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Open: 07/13/2010- Close: 08/01/2010
East To Edinburgh Festival
The East to Edinburgh Festival's Suspicious Package, a fun, interactive theater piece created and directed by Gyda Arber and written by Gyda Arber and Wendy Coyle, is a singular experience perhaps more in the vein of a scavenger hunt than a traditional play, but it's theater nonetheless with the audience, in groups of either four or six, acting out the story.
Arber greets the participants, assigns them characters, gives them costume pieces and video iPods, and lets them loose. The characters in her film noir tale-- the heiress, the showgirl, the detective, and the producer (when in a group of four)-- begin by following the voice and directions on their video iPods, which instruct them to go to different areas of the theater as well as neighborhood locations.
As the story unfolds, the video iPod plays scenes (additional writing and direction by Jason Godbey), and as the participants walk from place to place, a film noir voiceover tells the character's thoughts. Each participant has a different experience, with specifically tailored scenes, thoughts, and dialogue with the other characters. After the story ends, everyone attends an after-party at the theater bar to put all the pieces of the story together and discuss it with Arber.
It sounds complicated, but it all works, although not without minor flaws. One of my fellow participants/characters could not find the store she was supposed to go to, and the conversation I was to have with her there never occurred. We had to read our halves of the dialogue separately. Sometimes the flaws add to the fun, as when we took too long to say our dialogue, which caused overlap or line dropping, or we said it too fast, which caused silly awkward pauses. Mostly, though, the proceedings run impressively smoothly.
Arber changes the video and locations to fit the neighborhood of the theater. When the piece was done in Brooklyn, she was able to use more outside locations and local businesses. At 59E59, only one local business agreed to participate, and the hot July weather prompted Arber to contain the action primarily indoors. It would have been more adventurous and interactive to move around the neighborhood more, but each neighborhood and, therefore, theatrical experience is different. I at least got to walk down East 59th street in a feather boa.
The story itself is somewhat simplistic, but it almost has to be in order to get all the audience participation and video synchronization working as well as it does. The characters, although they are types, have clear motives, and the plot twist is logical yet unpredictable. Fans of the film noir genre will enjoy the references and stylized dialogue and cinematography (by Godbey and Aaron Baker).
More than just a fun way to spend an hour, Suspicious Package breaks new ground in interactive theater and in theater in general, introducing technological that could soon spread to other theatrical forms. Hopefully more pieces will be constructed in this unique way, and perhaps in the process the stories will evolve to be more complex so that the participants will not only have realizations about the other characters but about themselves and the world as well.
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There are different kinds of one-woman shows. Some tell the story of many characters channeled through one actor, some are personal memoirs, and some feature an actor embodying a single character, often from history. Considering Georgia O’Keeffe, which played July 31-August 1 at the East to Edinburgh Festival, is of the last category, however in a crisp 45-minute encounter with this popular artist, one only catches a glimpse of her life and thoughts. An assistant professor of voice and acting, a vocal coach, and an experienced solo performer, actor and creator Allison Hetzel brings the audience into the life and mind of Georgia O’Keeffe but doesn’t quite give us a full understanding of her character. The piece begins with a slide show of O’Keeffe’s paintings with lovely music by Raphael Crystal, which effectively draws us into her world. As Hetzel takes the stage, she is at first herself but then transforms into the character of Georgia with slight changes to her appearance. Some passages of Hetzel’s narrative are engaging and move fluidly while others feel awkward. Her use of props such as paintbrushes and a flower is perhaps a bit too on the nose and over-illustrative of the text. Her relationship with her husband Alfred Stieglitz is at the forefront but one never feels engaged enough with their relationship to care about its complications. Hetzel has a clear, mellifluous speaking voice that carries the piece, but there’s not much to take away from Considering Georgia O’Keeffe aside from images of O’Keeffe’s body of work and a slight biographical sketch told in the first person. Venue: 59E59 Theaters : 59 East 59th Street |
