Foreign Radical by Theatre Conspiracy, written by Tim Carlson and directed by Carlson and Jeremy P. Waller, is an immersive experience being hosted by Eastern Front Theatre at Alderney Landing as part of the Prismatic Arts Festival, which has two final performances today in Dartmouth (Punamu’kwati’jk).
Thirty participants are led into the theatre space which is divided into four separate areas. When we walk in together at first we find a person (played by Mehdi Darvish) in a very vulnerable situation and we are not overtly told who they are or why they are here, but it becomes more apparent as the experience continues. This initial moment though, I think, roots the participants in a feeling of discomfort and/or awkwardness and a sense of the unknown of what is waiting for them in the other playing spaces and the sense that things might be uncomfortable or even to some extent dangerous.
Theatre Conspiracy is trying to give their audiences an immersive experience that highlights the ways in which we judge one another and what it feels like to be singled out of the group for something that is at least somewhat true about ourselves and how this might connect, for example, to who breezes through an airport and who might end up getting deported, to use an extreme example.
It is an interesting experiment for sure and one that I definitely can see having the intended results, but there are also so many other factors at play that the audience can really have a profound impact on both their own experience and the experience of others. I’m not the ideal audience for this type of immersive experience because my own mix of being a people pleasing perfectionist with an anxious brain won’t let me just experience what is presented to me without obsessing over how to do everything the ‘right’ way and being so consumed with worry about what will be asked of me next and that I won’t be able to do it ‘correctly’ as well. We also had, perhaps, an anomaly audience where, although clearly each of us had differing opinions or experiences on certain questions being asked, we were largely united in our opinions on the overarching question and, I think, therefore also largely in tune, or at least sympathetic to, the message of the show. In this specific experience it feels a bit self-congratulatory on our part- we are sent out to feel good that we got the “right” answer and did the “right thing,” when in reality there are so many more nuanced problematic aspects of racial profiling, the fear of terrorism, Islamaphobia, the way we are all being manipulated by fear, and also our own ignorance, often, to the complex politics outside of our Canadian/American bubble, that cannot be addressed in such broad strokes of ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answers.
However, I can imagine that if we had had a more divisive group the exercise would have felt more grounded in reality: sharing our real opinions and disagreeing with one another, and maybe even trying to convince one another to change their minds or arguing- rather than having to pretend to have this debate where it doesn’t feel like there are any stakes involved.
What interested me the most, and frustrated me the most at first because I wanted to do what was asked of me ‘correctly’, was that the folks who were chosen to be removed for whatever reason from the main space had more access to the “evidence” than those who stayed behind. Yet, we were all asked to share our thoughts on what the evidence proved. I was frustrated by this because I could barely see or understand the evidence, I had no idea of the context of what I was looking at on the screen. I couldn’t really hear what was being said about our suspect, I felt entirely useless in offering my opinion because all I knew for sure is that someone was being accused, basically, of being Muslim in an airport, and having gone to the same mosque in contemporary times as Al-Qaeda members who have been dead for twenty-three years. But then I wondered if that was the point. Those who are labelled or flagged as suspicious in some way often have more information than those of us who haven’t been? So, therefore their knowledge and opinions should be the ones elevated or brought forth in the debate? The rest of us should defer to those who have a clearer context and more personal view of the situation? I don’t know if this was intentional, but it was the one aspect of the piece that gave me a visceral reaction at first and really caused me to ponder why this might have been the case.
Anjela Magpantay acts as our guide and she is excellent at keeping the mood in the room off-kilter throughout. She is part ringmaster, part Krusty the Clown, part jail keeper. She is both the good cop and the bad cop. She both tries to encourage the audience to let their guards down, be honest, play as though this were just a fun game, but she also creates a shroud of ominous mystery around where other members of the group are being taken and what is happening to them there.
I’m both relieved and disappointed that the experience I had was a very nice, polite, Haligonian, Canadian theatregoing experience. I wouldn’t have liked being more uncomfortable than I already felt, but in these contexts you often have a more transformative experience when you are fully outside of your comfort zone. I think this piece does have the power to be transformative for folks under specific circumstances, and judging from the responses it has had from other festivals, cities, and countries, it seems to have been a transformative experience for many folks. It depends so much on who you are, how closely you already align with the message of the show, and who all the others in your audience happen to be. For a fuller effect I would encourage folks to try to be part of an audience entirely of strangers. If you’re like me and you need to know what will be asked of you first in order to calm down enough to fully experience what is in front of you, you might want to go twice or ask someone who has already had the experience to walk you through what might happen ahead of time. There is room for the creators to work on making the experience more accessible for folks, especially those who use hearing aids.
Foreign Radical plays just two more times at Alderney Landing Theatre (2 Ochterloney Street) in Dartmouth: October 6th at 2:00pm and 7:30pm. You will have your own unique experience that likely will be ‘radically’ different from mine- so don’t take mine too much to heart. Tickets range in price from $15 plus fees to $35.00 plus fees. The show is intended for audiences 18 years and over. There is brief male nudity, audiences are standing for the full 85 minutes (chairs are provided for those who require them). For tickets please visit this website.
