Liveness on Stage: Intermedial Challenges in Contemporary British Theatre and Performance 9783110346534, 9783110345902

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Claudia Georgi Liveness on Stage

CDE Studies

Edited by Martin Middeke

Volume 25

Claudia Georgi

Liveness on Stage

Intermedial Challenges in Contemporary British Theatre and Performance

ISBN 978-3-11-034590-2 e-ISBN 978-3-11-034653-4 ISSN 2194-9069 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress. Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2014 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck ♾ Printed on acid-free paper Printed in Germany www.degruyter.com

Contents Acknowledgements Introduction

VII

1



(Inter‐)Mediality . The Medium . Intermediality



Drama, Theatre and (Inter‐)Mediality 45 . Theatre versus Drama . Theatre and Technological Media





16 16 24 45 53

Mediation, Mediatisation and Liveness 66 66 . Mediation and Mediatisation . What Lies Beyond Mediation and Mediatisation? Liveness on Stage 83 83 . Spatio-Temporal Co-Presence 110 . Ephemerality and Uniqueness . Unpredictability, Imperfection and Risk of Failure 160 . Interaction and Participation 196 . Representation of Reality

Conclusion Works Cited

247 255

Index of Performances General Index

272

269

68

133

Acknowledgements I could not have written this book were it not for the professional and personal support of a number of people. First of all, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Brigitte Glaser and Gabriele Rippl who wholeheartedly encouraged and patiently supported my project at all times. I have largely benefited from their great expertise and helpful criticism. I further owe a great deal to my colleagues and friends at the English Department of the University of Göttingen for taking an active interest in my progress. Among these, my special thanks go to Katharina Nambula, Anca-Raluca Radu and Winfried Rudolf for offering valuable advice as well as welcome distraction. I am also very much indebted to Clare Wallace, Werner Huber and, particularly, Martin Middeke for repeatedly inviting me to the annual young scholars’ forum of the German Society for Contemporary Theatre and Drama in English. Their feedback has been invaluable to me and their suggestions helped my argument to thrive. I also owe thanks to many of the participants of these workshops for their responses and encouragement. To Mary Oliver and Peter Petralia I am especially obliged for the generous provision of unpublished typescripts and DVD recordings of their productions. Furthermore, my thanks are due to all those performance companies and artists included in this book who permitted me to reproduce images from their productions. I gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) who funded my research stay in London from 2007 to 2008 and thereby largely contributed to the realisation of this book. The cooperation of my department and specifically of Brigitte Glaser in granting me this research sabbatical is also highly appreciated. Among those who unfailingly encouraged me with their love and friendship I would especially like to mention Winfried Rudolf, Anja Bauseneick and Heike Walker. Last but not least, I wish to express my most heartfelt thanks to my sister Katharina Georgi and to my parents Benedict and Christa Georgi: their patience has been unwavering and their loving support simply cannot be put into words. I dedicate this work to them.

Introduction “This revolution will be televised. Live.”¹ With this slogan, the British-German performance collective Gob Squad throws the spotlight right away on the intricate combination of liveness and mediatisation in its current production Revolution Now! (2010; still ongoing). When I attended a performance of Revolution Now! in June 2010 at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London, I quickly got swept up in the dizzying speed with which the action shifted between stage, auditorium, screens, monitors, and the street outside the performance space. With the active assistance of the spectators, the performers attempted to stir up the public outside the venue in order to find a representative of ‘The People’ who would appear on stage and help them instigate a revolution. To achieve this, two of the performers ventured out into the street to find a volunteer among the unwitting passers-by. All the time, it was the performers’ use of cameras that connected these different locations. Live video relays transmitted the action inside the venue to a monitor placed on the pavement outside, while the outdoor action was projected onto a screen raised on stage. This use of mediatisation blurred the line between fictional and real people because every passer-by was suddenly regarded as a potential revolutionary. As a consequence, a layer of fictionality was superimposed onto reality. What is more, the performance also seemed to conflate liveness and mediatisation, a process that culminated in the eventual transformation of a passer-by seen on video into a representative of ‘The People’ live on stage. As the live performers vied with the screens for the spectators’ attention, I repeatedly caught myself neglecting the live action and searching the screen for my own mediatised double when the cameras panned over the audience. Paradoxically, it were the video relays that seemed to confirm the liveness of the events when I repeatedly discovered myself ‘live’ on screen alongside projections of performers and passers-by I could not see on stage. Occasional interviews with performers, spectators or passers-by even added a documentary quality to the performance and created an impression of emotional proximity to the interviewees, though this effect was quickly undermined by the overt theatricality of the performance. Moreover, the way in which the performers constantly staged, restaged and improved scenes and even asked the spectators to strike poses for the cameras suggested that the authentic live experience of the audience was of lesser importance than its perfect media coverage. Revolution Now! thus emphasised the manipulative potential of the media. Was this pos Cf. http://www.ica.org.uk/whats-on/gob-squad-revolution-now.

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sibly also a revolution against the omnipresence of the media and their pervasive but often unnoticed influence in an age of increasing mediatisation? What created a strong sense of liveness despite the ubiquity of cameras, screens and monitors was the way the performance connected performers, spectators and passers-by in real-time and real spaces and thus rendered their interaction possible. The excursion into reality outside the venue moreover made the performance seem closer to life. At the same time, I was constantly aware of the fact that this performance could never identically be reproduced due to the high level of improvisation, and that it was a risky undertaking that could easily fail if no volunteer was found. With Revolution Now! Gob Squad thus address spatiotemporal co-presence, interaction, realistic representation, ephemerality and risk – aspects that are often mentioned in discussions of liveness. These concepts will also form the pivotal elements for my following analysis of liveness and mediatisation in intermedial theatre and performance and will be examined one by one.

Choice of productions Gob Squad’s use of live video relays in Revolution Now! may not be quite as revolutionary as its title seems to suggest, because theatre has always been receptive to other media. It has been influenced by other media in various ways and has, in turn, exerted its own influence on them. That this openness of theatre also applies to its relation to film and video can be seen in the cross-fertilisation between theatre and these media. Multiple careers of writers, directors, actors or other artists in theatre, cinema and video art, for instance, attest to the mutual affinity of theatre, film and video. Their interrelation also becomes manifest in countless adaptations from stage to screen or vice versa and in the reciprocal exchange and imitation of techniques and styles. In this book, I will focus on intermedial interrelations in the form of media combinations where film or video sequences are materially incorporated into theatrical performances. This phenomenon has existed as long as the medium of film itself and first occurred with the invention of film at the end of the nineteenth century. Nowadays, the combination of theatre with film or video is still popular among theatre practitioners from all over the world. Among the prominent contemporary representatives who combine theatre with film or video, but also with other new technologies, are John Jesurun, The Wooster Group and The Builders Association in America, Robert Lepage and his Canadian company Ex Machina, the British companies Complicite (originally Théâtre de Complicité) and Blast Theory, Laterna Magika in the Czech Republic, La Fura dels

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Baus in Spain, the Toneelgroep Amsterdam in the Netherlands, Guy Cassiers in Belgium and the Netherlands, Dumb Type in Japan etc., to name but a few. The works I selected for the present study were produced by British experimental theatre companies, collectives and individual artists from the mid-1990s onwards. In many ways their productions have been influenced by and show parallels to the work of international pioneers. Nonetheless, they have also developed their individual styles and approaches. Forkbeard Fantasy, Tim Etchells’s Forced Entertainment, Station House Opera and Gob Squad have themselves achieved an international reputation, whereas Proto-type Theater have toured primarily throughout Britain and America. Though Mary Oliver is a lesser known artist, I also chose two of her productions for my analysis because they most explicitly address the theoretical debates on liveness and mediatisation. As to the use of technological media in the selected productions, Forkbeard Fantasy’s productions such as The Fall of the House of Usherettes (1996; 2005; still ongoing) are the only examples which incorporate the medium of film. This combines with their general interest in older technologies. Pre-recorded video, in turn, figures prominently in Tim Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting (2001; still ongoing) as well as in Mary Oliver’s Wednesday, Wednesday (2005 – 2006; 2009) and Never Work With Animals, Children or Digital Characters (2006). In Station House Opera’s productions Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998; still ongoing) and Mare’s Nest (2001– 2004), the pre-recorded videos simulate live video relays because they are minutely synchronised with the live action. Gob Squad’s pre-recorded videos in Super Night Shot (2003; still ongoing) and King Kong Club (2005 – 2007), in turn, resemble live video relays because they are recorded immediately prior to or during the performances. Actual live video relays, by contrast, are used in Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) (2009 – 2010) as well as in many Gob Squad productions such as PraterSaga 3: In This Neighbourhood, The Devil Is A Goldmine (2004– 2010), Gob Squad’s Kitchen (You’ve Never Had It So Good) (2007; still ongoing) and Revolution Now! (2010; still ongoing). What all of the selected examples have in common is the way in which they treat theatre and film or video as equitable elements of the productions. They do not simply allude to film and video by means of intermedial references, but they materially incorporate these media and extend their use over the entire performances. Hence, neither live nor mediatised action can be considered dominant in any of these productions. Moreover, all of the productions were originally devised as intermedial experiments so that their media combinations have formed constitutive elements from the outset instead of being retroactive additions. Instead of serving as mere gimmicks or backdrops, film and video interact

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with the action on stage and can no longer be disentangled from the live elements. Accordingly, these media combinations implicitly or explicitly address the intricate relation between liveness and mediatisation and raise several issues that I will take up in the present study.

