New York: Mix a classic game and a popular online video game, and what do you get? From the Lincoln Center Collider Fellowship, a form of digital performance that disrupts and invites: Theater Royale.
Designed by 2024-25 Brandon Powers, Royal theater is both a theater company and an interactive livestream. Two actors read a room – currently by representing are While waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett, Antigone by Sophocles, and Love letters By Ar Gurney – while also playing the Fortnite video game. Two members of the public can serve as “guards” of the actors, defending them from the other characters in the world of the game, while unlimited public members can look at the livestream and interact in the cat.
Inspired by conversations on the death of the American theater, its history in choreography and immersive performance, and its experience in cultures on the Internet, Powers launched the project as a means of building the future of performance as well as a community around the game (and pieces). “I see Fortnite as the modern agora of ancient Greece,” he said. “It is a community gathering space, not just a game.”
It is a fairly massive space. According to Activeplayer.ioFortnite The average number of daily players in January was 2.25 million players, with a peak of 3.76 million players. Epic games, the manufacturer of Fortnite, describe it as “A world of many games and other experiences”, “ With Fortnite Battle Royale which takes place on an island where the objective of each player is to be the last. In their fight for survival in game mode, players can look for loot, build strong and shoot enemies. Where could a performance register? You might hear Antigone Cry for his brother while the gunshots leave, listen to several players enthusiastically react to dramatic action and visual effects, or explode the conversation with Emotes to influence the performances of the actors.
“Dissonance there, for me, is really exciting,” observed Powers. “You hear crossed fires when Antigone says:” Look at it on the doors “or” I need to bury it “- then get shot, combined with this idea of the death of American theater- that's what it is to be an artist right now. You try to create moving art at a time when the world apparently collapses and try to find a sense of making a room. We are in the midst of Battle Royale trying to do our job. »»
Chaos causes a different perspective not only on the role of traditional American theater, but on the way in which an integrated community space, in particular that full of young generations, can interact and play with art. In 2024, the Pew Research Center reported The 85% of teenagers in the United States play video games, with 72% of teenagers so that they can spend time with each other. And Powers is not the only artist to explore this hybrid: the 2024 documentary Flight hamlet Follows the attempt of two actors to stage Shakespeare's tragedy entirely in the Grand Theft Auto.
While Powers continues to develop the royal theater as an artistic society and as a community, it also has a long -term vision for these events to enter public spaces, where public members could pass as a teammates. He especially hopes that the public “is committed and inspired in what the theater can be. It's more than just sitting in a theater and watching something happen in front of you, but rather how we can solve problems together, be challenged and more deeply associated with the fabric of society. »»
Royal theater Streams on Twitch Tuesdays and Thursdays. Interested public members and potential players can reach the Discord.
