliant, erudite, playful, thoughtful, beautiful, sleep deprived people spoke repeatedly of love, commitment, joy and demonstrated the awesome magic that comes when such people do so.

‘@sallyhodgkiss walked down for her final bow. As she spoke- a poetic, magnificent final flourish - the universe seemed to scream at me that the time - bizarre as it might be- had come.

‘As the crowd applauded her, I took to the stage beside her. Wordlessly, I mimed that I was unlikely to be able to speak, as I was totally overwhelmed.

‘Then I dropped to one knee and she looked confused - this would be an odd twist for the characters we'd been playing (siblings as they were). It was only when I spoke her name she realised what was happening. Some people took pictures.

‘She said yes.’

Hogkiss also shared the photographs, writing: ‘Yeah so this is the moment that my favourite person on earth proposed to me on stage at the end of the London Improvathon.

‘I thought he was still in character, and therefore it was a pretty weird move considering he was playing my brother.

‘But then I realised that the name he said was mine, not my ludicrous character name. It was mad and beautiful, just like him.

‘Of course, I said yes. And we are absolutely over the moon!'

Yeah so this is the moment that my favourite person on earth proposed to me on stage at the end of the London Improvathon.

I thought he was still in character, and therefore it was a pretty weird move considering he was playing my brother.

1/2 pic.twitter.com/albhiWz3WC

— Sally Hodgkiss (@sallyhodgkiss) March 11, 2024