Research questions and hypotheses First of all, these productions pose the question whether forms of theatrical media combination are distinct in any way from instances of media combination that do not involve theatre as one of their components. In other words, does theatre provide more extensive opportunities for media combination than other media? With regard to this question, I will argue that theatre and other live performances (e. g. opera, ballet etc.) have an exceptional potential for incorporating other media without altering their mediality, materiality or sign systems. I will refer to this potential as their ‘medial mobility.’ This means that theatre can stage other media without subjecting them to its own mediality or blurring medial boundaries. In order to differentiate between the conventional theatrical mix of media such as language, music, dance, pictorial media etc. and the less established use of additional media such as film or video, I will depart from common conceptions of multi- or plurimediality and media combination as synonyms (e. g. Rajewsky 2002: 15; Wolf 2002: 172 f.). Instead, I will make a terminological distinction between media combination as an intentional strategy, and multi- or plurimediality as a mix of media that has become conventional in hybrid media such as theatre. With time and habituation, however, a specific form of media combination may eventually be perceived as a conventional case of multi- or plurimediality. But why, in the first place, does theatre choose to complement its inherent multi- or plurimediality with an additional media combination that includes film or video? It could be assumed that theatre would react to the frequently invoked encroachment of mediatisation on contemporary life by sealing itself off from technological media and shying away from a possible competition with them. Although the incorporation of technological media into live performances is no new phenomenon, the current proliferation of media combinations involving film or video in theatre suggests that theatre rises to the challenge posed by these media. My hypothesis is that such media combinations have acquired increasing significance for exploring the liveness of theatre and live performance. As I will argue in my analysis of the selected intermedial productions, theatre does not seem to consider technological media like film or video as threatening rivals. Instead, it regards their use as a chance to enhance its own possibilities

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5

and expressiveness, to position itself in relation to other media and to define its own liveness by comparison with and with the help of mediatisation. Rather than focusing on staging film or video – as Greg Giesekam’s study Staging the Screen (2007) suggests –, theatre primarily uses such media combination in order to stage itself and its own liveness. In more than one way, the selected productions thus present stages of liveness. Obviously this hypothesis calls for a definition of what is meant by liveness. Theatre practitioners or scholars rarely use liveness as a neutral concept but usually present it as a positive or even ideal quality of theatre. That liveness is valued as an asset is also implied by phenomena such as the ‘National Theatre Live’ project run by the National Theatre in London² or the ‘Metropolitan Opera Live in HD’ offered by the renowned Opera House in New York.³ In both cases, performances are broadcast ‘live’ to cinemas around the world. Such events claim to preserve the liveness of the performances and promise an experience different from other recordings. What can be considered live, however, is only the transmission in real-time and the shared reception of the performances among a community of spectators.⁴ As these examples illustrate, liveness is frequently invoked, yet remains an ill-defined concept in theatre and performance studies. In order to cast light on the hazy notion of liveness, I propose five aspects that are often associated with live performances and are frequently deemed to be defining characteristics of liveness: the co-presence of performers and spectators, the ephemerality of the live event, the unpredictability or risk of imperfection, the possibility of interaction and, finally, a specific quality of the representation of reality. In practice, these aspects are interrelated: while presence implies the threat of absence and hence ephemerality and disappearance, an increase in interaction augments the level of unpredictability and risk, but may also enhance the sense of realism. That this book investigates their relevance to the selected productions and their validity as defining characteristics of liveness in separate chapters is therefore not meant to suggest the mutual independence of these aspects. As their playful exploration in the selected intermedial performances illustrates, however, only three out of these five aspects actually constitute distinctive

 Cf. http://ntlive.nationaltheatre.org.uk/about-us.  Cf. http://www.metoperafamily.org/metopera/liveinhd/LiveinHD.aspx?nav=top.  To mark the company’s 30th birthday in 2014, Forced Entertainment are currently offering live streaming of their durational performances. Though transmitted in real-time, these performances no longer grant a communal experience because viewers may individually watch the performances via the internet (cf. http://www.forcedentertainment.com/page/3117/Live-Streaming).

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features of liveness. I will argue that liveness can be defined in terms of co-presence, ephemerality and unpredictability. Interaction and realistic representation, however, are not contingent upon either liveness or mediatisation and do not depend on a specific medium but on how a medium is used in specific contexts. That the selected productions nevertheless address all five aspects indicates their respective relevance to debates on liveness. Due to their disputed role for the notion of liveness, interaction and realistic representation in fact prove to be particularly productive for simulating effects of liveness. They are thus primarily employed when intermedial performances try to manipulate the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation. Yet, though individual criteria of liveness may also be met or simulated by technological media, a performance can only be considered truly live if the aspects of co-presence, ephemerality and unpredictability coincide. Rather than defining once and for all what constitutes liveness, however, I will focus on how its constitutive elements are taken up and playfully questioned by the selected intermedial performances and how this affects the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation. My guiding questions are: Do the performances pursue a defensive strategy and emphasise their own liveness as an unbridgeable opposition to mediatisation? Do they offer a conciliatory position by highlighting the similarities and smooth transitions between liveness and mediatisation? Or do they even go so far as to invert the respective status of liveness and mediatisation by claiming that mediatisation may be ‘more live’ than liveness itself? In other words, what is the self-conception of theatre with regard to its own liveness? As my in-depth analysis will illustrate, the productions tend to assimilate liveness and mediatisation. Some of them even playfully suggest that mediatisation may surpass liveness with regard to individual or all aspects of liveness. Though none of the productions achieves an actual conflation or inversion of liveness and mediatisation, they all critically comment on debates that consider liveness and mediatisation as ontologically distinct or even antagonistic categories. All in all, the artists do not seem to conceive of the relation between liveness and mediatisation as a rivalry but as a fruitful combination and mutual enrichment. Though they are concerned with the question of liveness and mediatisation, they are not necessarily concerned about the influence mediatisation may have on liveness. In addition to the question of how live and mediatised action relate to each other, I will also address possible differences among forms of mediatisation. Accordingly, I will examine whether film, pre-recorded video and live video relay have the same potential for simulating liveness, or whether they may influence the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation in different ways. As the comparison of these components of the media combinations will illustrate,

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7

live video relays offer more extensive possibilities for suggesting an assimilation of liveness and mediatisation than pre-recorded videos or films. The reason for this difference can be found once more in the actual and presumed aspects of liveness. Live video relays create temporal co-presence of stage, screen and auditorium in real-time. They are ephemeral and cannot be repeated identically. They are unpredictable or possibly imperfect due to the lack of post-production. They may facilitate interaction and audience participation. And finally, they may extend into reality beyond the stage by broadcasting from real spaces in realtime. In this sense, live video relays may appear to be ‘more live’ than other forms of mediatisation as the term itself suggests.

