From left, Guy Marsan, Sarah Conn and Laura Astwood.
Andrea Grant is a volunteer facilitator for The Lab, and she is looking forward to colLABorating with Apt613 readers before and in-between undercurrents shows.
If you led a theatre company, how would you design the perfect play? Is it even possible to create such a “perfect play”? If so, how could you incorporate a whack load of toilet paper rolls?
These are some of the questions that seeded the growth of The Lab – an interactive theatre project, taking place alongside the undercurrents theatre festival at the GCTC. Every evening of the festival, in the airy second floor lobby, Two Little Birds Theatre Company will be conducting an experiment – and it will be up to enthusiastic theatre-goers to get behind the microscope.
While most people are reluctant to participate in unusual clinical trials, The Lab is different from the science one usually associates with safety goggles, frog dissections, and melting ballpoint pens with Bunsen burners. Despite the white coats and clip boards, The Lab is a fun and, well, safe experience, that leads participants to examine their personal connections with theatre.
“We’re looking for stories and thoughts about the place of theatre in people’s lives, and their ideas about the evolution of performance in Ottawa,” states Sarah Conn, Founder of Two Little Birds and The Lab mastermind.
“What’s the next wave of theatre, and who is the audience?” wonders Conn. “Is there even an audience?”
To extract participants’ perspectives on these questions and more, The Lab is organized into three interactive stations. Willing collaborators are given the option of being “writers,” “designers,” or “performers.” Depending on their comfort levels with cameras, written surveys, scissors, and pipe cleaners, there are various options for contributing.
Ultimately, Two Little Birds will use the data collected by The Lab to craft the perfect play, to be performed this summer. But they emphasize that this project isn’t just about the results. Guy Marsan, actor and member of Two Little Birds, hopes that people really enjoy themselves at The Lab.
“It isn’t everyday that people can contribute to a future piece of theatre,” says Marsan. “And I hope people leave feeling like they really lived the experience that we’ve created for them.”
The undercurrents theatre festival runs until February 6. Follow Two Little Birds on twitter as they live tweet their zaniest results: @2littlebirdsott.
