Just when you think you have experienced all tangents of experimental theatre you can be hijacked from behind!

Spectate is ostensibly a fourth wall audience participation transmedia presentation set in the Garrick theatre in Detroit during Harry Houdini’s final performance in 1929, but it is much, much more!

Metro Arts’ presentations specialise in shifting paradigms and stretching audience perceptions. Spectate produced by Counterpilot, a transmedia performance collective, co-founded by Sandra Caluccio and Nathan Sibthorpe, combines live theatre, film, audio and short messaging service (SMS) to fully immerse the audience in the moment.

On arrival our phone numbers were collected and permission given to be contacted, reminding me of a Penn and Teller magic show I saw recently in Vegas. I was expecting it to be used for some illusionist trick of Houdini’s, as we were asked to keep an eye on our phones, but instead, it was to create an illusion of a different kind.

[[{"type":"media","view_mode":"media_preview","fid":"28050","attributes":{"alt":"","class":"media-image","height":"180","style":"width: 180px; height: 180px; float: right;","width":"180"}}]]Entering the cosy theatre, each chair had a set of headphones which we were instructed to wear. Old Houdini films were playing on a screen surrounded by Vaudeville-style red plush curtains, with the audio coming through the headphones. After a quick technical check we embarked on a 90 minute adventure, each of us was an audience member of Houdini’s last act in 1929 after he had been fatally wounded by a punch to the stomach which ruptured his appendix, eventually causing his death days later on 31st October.

Two video cameras with interchangeable live feed were set up. One focussing on miniature sets which were changed intermittently and interacted with by the actors. The feed was transmitted to the large screen and combined ingeniously with the second camera’s live feed allowing the actors to appear in the sets. The live feed was also combined with pre-recorded film to create a multilayered media presentation. Walls and curtains were used to reveal new sets which removed the audience from the Houdini stage and placed them into a retrospective excursion into Houdini’s life.

An audio narrative was given via the headphones from an audience member’s or Houdini’s perspective giving insight into their thoughts. The voice overs accompanied the visuals and were recordings provided by Hugh Parker, Anna McGahan, Lucas Stibbard, Veronica Neave and Lauren Jackson.  Freakily, the predicted thoughts from the narrative were often similar to your own, which enhanced the mind reading Houdini experience.

Four actors were intermittently on stage, with a enigmatic, but troubled Houdini played by Toby Martin. Cam Clark had various roles, whilst also changing the miniature sets and operating the cameras. As Houdini explored the world of the supernatural he was determined to expose spiritualism as fake and he became friends with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle portrayed in his later years by Brad Haseman. Elise Grieg played the famous psychic Mina Crandon who Houdini had famously debunked as a fraud, despite her alleged contact with his mother.

On several occasions through the show, an unknown character, alluding to be an interested female in a green skirt from the bar, contacted the audience via SMS asking to meet up after the show. Messages included philosophical questions and they appeared to be answering replies from the audience, which was amusing and disturbing. During the pseudo intermission I received 10 SMS replies to my messages from the lady in green, creating a totally new “5th wall” dimension to the experience and no doubt titillating some male audience members. I almost stopped worrying that we had just witnessed Toby Martin playing Houdini, lock himself in a milk churn full of water a 15 minutes prior!

Throughout the presentation you feel dichotomised, as you are in the Houdini audience with interactions from the actors on the stage and the audio steering your own thoughts with their muses, yet, you also feel isolated due to the headphones blocking out extraneous sounds creating an almost psychedelic emotional experience.

Spectate is an innovative fourth-wall conceptual experience which acts like pinball for the consciousness as your mind ricochets from one perception to the next!

By Dr Gemma Regan

Image by Stephen Henry