Outline Preliminary to the in-depth analysis of how the actual and presumed aspects of liveness surface in the selected productions, chapters 1 to 3 of the present study establish the theoretical framework for the afore-mentioned questions. Chapter 1 provides a working definition of the ‘medium’ that highlights the relevance of conventional conceptions of medial boundaries and comments on how the ‘medium’ relates to the terms ‘art’ and ‘sign’ (chapter 1.1). This serves as a point of departure for the discussion and comparison of different theories of intermediality and for a terminological clarification of the central concept of media combination that will be distinguished from multi- or plurimediality (chapter 1.2). Chapter 2 shifts the focus to the specific mediality of theatre and elaborates on its ‘semiotic’ and, more importantly, ‘medial mobility.’ This helps explain its potential for incorporating other media without affecting their materiality, a potential that marks the mediality of theatre as special when compared to other media and as different also from the mediality of drama (chapter 2.1). It is this unique quality of theatre that also enables it to stage its own liveness in distinction to the mediatisation of technological media. The brief subsequent account of how theatre has been influenced by technological media over time illustrates what types of intermediality have resulted from such experiments (chapter 2.2). It also provides the historical context for the intermedial productions analysed in chapter 4. Since an investigation of liveness requires that liveness may be set apart from its supposed opposite, chapter 3 opens with a brief definition of ‘mediatisation’ as the use of mechanical, technological or electronic media. It further distinguishes this process from ‘mediation’ as an inevitable aspect of how we experience the world, irrespective of the use of technological media (chapter 3.1). With recourse to debates in the field of media philosophy, this chapter also en-

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quires whether it is possible at all to have direct access to reality without involvement of any medium whatsoever. This discussion weighs the pros and cons of the claims of ‘media marginalism’ and ‘media generativism.’ It also introduces the central idea of an encroachment of mediatisation on liveness as expressed by American performance and media theorist Philip Auslander. His theory may also be seen as a comment on the relation between mediatisation and reality (chapter 3.2). Chapter 4, finally, addresses the central questions of the present study by investigating how the relation between liveness and mediatisation is presented and challenged in the selected intermedial productions. It analyses the suggested defining characteristics of liveness one by one and in this way covers co-presence (chapter 4.1), ephemerality (chapter 4.2), unpredictability (chapter 4.3), interaction (chapter 4.4) and the representation of reality (chapter 4.5). It not only tests the validity of these criteria for the definition of liveness. What is more, it also points out the differences between film or pre-recorded video on the one hand, and live video relays on the other hand, with regard to their respective potential for creating or simulating liveness and hence manipulating the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation. The analysis of the individual case studies draws on few experiences of attending the live performances and is primarily based on DVD recordings of the respective productions. Additionally, scripts have been kindly made available by Mary Oliver and Proto-type Theater’s former artistic director Peter Petralia, whereas Forkbeard Fantasy provided the illustrated storyboard that served as playbill for The Fall of the House of Usherettes. Tim Etchells’s script for Instructions for Forgetting, moreover, was published in The Drama Review in 2006. Admittedly, it may be regarded as problematic to base an analysis of the liveness of theatre primarily on scripts and recordings that can no longer be considered live. It is the very nature of liveness, however, to disappear immediately after the event so that this is a general problem of the documentation of live performances. It thus proved inevitable to draw on additional forms of documentation to render the analysis reliable. I am aware, however, of the fact that the performances may occasionally depart from their scripts. Especially in the more interactive or improvisational productions, individual performances may differ extensively from each other so that a recording of a single performance may not be absolutely representative of an entire production. In order to compensate for these problems of documentation and to gain a more comprehensive impression of the productions, I have used additional sources in combination with the DVD recordings and scripts. In this context, the companies’ websites proved particularly helpful because they provide background material, video clips, press photos etc. Tim Etchells and Gob Squad have

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also published extensive material on their own productions (e. g. Etchells 2007a; Gob Squad, and Quiñones; Gob Squad, and Freiburg). Reviews of all productions offer additional insights into the respective mise-en-scène and the experience of the audience. While the British Library in London holds an extensive archive relating to Forced Entertainment, their creative output as well as Forkbeard Fantasy’s and Station House Opera’s oeuvre have also been covered in monographs and collections of essays by Bailes (2011), Helmer and Malzacher (2004), Giesekam (2007) and Kaye (1996) among others. Secondary sources on Mary Oliver’s, Gob Squad’s and Proto-type Theater’s productions, however, are relatively sparse. Most of the secondary literature on any of the productions is moreover only remotely concerned with the guiding questions of the present study. Nevertheless, these publications provide useful overviews of the companies, performer collectives and individual artists, of their productions, characteristic approaches and recurring themes.

Previous research on (inter‐)mediality An exploration of the exceptional quality of theatrical intermediality requires a general theoretical framework of intermedial relations among any media. Media scholars disagree whether intermediality is a general condition of all media or a more specific phenomenon. Some representatives of German media studies argue in favour of a general pan-intermediality as an inevitable state of all media by questioning the very existence of isolated mono-media (e. g. Schröter; Spielmann; Müller 1996). Some Anglo-American media theorists have voiced comparable claims. In Picture Theory: Essays on Verbal and Visual Representation (1994), for instance, William J. T. Mitchell argues accordingly that “all media are mixed media” (5). Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin’s monograph Remediation: Understanding New Media (1999) accounts for such general interrelations between all media by identifying a constant ‘remediation’ or mutual refashioning of media (e. g. 15). No doubt, such observations are useful because they question strict notions of medial specificity and point out that the supposedly clear borders between media may merely be based on conventions. Yet, these approaches offer no means of explaining or categorising different types and degrees of interrelations between media. Other theories instead consider intermediality as a specific and intentional rather than general phenomenon and assume the existence of medial boundaries and differences. Although they often restrict their focus to individual media, their observations tend to be more widely applicable because they also offer general insights into the workings and types of intermediality. This applies,

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for instance, to many studies centring upon literature and its relation to other media in general (e. g. Lüdeke, and Greber). It also holds true for more specific analyses of how literature relates to new media (e. g. Griem), to the visual arts (e. g. Emden, and Rippl; Rippl 2005; Brosch; Eicher, and Bleckmann), to film (e. g. Paech 1988; Albersmeier) or to music (e. g. Wolf 1999; 1996). Werner Wolf (e. g. 2008; 2005; 2004; 2002; 1999) and Irina Rajewsky (e. g. 2005; 2004; 2002) offer the most comprehensive categorisations of possible forms of intermediality and provide universally applicable terminologies. Their respective typologies of intermediality are therefore central to the present study. They both distinguish between ‘intermedial references,’ ‘(inter‐)medial transposition’ and a fusion of media that is referred to as ‘media combination’ by Rajewsky and as ‘multi- or plurimediality’ by Wolf. Wolf additionally introduces ‘transmediality’ as a fourth subcategory. My focus in the present study is on theatrical media combination. I will consider other forms of intermediality only where they occur in addition to media combination. In this context, I will slightly modify the existing terminology by differentiating between media combination on the one hand, and multi- or plurimediality on the other hand. This proves necessary in order to distinguish intentional, and often unconventional, media combinations such as the use of film or video within theatre from already established multi- or plurimedial fusions that result in hybrid media. According to this distinction, theatre is generally multi- or plurimedial because it may consist of language, music, pictorial media etc., but it does not always use media combination. At the basis of my approach is the assumption that intermediality is no ubiquitous and inevitable phenomenon. Although media relate to each other and need to be analysed in comparison to each other, they are nevertheless distinct and have their specific characteristics. In fact, it is the assumption that there are distinct media and medial boundaries that renders fusions of media (such as the incorporation of video and film within theatre) unusual enough to provoke reflection on their mediality.

