Second Life Plays

Last week, I finally purchased a ticket to see the last show of ART's production of "Alice In Wonderland". The experience made me question whether or not stage productions can find a proper place on this grid and others.  I must add a caveat with this semi-review, I do know most of the actors in ART and have worked with some of them.  But this is in no way influencing my review of their production.

ART made a very commendable effort in trying to use the grid as a part of their production.  In essence some scenes had an interactive effect.  The audience falls with Alice down the rabbit hole and swims in her tears.  Those special effects were delightful.  But I couldn't help thinking that they were somewhat of a distraction in some ways and only showed how stodgy the conventional staging appeared (more on this later).  The virtual sets were lovely on the whole and really captured the charm of Tenniel's illustrations.

The voice acting was well done.  However I sensed problems with the rushing of line delivery in a few scenes (particularly the Cheshire cat and Tea Party scenes) and some did not savor Dodgson's wonderful nonsense dialogue as much as they should have.  I noticed there were a lot of actors switching parts through out the performance which I did not like.  Simply because the characterization work was extremely different and it led to uneven performances in regards to some characters.  The character of Alice suffered greatly from this sharing of the part between 2 actresses, they each had different vocal quirks which led to wildly different interpretations through the play.  Another short coming was the use of a narrator to connect disparate scenes.  This, however, is a problem with the source material itself.  The books work on dream logic and nonsense story lines, so the scenes do not fit.  Therefore the narrator keeps it together loosely.  However when transferred to stage, the narrator just comes across as an unneeded element.  We didn't need him/her to describe the scenes or the reactions of the actors.  The narration could have been cut entirely.

Despite these few problems the production was, I thought, successful and it was a great hit with the audience.

The production did inspire me to question whether or not acting performances have a proper place in Second Life.  The grid by it's very nature is interactive and requires individual and collective input from it's users.  Performances require spectators not interactive collaborators.  An audience allowed to run free during a play is just mayhem.

As a voice actor in SL, I've had frustration in battling against the problems of the grid (lag, griefers, unreliable voice software, and unexpressive avatars).  I've also noticed that the grid is much larger in spirit then the old forms of plays and films.  We are not taking full advantage of it's pluses.  But what are those pluses?

In ART's Alice production, there was a hint of it in those few interactive scenes.  How could that be expanded?

Should there be a fourth wall in SL?  Especially when the platform itself works on the notion of no dividers.  As an actor, I believe there should be some remnant of the fourth wall.  Without it, plays would become the equivalent of dinner shows like "Medieval Times".  But it should be reconfigured.  I don't believe audience members should have to sit.  Nor should they be condemned to gawk at a stage.

The future of plays in SL and other grids will be some kind of audience interactivity.  What if they could move through sets (abet with some restrictions) or become impromptu extras?  I like the idea of having the audience move through time and space with the actors.  To follow our character's journeys with their own avatars.

I envision the audience as party members at the Capulet's ball....  Plays should be presented with this aim in mind.  To set the audience free from their seats.