Flux Theatre Ensemble

Adina Levin has a fascinating post building on a theory of Dave Weinberger's called The End of Information, The Return of Conversation. In it, Adina persuasively argues that Information - who has it, who doesn't, and how it is distributed - is no longer the primary mover of our culture.

Now it is Conversation, through the form of social media, that is in the driver's seat. Rather than engaging the world through Information obtained from a single reliable source; the world is increasingly understood through the context of Conversation. Comments on blogs and Facebook, tweets and retweets, Google Wave and Wikipedia are more than just crowd sourcing information; they represent a fundamental values shift in perception. Asking the question, and hosting the conversation, have primacy over providing a single answer.

In her excellent recent post The Future Of Politics Is Mutual, Hannah Nicklin issues a call to arms for the creation of an open sourced WikiPolitics, something my friend Matt Cooperider has been advocating for at Open Government NYC. As Hannah argues, the structures of social media are ideally suited to creating a more open, participatory democracy.

What does this mean for theatre? Primarily, it means that if you claim to want Conversation, it can't simply be your old Information dressed up in social media's clothing. Flux is taking steps towards this by directly soliciting feedback for The Lesser Seductions of History, but this is only a start. As WikiPolitics and Open Government movements increase the access and leverage of engaged citizens, we must encourage a similar level of direct and meaningful conversation with our stakeholders. What theatre companies are doing this well? Please post any good examples in the comments field; especially those that move beyond using new media as a platform for old content, and instead let their audience sit in some meaningful way at the table where decisions are made. Read the full story

The observant of you readers may have already noticed, but Flux has begun tweeting about The Lesser Seductions of History. Along with the blog, this is our way of opening up our rehearsal process to you.

The tweets take two forms: @LesserSedux I'm posting moments of clarity and hilarity in the rehearsal process as they happen. Other artists working on the project are also tweeting their experience.

But here's what we're really excited about: the characters themselves are tweeting. Before you begin singing "You Gotta Get a Gimmick", consider the following reasons why this is as useful to our process as it is (hopefully) fun:

1. Thematic resonance with the play: Lesser Seductions explores how events both great and small shift the direction of our lives in subtle ways; as such, a daily look at imagined moments in the characters' lives through Twitter fits.

2. Research: The play is set in the 1960's, and while the broad strokes of the decade are still lit up like neon in our collective consciousness, the details are essential. Each character has been given 1 year to tweet from - Marie is tweeting from 1960, Tegan from 1964, Bobby from 1969, and so on. We've already learned a lot about the decade from the research the actors have done to make their year specific tweets feel authentic.

3. Character development: Actors and their director often need to create a credible back story for their characters. This project allows our actors to imagine the daily lives of their characters, moment by little moment. Already, this has yielded tangible benefits: Lee (Isaiah Tanenbaum) has done amazing work detailing his troubled relationship with his cousin and wife, as well as explored the nature of his art work.

4. Conventions: The nature of time and the arc of our characters' journey through it also resonates with the way we're tweeting: characters are talking across their specific years in a way that mirrors that madness of 1968. As in the play, they are both in time and outside of it.

5. And yes, it's fun: Matthew Archambault has already drafted a story of his character Barry's actions in Vietnam that will involve four main characters and play out over the next few weeks. It is, essentially, a play within a play that he's writing. Those who read it will have an enhanced relationship to that part of Barry's journey.

How to follow us:
The tweets are aggregated by the hashtag #LesserSeductions, but if you're not a Twitterhead, just scroll down the right nav and you can see the tweets from that hashtag streamed to the blog; right below our Fan Box and over the Archive. Clicking on each tweet will let you see which character wrote it, but only by joining twitter can you see the full stream of characters in all its glory.
If you are on Twitter, be sure to follow the project @LesserSedux, and each of the individual characters (not all of the actors are Tweeting yet, but they will, oh yes, they will)
Marie_1960
Lee_1962
Tegan1964
Barry_1966
Bobby_1969
The_1960s (This last account belongs to a very special character in the play - on this it's best not reveal more).

Our hope is this project will enhance our work in the rehearsal room, make you feel more connected to the process, and (of course) generate a little buzz for the project that will translate into new audience.

So, follows us, and let us know what you think; and if you have any kind of experience with new media brought into a process like this, please post your experience below (I believe Waterwell and New Paradise Laboratories involved Twitter directly into performance, and I remember vaguely a Shakespeare play attempting this).
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Is Thomas Cott the Steven Colbert of arts administrators?

I ask, only half in jest, based on the similarities between the much lauded Colbert Bump and our own recently experienced Cott Bump. The Colbert Bump is the hypothesis that politicians experience a 'bump' in their popularity immediately after appearing on the Stephen Colbert show.

Thomas Cott curates "You've Cott Mail", an invaluable aggregate of the weekday's most important arts related news. Yesterday, he featured a post of ours, and we experienced the second highest ever number of hits on our website and blog, aka, The Cott Bump.

I jestingly bring up this Cott Bump to make a slightly more serious point: this Bump is second only to the previous record of hits established when the New York Times published their positive review of Pretty Theft. I think this is fascinating - that an email listserv administered by one dedicated advocate could drive nearly as many people (502 vs 616) to our work as the Paper of Record.

Of course, the Times review was significant in that it translated directly into tickets sales, something the Cott Bump has not (yet!) done. But in the ongoing discussion of how we reach new audiences, I thought this was worth sharing.

And to return the bump...why not sign up for "You've Cott Mail"? And what has been your experience in the difference between traditional and new media driving new audience to your sites? Read the full story