Previous research on theatrical (inter‐)mediality As opposed to general theories of intermediality, studies of intermediality in theatre and performance investigate more specifically how theatre may combine with other media. They document possible forms of such intermedial relations and analyse their impact on the spectators’ perception of the involved media. In Staging the Screen: The Use of Film and Video in Theatre (2007), Greg Giesekam approaches the effects of incorporating film and video within theatre by offering

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various case studies from British and North American theatre practitioners rather than starting out from a theoretical framework. His examples – among the Wooster Group, The Builders Association and Robert Lepage – also cover Forkbeard Fantasy, Station House Opera and Forced Entertainment, companies that also figure prominently in the present study. His publication moreover provides a thorough historical account of the use of film and video in theatre and investigates how it impacts on scenography, dramaturgy and modes of performing and spectating. More importantly, his study accentuates the potential of such intermedial combination for raising awareness of the respective mediality of theatre, film and video (cf. 249, 252). Yet, Giesekam primarily focuses on how theatre draws attention to the incorporated media and mediatisation in general by “staging the screen, […] destroying the normal cloak of invisibility that is cast over it in cinemas and on television” (252). My own study, by contrast, illustrates how theatre also ‘stages’ itself and its own liveness via the direct combination and comparison with other media. Accordingly, I consider the self-reflection of theatre on its own liveness the key aspect of the use of technological media in theatrical performances. Instead of focusing on the use of film and video within theatre, Elizabeth Klaver’s Performing Television: Contemporary Drama and the Media Culture (2000) analyses the impact of television on theatre performances. She considers thematic or structural influences as well as the actual use of television within theatre. Nevertheless, she comes to a similar conclusion when observing that such uses of television serve as a “self-reflexive act” (5, cf. 83) and engender “dramatic and theatrical self-scrutiny” (25). What she does not take into consideration, however, is the notion of liveness as the crucial point of such theatrical self-scrutiny. Marvin Carlson, in turn, concentrates on the use of live video relays in his article “Video and Stage Space: Some European Perspectives” (2003). He illustrates their function of extending the theatrical space and fusing real and fictional, live and mediatised spaces. As my analysis of the selected productions shows, this function is not only exploited by live but also by pre-recorded videos in Station House Opera’s and Gob Squad’s productions. Whereas the above-mentioned studies examine forms of media combination, the contributors of Kimball King’s edited volume Hollywood on Stage: Playwrights Evaluate the Culture Industry (1997) analyse intermedial references to Hollywood film and film business in a variety of plays dealing with this topic. Examples of intermedial transposition in the form of stage-to-screen adaptations can finally be found in R. Barton Palmer and William Robert Bray’s collection of essays Modern British Drama on Screen (2013). While each of these studies concentrates on theatre and its specific relation to film, video or television, there are also accounts of theatrical intermediality

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that more generally demonstrate the intermedial potential of theatre to incorporate any medium whatsoever. In her monograph Intermedialität des Theaters: Entwurf einer Semiotik der Überraschung (2001), for instance, Petra Maria Meyer refers to this ability of theatre to incorporate other media while respecting their differences as its ‘semiotic mobility’ (e. g. 62 f.). Further valuable advances in exploring the particularity of theatrical intermediality have been made by the members of the working group “Intermediality in Theatre and Performance” that forms part of the International Federation for Theatre Research (IFTR). Their findings have been published in Intermediality in Theatre and Performance (edited by Freda Chapple and Chiel Kattenbelt in 2006) and Mapping Intermediality in Performance (edited by Sarah Bay-Cheng, Chiel Kattenbelt, Andy Lavender, and Robin Nelson in 2010). Both volumes identify theatre as a unique ‘hypermedium’ capable of including and staging other media without transforming them (e. g. Chapple, and Kattenbelt 2006b: 20; Nelson 13, 19). The contributors moreover regard intermediality in theatrical contexts as a phenomenon that becomes manifest “at a meeting point in-between the performers, the observers, and the confluence of media involved in a performance” (Chapple, and Kattenbelt 2006b: 12; cf. Boenisch 2006: 113). In this sense, intermediality primarily serves as a perceptual category that depends on and influences the spectators’ awareness (cf. Chapple, and Kattenbelt 2006b: 20 f.; Boenisch 2006: 113; Nelson 13). I would argue instead that intermediality resides in the intermedial artefacts themselves; for although intermediality tends to raise medial awareness, the existence of intermedial phenomena – and specifically of media combination – does not depend on them being noticed by the recipients. The exact ways in which theatre may interact with other media and may affect the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation, moreover, is not further specified in the two volumes.

Previous research on liveness and mediatisation Although theatre has always been a live medium, its liveness only gained centre stage with the successive invention of film, television, video and other technological media. With the spread of mediatisation, the liveness of theatre could no longer simply be taken for granted and seemed to be threatened by mediatisation. It was only in the 1990s, however, that the debates on the relation between liveness and mediatisation in performative contexts eventually gained momentum. These discussions were primarily kicked off by the performance and media theorists Peggy Phelan and Philip Auslander. They share a very broad notion of performance that extends beyond theatre. Whereas Phelan’s study covers visual and performing arts, politics and demonstrations among other phenom-

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ena, Auslander draws on live events such as theatre, stand-up comedy, rock concerts, sports events and court hearings, to name but a few examples. Their positions with regard to the relationship between liveness and mediatisation, however, are diametrically opposed. Phelan considers liveness as an ontological feature of theatre and performance that contrasts with mediatisation. In Unmarked: The Politics of Performance (1993), Phelan argues that the ontological difference between liveness and mediatisation resides in the uniqueness and irreproducibility of live performances. This opinion has also been expressed by performance theorist and director Herbert Blau who believes theatre to be “predicated on disappearance” (1987: 198). Since live performances do not leave lasting artefacts or goods behind, Phelan believes them to counter the commodification of consumer culture. From her political and specifically feminist perspective she moreover considers liveness as a means of subverting entrenched power structures by questioning supposedly ‘male’ representational visibility via disappearance (cf. Drewes 31 f.). As opposed to this, Auslander questions the ontological difference of liveness and mediatisation (1999: 7, 159). He does not believe liveness to be tied to specific media and instead considers it as a historical, cultural and economic construct that only gained relevance with the proliferation of technological and electronic media (cf. 1999: 51, 54; 1997: 54 f.; 1996: 198). In Liveness: Performance in a Mediatized Culture (1999), he identifies an “incursion of mediatization into live performance” which becomes manifest in the actual use of technology as well as in the spread of a more general “media-derived epistemology” (33). The omnipresence of media, he claims, has not only eliminated experiences of pure liveness but has also decreased their cultural value (cf. 6, 36) so that the distinction between liveness and mediatisation has lost relevance (cf. 1992: 79). Auslander’s view of contemporary culture as being media-saturated is carried to an extreme in Matthew Causey’s Theatre and Performance in Digital Culture: From Simulation to Embeddedness (2006). Causey argues that technology has not only imbibed and altogether altered the liveness of performance (e. g. 6, 29) but has become entirely implanted in nature and the human body to an extent where everything is mediatised (cf. 165 f.). Although such arguments for or against an ontological difference help draw attention to the importance and disputed status of liveness and mediatisation, such provocative and radical argumentation also has its drawbacks. Phelan’s defence of pure liveness disregards the fact that theatre has always embraced other media and technologies and thus ignores phenomena such as the media combination in the productions selected for the present study. Auslander’s argument that liveness has lost cultural value is confuted by the persistent appeal of live events. That theatre is influenced by and incorporates technological media more-

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Introduction

over does not necessarily imply that it can no longer be distinguished from these media or relinquishes its characteristic mediality and liveness. As I will demonstrate, the media combination in the selected productions does not simply blend liveness with mediatisation. Instead, the live action stages and frames mediatisation while also reflecting on its own liveness. Even where live and mediatised action are playfully conflated, the spectators may therefore still be aware of their distinct mediality. Hence, the main question is not to what extent mediatisation influences liveness, but how noticeable this influence is and how self-assertively theatre reacts to it. Bolter and Grusin’s publication Remediation: Understanding New Media (1999) serves as an important point of departure for this question. Its distinction between ‘immediacy’ and ‘hypermediacy’ aptly points out that the transparency or salience of mediation and mediatisation may vary. This observation helps explain why the contrast between liveness and mediatisation in intermedial performances may also be more or less apparent to the spectators. Whereas Phelan and Auslander represent the extremes in the debates on liveness and mediatisation, intermediate positions predominate in the scholarly discussion about liveness. In Digital Performance: A History of New Media in Theater, Dance, Performance Art, and Installation (2007), for instance, Steve Dixon provides a comprehensive historical survey of the use of technological media in live performance and thus acknowledges early influences of mediatisation on liveness. Nevertheless, he does not generally query the continued existence of liveness but instead argues that liveness is not a question of the medium. From his wide range of examples including the internet, virtual reality, telematic performances etc., he concludes that liveness primarily depends on the factor of time. Accordingly, he observes that “liveness in itself has nothing to do with the media form, but at core concerns temporality. Put simply, for the spectator, liveness is just ‘being there,’ whatever performance form (live, recorded, telematic – or their combination) is being watched” (129). My analysis similarly highlights the relevance of temporal co-presence and its potential for simulating liveness. Yet, it illustrates that true liveness requires the combination of temporal and spatial co-presence. Nonetheless, Dixon’s study provides useful insights into how technological media may create effects of liveness via real-time transmission and interactivity. In her semiotic approach to theatre, Erika Fischer-Lichte elaborates in more detail on the distinctive features of liveness. She identifies three of the five aspects I address in the present study, namely the disappearance of liveness or its ‘event character,’ the co-presence of performers and spectators, and the possibility of interaction due to the ‘autopoietic feedback loop’ (e. g. 2010: 24 ff., 32, 47 f., 59 f.; 2004: 47, 58, 80 ff., 115, 127, 283). My own analysis confirms that disap-

