Last week, in preparation for our trip to New Orleans, Haymaker presented a draft of I Know You Are But What Am I to a small group of willing participants. Below, Akiva, Dan, and Emily share some reactions to that draft performance, and what they are excited to try during the two draft performances in New Orleans.

Akiva:

I hate audience participation.

Is a line I say in I Know You Are But What Am I.

But it’s in there because I feel it. For all the work I do breaking down divisions between performers and audience, for all the times I’ve made a play where an actor talks to an audience member or asks them to do something, I have to admit that most of the times when I’ve attended a show that wanted me to participate, I’ve pulled away. And I don’t think I’m alone in this opinion – I’ve seen people in our audiences (on this show, even) pull away when we ask them to join in.

So in the interest of full disclosure, “I hate audience participation” had to be a line in this show.

Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised, but very early on in the piece, I sit with the audience rather than staying at the front. It’s an “actor participation” show for me. I try to melt back into the audience and let myself become a passive observer again, a role that feels very easy for me. That’s my system for controlling complexity, a way to be a part of an interactive medium without interacting too much.

But every simplifying system in this show also confines. So my experience of being in this audience has been about giving up that system to try for a genuine interaction. My system is a lie from the beginning. When I tell them that I hate audience participation, I’m engaging in it. I don’t melt into the audience, I declare myself in it. I’m a hypocrite.

Still, when we “took off” at the end of our first performance of I Know You Are But What Am I, it felt like a release. I didn’t feel like a performer or a puppetmaster guiding an audience. I felt like part of a group experiencing a genuine interaction together.

I didn’t expect that. Maybe I was still falling back on actorly detachment. But it felt like something new to me.

Dan: 

Sometimes I forget audience is not singular.

I blame rehearsal for this. It’s where I think of the audience as a herd. We’ll move them here…and then they’ll probably do this…and then they’ll grasp this idea, etc. At times, creating a performance can feel like a sociology experiment.

Last week, during our first full draft run of I Know You Are But What Am I, we’d agreed to try not having a formal greeting process as audience members arrived. So imagine no ticket taker, and no one to really acknowledge the arriving audience members as they came in the door.

The memory that comes to me is of a man arriving out of breath, slightly panicked, and looking desperately for someone. After a short time, I caved and introduced myself. He’d forgotten his ticket printout. He was apologetic and worried. He’d never been to something like this and didn’t know what to do. I assured him he’d done everything right so far, and then his face relaxed and his shoulders dropped. It was as if I’d dunked him in warm water.

I was reminded of how generous it is for someone to walk through that door. I was reminded of how much I want to reward them for coming, for taking that risk. I was reminded of just how much I appreciate that one person walks through the theater door and then another, and another, and so on.

Selfishly, I abandoned our agreement after that and then room changed for me. It seemed less like an audience or a group, and more like accumulation of persons. A weird perception trick, both singular and plural.

Emily:

I love people. Sometimes I hate them, sure – when they drive too slow or too fast, when they are in front of me in the grocery line, when they send me an email that is rude, when they say inflammatory things on the internet, when they vote anti-choice – you know, when they are inconsiderate. But for the most part, I love them. And when I’m not in a rush or unhappy or inconsiderate myself, I can see these annoyances as just part of humanity. A complicated, messy existence. We’re just all popping around doing our thing, banging into each other. Making mistakes, making people’s days, trying and failing to love and be love.

It’s why I like people watching. We get to be observers of this mixed-up world of people without any of the anxiety inherent in trying to deal with them. You get to see their humanity in its perfect complexity. You get to imagine stories about them, make judgments, and imagine what life would be like in their shoes or next to them.

There’s this part in I Know You Are But What Am I, where I get to sit and watch the audience. They are watching something behind my head – a video entitled “How to Make Flying Amazing.” The video is almost 10 minutes long, and I just sit there and watch them while they watch the screen. After Monday’s draft performance, it became my favorite part of the show. Watching them take in this video, each in their private way, reminded me of the ocean. Sitting there and watching the expressions change on their faces, I felt the individual responses – like the individual waves – becoming a tide of emotions washing over me. I was transported by them being transported. I felt love and loved. I can’t wait to do it again.

Learn more about I Know You Are But What Am I? on Haymakers blog.