Curtains Up Winnipeg

By Christopher Douglas

When I see announcements for performances that walk around a park or a warehouse, I jump at the opportunity. I love theatre that asks me to do more than merely sit in my comfortable seat in the dark and watch the action unfold. Sometimes that means becoming a participant in the work: making choices about where to go and what to watch within the playing space or building. Sometimes it means I’ll interact with the cast, maybe following instructions they offer me, and every so often I might even get to engage with parts of the set – look into a drawer or hold an actor’s prop. And then there are times when I’m given enough agency to choose what happens next…

For audiences seeking interactive experiences from their theatre seats: 

Ayn Rand’s Night of January 16^th casts the audience as a courtroom jury, deciding if the defendant is guilty or not. The decision they make changes the course of the script, with roughly a page of dialogue spoken after either verdict – which isn’t a lot of text. Written in 1934, this example of an audience having agency shows that our desire to participate isn’t a new feature in theatre although it offers viewers only limited options.

Even musicals can incorporate interactive components. The Mystery of Edwin Drood, based on an unfinished Charles Dickens novel, uses alternate endings to solve the mystery, and The 25^th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee usually has a couple of ticketholders called up as spellers. 

Tony and Tina’s Wedding is another popular example, where the interactions between characters and the audience change nightly but the structure of guests attending a wedding banquet for the titular characters does not change. Or currently playing on Broadway and in numerous regional theatres, Every Brilliant Thing is a one-person show that gently prompts audiences to fill in the blanks of the storytelling.

In our local scene, in 2023, Theatre by the River offered Glad to be Here by Ginny Collins, set in New Winnipeg, a futuristic city rebuilt from a present-day disaster. This example hews closer to Rand’s script, as the only significant choice the “diplomatic guests” make lies at the end of the show. There are smaller options scattered in earlier, such as if you want to eat the Jeannie’s cake, but nothing that alters the flow of the production. As it was staged within a church, guests were led through stylized corridors and backrooms – a promenade-style performance, which increased the interactivity without offering the audience additional agency. 

For those who want to participate in the world of the play, try immersive theatre: 

New York housed Sleep No More by Punchdrunk and Third Rail’s Then She Fell for years. In these immersive examples, audience members move through a multilevel space to encounter scenes as they untangle the story’s details. Afterwards, participants can follow the performer to explore a new room or plotline or they can stay and wait for whatever might happen next in that space. Part of the thrill of these experiences is the heightened world-building. Surrounded by posters and letters or food to nibble and televisions to observe, audiences become part of the live show, crafting a personalized performance that only each one of them will witness – almost a live video game. The choices you make might be quite different from what your friends choose: paths forged without overt guidance from the play’s creators. Typically, choices made by an individual affect only their experience of the piece (which scene is seen) rather than the overall characters or narrative. 

I’ve been a part of the above examples and, most recently, Storehouse in London with its embodiment of the data-storage cloud. For a Canadian approach, try reading John Krizanc’s Tamara, about Art Deco painter de Lempicka, first staged in 1981 in a Toronto mansion. This fascinating and unusual script offers all the scenes that were performed and lets the reader choose which permutation appeals to them. You can follow a certain character’s path travelling between spaces, or read only the scenes set in the dining room, or – if adventurous – try to determine which scenes would be performed simultaneously in the different rooms of the mansion.

In a whole other unique realm:

Nominated for the Governor General’s Literary Award for English-language Drama, Inheritance: a pick-the-path experience by Daniel Arnold, Medina Hahn, and Darrell Dennis featured the three authors as the performers in the debut production. Within this seemingly standard play’s first moments, the action pauses to ask the audience to vote on what happens next as a young couple visit her father’s cabin to find someone unexpectedly staying. Among the decision points asked of the crowd: what music is he listening to, does the blood on the floor belong to a recently caught animal, or who takes control of the rifle? This style of storytelling channels the children’s literature series “Choose Your Own Adventure”. Some of the script’s options reuse the same references and jokes about colonization or Indigenous rights, however, spectators are given agency to plot their own course, as each alternative influences the next fork in the road. At the night’s conclusion, the audience sees a chart of the 50+ potential pathways to demonstrate just how much freedom was offered. This (so far) underexplored format differs from the environmental immersion of Tamara or Sleep No More to still allow each performance’s audience to create a distinctive experience. 

When I’m in an audience, I want to feel that this performance is special for everyone: the people onstage, the people around me in the dark, and the person I am. When all present have agency over how the performance comes together the room feels alive, it states why we gather together, and addresses how unique this moment is. That convergence of time and people and place is an experience that does not exist in any other form because, together, we collectively imagine a reality, explore an idea, and partake of the theatrical ritual. That’s what motivates me to leave my home on a cold January night and discover our community.

Christopher (he/him) has primarily been a producer or stage manager. He has worked on 40+ productions in a variety of venues including parks, a bed-and-breakfast, a former coffin factory, and on a literal island. His short plays and adaptations have been performed in academic and festival settings and he is currently exploring poetry and libretti. He has (very) occasionally been convinced to act. As a reader, he devours award-nominated scripts and, as a critic, he has a history of being outspoken. A Torontonian by birth and a graduate of York University, he now lives in Winnipeg.