Introduction

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pearance and co-presence are defining characteristics of liveness, but it also demonstrates that interaction is not contingent on liveness but can equally (or sometimes even better) be facilitated via mediatisation. My approach to the use of film and video within theatre and its effects on notions of liveness and mediatisation is located at the intersection point of the presented research in media and intermediality studies, media philosophy and theatre and performance studies. Despite extensive research in all of these areas, there has been little interdisciplinary cross-fertilisation among their findings with regard to the question of how theatrical intermediality, and specifically media combination, affects the liveness of theatre. My research focuses on how theatre practitioners react to the presumed encroachment of mediatisation on liveness and how they position themselves and their productions in the theoretical discourse dealing with this issue. Although the media combination of theatre with technological media is no new phenomenon, these questions have gained in importance proportionally to the increasing proliferation of mediatisation in all areas of everyday life, including the realm of art. I therefore hope to contribute to a better understanding of the mediality and liveness of theatre and its relation to technological media and, by extension, to cast light on the relation between liveness and mediatisation in general. This relation, as it will become apparent, is more playfully and open-mindedly approached by theatre practitioners than by the theoretical discourse.

1 (Inter‐)Mediality 1.1 The Medium The term ‘medium’ is not only central to the field of media studies but it has also been appropriated as a key concept by the humanities and social sciences in general. As such it figures prominently in academic disciplines as diverse as communication studies, literary and cultural studies, linguistics, philosophy, visual and performing arts, sociology and anthropology – to name but a few. Since most of these disciplines issue their own definitions of the term ‘medium’ according and limited to their own contexts and specific interests, this interdisciplinary significance of the medium often leads to terminological fuzziness. The confusion is further enhanced by the fact that the term ‘medium’ is frequently used in everyday language where it barely undergoes further terminological reflection or scrutiny, because its deceptive familiarity as an all-purpose term suggests a tacit agreement on a commonsensical understanding of the term. Alluding to this multitude of approaches and the ensuing definitional confusion, Frank Hartmann argues that there can be no absolute answer to the question ‘What is a medium?’ because the medium per se does not exist. Instead, he insists that anything can become a medium or a sign, depending on the circumstances and contexts (cf. 2008: 96). Etymologically, the meaning of the term ‘medium’ can be traced back to the Latin noun ‘medium’ and the corresponding adjective ‘medius.’ Among the dominant meanings of ‘medium’ the Oxford Latin Dictionary lists “[t]he middle part, centre” and “something which acts between two things, an intermediary” (“Medium,” def. 1, 6.b). According to the Oxford English Dictionary Online, two basic meanings have developed from this root in current English: firstly a middle condition in the sense of “[s]omething which is intermediate between two degrees, amounts, qualities, or classes; a middle state” and secondly an interceding instance in the sense of “[a] person or thing which acts as an intermediary” (“Medium,” def. I, II). Scholarly analyses and definitions of the medium restrict themselves to variations of the second sense and therefore carry the notion of the medium as a means of communication, transmission of information or cognition as their common denominator. Yet, their scope still varies significantly due to the many subordinate meanings that can be derived from this rather broad understanding of the term. Depending on the context and the respective academic discipline, the focus is thus placed on different facets of meaning from which diverse definitions can be gained.

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Instead of providing a universally valid definition that is applicable to all disciplines and contexts, I shall introduce central approaches to the term ‘medium’ in the following in order to provide an overview of the range of possible frames of reference for this concept. Moreover, since the status of theatre and its interrelation with other media depends on how broad a definition of ‘medium’ is applied, I attempt to establish a working definition of the medium in order to support the analysis of the role of distinct media in theatrical performance which forms the centre of the present study. In aesthetic definitions, such as those issued by the visual and performing arts, the medium is perceived as a means or form of artistic expression. According to this notion, all established arts such as painting, sculpture, architecture, theatre, music, dance etc. are media because they communicate meaning – sometimes overtly, sometimes in more abstract or obscure ways. As such, this notion of ‘medium’ implies an aesthetic or artistic claim although it is not necessarily meant to be an evaluative term in the sense of being limited to traditional ‘high arts’ or products of ‘high culture.’ Closely related to this use of the term ‘medium’ are institutional or sociological approaches as represented, for example, by media and communication studies which often rely on empirical methods of media analysis. With their focus on social, material, economic and pragmatic conditions of public communication, these studies analyse any aspect concerning the processing, distribution and reception of information via print, mechanical, analogue and digital media such as newspapers, magazines, radio, television, video, film, computer or internet. Due to their function as means of public communication, these media address a wide range of recipients in an impersonal way and used to establish a one-directional communication that hardly offered the addressees any means of active immediate response. Technological innovation in these media, specifically in online communication, however offers increasing opportunities for reciprocal communication and consumer participation via audience call-ins, live blogs, fan fiction websites etc. Nonetheless, the term ‘mass media’ under which these media are commonly subsumed still bears a negative connotation and implies a criticism of how mass communication often forces the recipients into a passive role.⁵ In a figurative sense, the people (e. g. journalists) and insti-

 Few scholars, however, defend the possibility of active reception despite mass communication as does John Fiske with his notion of the “reader” as an active producer of televisual “texts” (e. g. 17, 19, 62 ff.). In his essay “Encoding/Decoding,” the renowned sociologist and co-initiator of British Cultural Studies Stuart Hall also highlights the television audience’s agency by arguing that the decoding of televisual discourses is less predetermined than often assumed because it depends on the individual viewer whether televisual signs, and specifically their connotative

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tutions (e. g. publishing houses) providing and disseminating public communication can also be referred to as “the media” (cf. “Medium,” OED Online, def. II.4.d). (Information‐)technological or mathematical approaches to the medium are common in informatics and figure prominently in Claude E. Shannon and Warren Weaver’s seminal work The Mathematical Theory of Communication (1949). Here, the medium is seen as a channel of communication. Hence, the main object of research is not the semantic content of a message but the mechanical and one-directional process of transmitting codes and signals from sender to receiver. This approach neglects aspects such as meaning, context or even the use of a specific medium because “[t]hese semantic aspects of communication are irrelevant to the engineering problem” (31). Accordingly, these variables are not included in Shannon and Weaver’s well-known transmission model of communication, which only operates with abstract and general categories such as information source, message, transmitter, signal, noise source, receiver or destination (cf. 7, 34). A technological notion of media is also expressed by literary scholar and media theorist Friedrich A. Kittler. In his Discourse Networks 1800/1900 he identifies processing, storage and transmission of data as basic functions of media, which have pervaded their historical evolution from the “age-old medium of the alphabet” up to digital media such as the computer (370). Semiotic and symbolic approaches, by contrast, regard the medium as a complex system of signs, codes or symbols effective in networks of communication and therefore see it as inseparable from its context. Language, music or painting, for instance, can therefore be considered as media in virtue of their intricate systems of signs such as words, sounds, forms and colours etc., all of which communicate meaning. Neil Postman, for example, emphasises the role of linguistic sign systems by observing that “our languages are our media” (15) and by claiming speech to be “the primal and indispensable medium” (9), the medium par excellence. In his ‘communicology,’ Vilém Flusser too expresses a semiotic and symbolic understanding by defining media generally as structures that function via codes (cf. 271) and by interpreting mediation as a process of “creat[ing] symbols and order[ing] them in codes” (37). Basically, according to Flusser, “the code as a medium of communication” (11) is any phenomenon that acquires a symbolic meaning (cf. 77) so that his examples, to name but a few, range from spoken language, the alphabet, the Morse code, the body, psychoso-

meanings, are decoded according to their “dominant” or “preferred readings” or rather result in “negotiated” or even “oppositional” readings (cf. 169, 171 ff.).

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matic diseases, dreams, colours, sounds, numbers etc. (cf. 11, 77, 271) to the digital or “techno-codes” of photography, film, video and computer (40). The symbolic nature of media is also specifically relevant to approaches that consider media in terms of exchange values. In addition to Talcott Parsons’s symbolic media of money, power, influence and value commitments, for example, Niklas Luhmann’s sociological systems theory further introduces truth and love as symbolically generalised media of communication [“symbolisch generalisierte Kommunikationsmedien”] (28). The notion of the communicative process as a complex system is also inherent in human-centred or corporeal approaches to the medium, common in disciplines such as anthropology, psychology and politics. Instead of focusing on inanimate, material or technical channels of communication these theories take the medium to denote a living agent or subject of communication and investigate the complex role of all kinds of anthropomorphic mediators or intermediary agents. These can be, for example, messengers, interpreters, go-betweens, intercessors, actors and – in religious or esoteric contexts – spiritualists (cf. “Medium,” OED Online, def. II.6.b). As a consequence, the human body is occasionally perceived as a primary or original medium which has been complemented or even successively superseded by other media. Marshall McLuhan, for instance, regards “all media [as] extensions of some human faculty – psychic or physical” (1967: 26; cf. 1964: 7, 45, 49). Following this idea, any medium becomes inseparably connected to the human body and mind to an extent that renders media “self-amputation[s] of our physical bodies” (1964: 45) as well as “extensions of our senses” (1964: 53). In this line of argument, a book can be seen as an “extension of the eye” (1967: 34), whereas “electric technology” such as the computer functions as an extension or “live model of the central nervous system itself” (1964: 43). Since McLuhan also assumes that the “‘content’ of any medium is always another medium” (1964: 8), media ought to be perceived as Chinese boxes with each medium containing an older medium down to the very core of media which is formed by the human body and its senses. With this all-encompassing concept of media McLuhan provides one of the broadest definitions of the term which has been repeatedly criticised for its vagueness. In like manner, French media theorist and philosopher Paul Virilio sees the human body and specifically the female body as the basic medium. With his understanding of media as devices for transportation and increasing velocity he regards women as primary media of transportation because they bear (i. e. ‘transport’) children and used to carry the men’s possessions in prehistoric times before being substituted by the use of pack animals and eventually by technological means of transportation such as trains, automobiles etc. (cf. Lagaay 152 f.; Kloock, and Spahr 135). Thus, surprisingly, both McLuhan’s and Virilio’s human-centred definitions

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provide a link to technological approaches to the medium because they understand the human body as a historical precursor to technological media. However, where McLuhan welcomes these media as helpful extensions for overcoming limitations of the human body, Virilio sees them as external substitutes that are strange and essentially hostile to the human body (cf. Margreiter 2007: 151). In a much broader sense, this human-centred definition of the medium leads over to a physiological understanding. This encompasses the notion of “environment” or milieu either as a person’s “social setting” and “condition of life” or as the biological or ecological habitat of an organism (“Medium,” OED Online, def. II.5.b). It also extends to physical or natural substances that transmit light or sound and trigger sense perceptions, as well as to abstract entities such as time or air (cf. “Medium,” OED Online, def. II.5.a). This understanding is common specifically among German media philosophers such as Fritz Heider (cf. Mersch 2006: 10) or Walter Seitter (cf. Margreiter 2007: 177 f.), and it is occasionally expanded to include cognitive media such as the human senses themselves, as suggested by Reinhard Margreiter (cf. 2003: 156 f.; 2005: 239), Dieter Teichert (cf. 201) and Frank Hartmann (cf. 2000: 27). Although this typology of different approaches to the term ‘medium’ arranges the various semantic layers of the term ‘medium’ in some systematic order, it necessarily simplifies the matter because, in practice, the individual categories overlap and are often not quite as distinct from each other as they might seem in theory. Not only are human-centred and technological definitions of the medium linked by McLuhan’s and Virilio’s approaches, but the boundaries between the terms ‘medium,’ ‘art’ and ‘sign’ are also frequently blurred, causing some phenomena simultaneously to fall into several subcategories. Theatre and film, for example, could be considered as aesthetic media with regard to their status among the arts, as institutional media in terms of their position in the media industry, as semiotic media due to their use of various sign-systems, as human-centred media based on the actors’ bodies, and finally as cognitive media offering multisensory experiences. Additionally, film qualifies also as a technological medium. The allocation of a single phenomenon to more than one subcategory of the term ‘medium’ may not be problematic as such. Yet, obviously a definition of the medium that takes into consideration all of the above-mentioned approaches in combination is too vast and will hardly be of any use as an analytical tool. Such a definition would subsume phenomena that, intuitively, should not be assigned to an overarching category under the notion of ‘medium.’ Instead, it would seem appropriate to establish a definition of the medium that incorporates all aspects conventionally associated with the term ‘medium,’ while allowing the demarca-

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tion of boundaries between distinct media as well as between ‘media,’ the ‘arts’ and ‘signs.’ In a first step, therefore, it is necessary to distinguish between the notions of ‘medium’ and ‘sign’ or ‘sign system.’ Whereas ‘medium’ refers to the materiality and mediality, the term ‘sign’ focuses on the semiotic or semantic qualities of a means of communication. Accordingly, a medium makes use of signs or semiotic systems and is thus a carrier of signs rather than the sign itself (cf. Rippl 2010: 52; 2005: 42 f., 45; 2004: 47 ff.). Signs, in other words, are essential constituents of media. Since any medium makes use of one or more sign systems, distinct media can therefore be differentiated according to their characteristic choices of signs. Whereas some media are thus restricted to the use of a single semiotic system, other media are defined by their characteristic inter-semiotic mixture or combination of signs (e. g. theatre as a combination of sounds, words, movement, gestures and – potentially – any other signs). Furthermore, a terminological distinction between ‘media’ and the ‘arts’ seems useful because, as Joachim Paech observes, both are often treated as synonyms (cf. 1998: 17). While ‘medium,’ as mentioned above, is meant to refer to the material aspect, ‘art’ expresses an aesthetic focus. Moreover, where a medium best serves its purpose when remaining unobtrusive and imperceptible, the arts deliberately (and sometimes self-reflexively) highlight their own artistic status or quality (cf. P. M. Meyer 82). Yet, ‘medium’ and ‘art’ are closely related and could also be seen as two sides of the same coin, differentiated only by the respective focus or perspective. A single phenomenon may therefore be categorised as both ‘medium’ and ‘art’ depending on the point of interest. Film, for instance, could be considered an art with regard to its aesthetic quality or a medium with regard to its technical materiality. This multiple labelling should, however, not be regarded as problematic because it renders possible a more detailed description of composite or multimedial arts such as theatre, that can combine a potentially unlimited amount of distinct media, based again on their respective sign systems, while never losing its status as a dramatic art. Besides, the distinction between ‘medium’ and ‘art’ allows to shift the emphasis between material and aesthetic criteria and to analyse the material interactions in intermedial phenomena without necessitating value judgements with regard to artistic quality or aesthetic consequences. The definition of the medium is not only problematic because of the variety of approaches and the terminological proximity to the terms ‘sign’ and ‘art.’ What further complicates the definition is the fact that the medium per se – for example the media ‘theatre,’ ‘film’ or ‘video’ in their ‘pure form’ – only exists as a theoretical construct derived from repeated concrete manifestations of the respective medium (cf. Rajewsky 2004: 67; Krämer 2003: 85). Nevertheless,

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users or recipients of media develop general ideas with regard to the typical properties and characteristics of individual media based on their own media experiences. Although these shared notions of distinct media undergo historical and subjective changes over time, they establish a general consensus from which conventional conceptions or mental “frames” of the medium or of distinct media are derived (cf. Rajewsky 2004: 70 ff.). Werner Wolf’s often-quoted definition of the medium similarly regards media as “conventionally and culturally distinct means of communication” based on a shared cognitive “frame of reference” (2008: 19; 2002: 165; cf. also Rajewsky 2004: 72 f.). It aptly captures most of the above-mentioned aspects of the ‘medium’ without, however, clearly distinguishing between the terms ‘medium,’ ‘sign’ and ‘art.’ In fact, it explicitly “encompasses the traditional arts but also new forms of communication that have not or not yet advanced to the status of an ‘art’” (Wolf 1999: 36; cf. 2002: 165). I will therefore adopt his formula (cf. Wolf 2008: 19; 1999: 35 f.) with slight modifications and define the medium as the material quality of a means of communication that can be identified by its characteristic and conventionally established use of specific signs or semiotic systems. Obviously, a definition of the medium that takes into consideration cultural, conventional and sometimes intuitive notions of the term remains subject to historical change. Not only are new media occasionally invented and added to the canon, but existing media are also in flux and continue to renegotiate their cultural status. As different times bring forth their own media, these media come to coexist with already established media, imitate, improve or replace them, or they are, in turn, superseded by subsequent inventions. Since the scope of media theories ranges from theories that try to cover the history of media in a trans-historical approach to those that are restricted to a specific historical period, both the corresponding notion of the medium and the attitude towards historical changes of media vary. Media scholars can thus roughly be divided into those who try to offer neutral accounts of the evolution of media, those who praise media history as a success story of progress and finally those who paint apocalyptic visions of the future of media and are alarmed by what they consider as their threatening impact on everyday life, society and culture (cf. Lagaay, and Lauer 22). But not only has the historical development of media repeatedly altered their conventional meanings; the term ‘medium’ as such has also gained new relevance directly proportional to the increasing diversity of available media. Kittler argues therefore that the notion of medium only became indispensable when it became necessary to distinguish between different media. He holds that as long as writing represented the only and uncontested “universal medium” there was as yet no need for a “concept of medium,” but the evolution of distinct media

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such as literature, television, radio, telephone etc. made such a concept inevitable (1999: 5 f.). Yet, with the invention of computers which reduce all information to digital numbers and make it possible to transform any medium into any other medium, Kittler predicts that the concept of the medium will become altogether redundant and superfluous (1999: 1 f.). Thus, the “universal medium of computation” (1997: 126) will not only “erase[…] the differences among individual media” but “will erase the very concept of medium” (1999: 1 f.). Rajewsky also points out the problematic role of digital media when commenting on computer technology and its potential to simulate other media and completely to level out their differences. She reminds us that this poses a challenge not only to the distinction of media but by extension also to the concept of intermediality, because the idea of a transgression of medial boundaries presupposes the existence of medial differences in the first place (cf. 2005: 62). Kittler sees the fusion of formerly distinct media as a new phenomenon characteristic of the current age of increasing digitalisation, while other media theorists claim that media have never existed in isolation. This idea is expressed, for example, by Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin’s notion of ‘remediation’ and Jens Schröter’s concept of ‘ontological intermediality’ (see chapter 1.2). For Kittler, however, the dissolution of medial boundaries is a new and not yet completed trend so that he does not yet discard the notion of isolated media altogether. Hence, “there still are media” and we are dealing only with “partially connected media links” (Kittler 1999: 2). Despite the blending of media in digital technology, I would argue, however, that media specificity and medial boundaries paradoxically remain of particular importance to intermedial practices which generally take advantage of and draw attention to the differences between media while also exploiting their similarities. As a consequence, intermedial phenomena increase rather than decrease the awareness of the mediality and materiality of their respective components and thus prove the continued relevance of the concept of the medium. Rajewsky even proposes the possibility of creating “virtual” intermediality via digital technology by merely simulating differences between media (2005: 63). Whether or not media (still) appear in isolation, the existence of conventional ‘frames’ and abstract notions of the nature of distinct media justifies the restricted focus on individual media that is retained by some scholars. Consequently, single media theories that focus on an individual medium instead of claiming general validity for all media are neither anachronistic nor outdated and may still offer valuable insights into conventions and assumptions on which the notions of individual media are commonly based. It must be clear then that differences between media still matter, if only in the form of conven-

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tional constructs that highlight subtle nuances in an otherwise increasingly intermedial world.

1.2 Intermediality As chapter 1.1 has shown, defining the term ‘medium’ is a complex issue. It is logical, therefore, that ‘intermediality’ as a compound that incorporates the notion of ‘medium’ must be an equally contested concept and generates a similarly wide scope of definitions ranging from very restricted notions to an almost allembracing sense of a universal intermediality. As early as 1812, the term ‘intermedium’ was first used by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, though not in a sense that we would associate with intermediality today, but in order to refer, for instance, to the narrative functions of allegory as an “intermedium between person and personification” (Coleridge qtd. in Paech 1998: 17). No sooner than 1983, the German Slavicist Aage A. Hansen-Löve coined the term ‘intermediality’ and for the first time applied it to the relation between distinct media, namely modern Russian literature and the visual arts (cf. Wolf 2005: 252). Although Hansen-Löve claims that multimediality extends over all historical periods and is the rule rather than the exception (cf. Hansen-Löve 64), he observes a specific tendency to combine media and transcend their boundaries in Russian symbolism. He also notes a trend towards medial self-reflexivity based on a dialogical juxtaposition of distinct media in the avant-garde (cf. 31 f.). Yet, Hansen-Löve neither provides an explicit definition of ‘intermediality’ nor does he offer general insights into possible types, functions and principles of intermedial processes. As suggested by the prefix ‘inter-,’ intermediality can vaguely be described as a phenomenon that is located between media – analogous to intertextuality as a phenomenon occurring between texts. Yet, both ‘text’ and ‘medium’ are polysemous terms and the range of their definitions not only influences the respective understanding of the compounds ‘intertextuality’ and ‘intermediality,’ but it also affects how they relate to each other. ‘Text,’ to begin with, may refer exclusively to verbal and written semiotic systems. However, in a broader (post)structuralist understanding based on Julia Kristeva’s metaphorical notion of ‘text’ as referring to any sign system, the term is no longer limited to verbal or written texts, but can be applied to cultural and social phenomena in general. Whereas the limited definition of ‘text’ regards it as a potentially independent and self-contained entity that may, however, intentionally and deliberately refer to other texts or literary genres, a ‘text’ in the broader sense never exists in isolation from its cultural contexts but automatical-

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ly relates and refers to other texts. ‘Intertextuality’ can accordingly be understood either in a restricted sense as an intentional or marked relation between literary texts or in a broad sense as a universal and inevitable feature of any cultural or social text (cf. Rajewsky 2002: 47 f.). This latter definition would include any media in terms of filmic, televisual, theatrical, musical etc. ‘texts.’ The restricted notion of intertextuality, in other words, is limited to the literary medium instead of extending across distinct media; the notion of pan-intertextuality, on the contrary, subsumes all media under the notion of ‘text’ so that intermediality figures merely as a subcategory of intertextuality⁶ or even becomes an altogether superfluous term, absorbed by the concept of intertextuality. Since the latter approach blurs significant medial and material boundaries and differences between distinct sign systems (cf. Rippl 2005: 54; 2004: 53), intertextuality will in the following be understood as being limited exclusively to intentional or marked relations among verbal sign systems. According to my distinction between ‘medium’ and ‘sign’ (see chapter 1.1) and in keeping with Irina Rajewsky’s and Werner Wolf’s approaches, both intertextuality and intermediality figure as “inter-semiotic relations” (Wolf 1999: 46). Intertextuality, however, can be identified as a homomedial or monomedial phenomenon and hence as a subcategory of intramediality, whereas intermediality figures as a heteromedial or crossmedial phenomenon (cf. Wolf 2005: 252; 1999: 46; 2002: 165; Rajewsky 2002: 14). There are, nevertheless, parallels and analogues between intertextuality and intermediality so that intertextuality can offer valuable insights for the analysis of intermedial phenomena, especially for the corresponding subcategory of intermedial references (cf. Rajewsky 2005: 54; 2004: 41). Having thus derived the definition of ‘intertextuality’ and its relation to ‘intermediality’ from the definition of ‘text,’ it is further necessary to specify the exact scope of ‘intermediality’ – which in its turn depends on the underlying definition of ‘medium’ – and to weigh the pros and cons of an all-embracing panintermediality as opposed to a more restricted concept. The understanding of intermediality as a universal phenomenon may principally originate from two different, but partly related assumptions: on the one hand, it may be based on a broad understanding of mediation as an inevitable datum and on the other hand, it may rely on the notion that media do not exist in isolation, but always position themselves in relation to other media by way of a general ‘remediation’ among media.

 This position is illustrated, for instance, by Ernest W. B. Hess-Lüttich who considers intermedial relations in terms of intertextual references (e. g. Hess-Lüttich 11 f.).

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As I will further explain in chapter 3.2, the notion of mediation as an a priori condition is primarily associated with the proponents of media generativism among whom Marshall McLuhan figures prominently. According to his broad definition, “media are extensions of some human faculty – psychic or physical” (1967: 26). Participating directly in all processes of perception and cognition, media are therefore ubiquitous and render an im-mediate access to reality impossible. Since cognitive media are always involved in combination rather than isolation in processes of perception and cognition, the mere workings within the mind could be seen as instances of intermediality. Such a line of argument supports theories that regard intermediality as a universal characteristic of mediation in general. Wilhelm Füger explicitly refers to McLuhan when introducing his extensive concept of intermediality that includes mental processes. In addition to more restricted approaches to intermediality that are only concerned with relations among externalised media, Füger presents two options of defining intermediality with reference to mental processes: the first approach considers the various senses as media and thus regards cognitive information processing as a generally intermedial phenomenon; the second approach perceives the transition from internal mental processes to their external manifestations (e. g. via verbal, visual or acoustic media) as an intermedial ‘transmediation’ [“Transmediatisierung”] (Füger 41 f.). Füger himself argues for the latter approach and consequently supports a broad understanding of intermediality that applies not only to the interrelations between already externalised expressions, such as those between verbal and visual media, but also to the basic transmediation of mental processes into their external manifestations (cf. 55). Shifting the focus, Bernd Scheffer regards the reception rather than production of such external media as an intermedial phenomenon. Although Scheffer does not rule out the possibility of monomedial phenomena as such, he believes the reception of all media to be generally multi- or intermedial because the receiving or interpreting mind does not allow for a strict medial separation (cf. 103, 111). Alternatively to the idea of a generally intermedial mediation based on relations among the senses, intermediality may be considered a universal phenomenon due to the assumption that media always relate to other media so that they cannot be conceived of as existing in isolation. In his Picture Theory (1994), William J. T. Mitchell therefore claims that “all media are mixed media” (5), not without pointing out that “[t]his doesn’t mean that there is no difference between the media” at all (4). While accepting the existence of medial differences, he thus questions the belief in pure and static media by pointing out that media influence each other and are subject to historical transformations. Moreover, he

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adds that media are not homogenous and uniform so that differences cannot only be observed between but also within media (cf. 4). The idea that media always relate to each other is derived from yet another of McLuhan’s famous catchphrases, namely from his observation that the “‘content’ of any medium is always another medium” (1964: 8). His implication that media always refer to each other and to what has already been rendered by other media (e. g. 1964: 52 f.) echoes in Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin’s concepts of a general ‘remediation’ and ‘refashioning’ of media. These concepts express the idea that media have always positioned themselves in relation to each other and will continue to do so, be it in rivalry, contrast or imitation. Hence, remediation and refashioning are not restricted to the actual incorporation or representation of one medium within another (cf. Bolter, and Grusin 45), nor to the simulation of other media within digital media. More generally, they refer to an inevitable appropriation of “techniques, forms, and social significance of other media” (65). Thus, remediation and refashioning also take into consideration the cultural and social contexts, such as the production, distribution, reception or genealogy of media, and express the idea that interaction and competition among media transcend medial isolation and are universal qualities of all media (e. g. 65, 55). Peter M. Boenisch concludes from this argumentation that due to remediation “any medium will always remain in-between” so that intermediality figures not as “a remote and artificial phenomenon […] [but as] a default effect of any mediation” (2006: 108; emphasis in the original). A similar idea is Jens Schröter’s concept of ‘ontological intermediality’ [“ontologische Intermedialität”] or ‘ontomediality’ [“Ontomedialität”] which argues that the notion of clearly isolated ‘monomedia’ [“Monomedien”] is an artificial construct because media are always relational. Their defining features only appear in contrast and comparison to other media so that they can never be grasped or defined unless they are seen in relation to each other. If, therefore, monomedia are abstractions that actually depend on other media as points of reference for their own definition, ‘ontological intermediality’ is not an exceptional case of interrelations among normally separate media, but a basic and universal phenomenon (cf. Schröter 11 f.). The concept of ‘remediation’ also figures in Joseph Garncarz’s appeal not to reduce intermediality to actual combinations of media within a single medial manifestation, but to discuss intermediality within a wider context by taking into consideration possible interrelations between media that occur during their production, distribution or reception and concern, for example, the negotiation of their respective functions or their comparative cultural status (cf. 244 f.). Last but not least, Yvonne Spielmann considers remediation from a primarily genealogical perspective in the sense of a generally intermedial

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‘birth of media’ by observing that newly emerging media always negotiate their position with respect to pre-existing or contemporaneous media (cf. 81 f.). Admittedly, the concept of remediation serves as a helpful reminder of the fact that media never exist in a neutral void because they function within a broader cultural context and are subject to social conventions that determine their use, status and mutual relations. Nonetheless, remediation should not be equated with intermediality all too quickly, because the general observation that media are relational does not allow for a detailed analysis of individual instances of medial interrelations and does not take into account their actual material differences (cf. Rajewsky 2005: 64). It is equally problematic to derive a concept of universal intermediality from the idea of ubiquitous mediation and, correspondingly, from an extensive notion of the medium. Since this approach uniformly classifies mediation per se as an intermedial phenomenon, it again offers no means of comparing different types and degrees of interaction among media and therefore supplies no convincing and adequate tool for the actual analysis of intermedial relations. Lars Elleström therefore takes up a more moderate position. Although he also assumes that intermediality is a general phenomenon that applies to all media (cf. 2010b: 38), he acknowledges that “some media may be more border-crossing than others” (2010a: 4). Even though he believes that there are no natural borders between media, he moreover admits that such borders have to be established in order to be able to investigate intermedial relations (cf. 2010b: 27 f.). Neither remediation nor ubiquitous mediation are thus adequate concepts when it comes to the precise differentiation and categorisation of particular types of interrelations between media. This task can only be accomplished with the help of a more restricted concept of intermediality. While remediation and universal mediation primarily refer to unintentional and subconscious relations among media that occur during their genesis or production, their distribution and reception, such a restricted understanding of intermediality must focus on internal and intentional relations between or within media. The notion of intermediality as a universal phenomenon regards isolated media and medial differences as mere constructs. The restriction of intermediality to more specific instances of medial interrelations, however, presupposes that it is possible, after all, to distinguish between media, if only via the already mentioned cultural ‘frames’ that establish boundaries between media based on conventions (cf. Rajewsky 2004: 68, 70 ff.). Without the assumption of conventionally distinct media, the whole concept of intermediality as a transgression of medial boundaries is redundant, if not even an impossibility. Starting, however, from an understanding of media as potentially separable phenomena, it becomes possible after all not only to define distinctive features of media, but

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also to compare different ways and degrees in which these media may interact. This means that intermediality can be identified as a phenomenon distinct from other relations among media such as remediation. What is more, it becomes possible and necessary to distinguish various subtypes of intermedial interrelations. Among the many attempts to distinguish intermediality from similar phenomena and to cover all possible subcategories of intermedial relations, Irina Rajewsky’s and Werner Wolf’s typologies are the most exhaustive and therefore deserve special attention. Even though, for the most part, they focus on literature and its relation to other media, their terminology is applicable to drama as a literary medium as well as to theatre as a performative medium. Admittedly, both scholars may at times be meticulous about their categories and subcategories of intermediality which can be confusing sometimes. Furthermore, many of the categories that are neatly differentiated in theory are difficult to tell apart in practice where they often overlap. Nonetheless, the strong point of their approaches is that they no longer consider intermedial phenomena as individual cases, but allow us to deduce more general rules and tendencies from the vast field of intermedial practice. Once their terminology is understood, it provides an economic way of discussing related phenomena which avoids a repetitive restatement of shared features. In this way, their terminology offers a useful toolkit for any analysis of intermedial relations and figures as a helpful starting point for seeing the specific phenomena analysed in the present study in the broader context of intermediality in general. Even if most of Rajewsky’s and Wolf’s categories are identical, some bear distinct labels or are differently defined, so their theories shall be introduced consecutively in the following. First of all, Irina Rajewsky defines intermediality as distinct from intramediality and transmediality. Intermediality involves at least two distinct media, in some way transcends medial boundaries and is therefore located in-between media. As opposed to this, intramediality occurs within the limits of a single medium and denotes its references to products of the same medium, to its medial genre or to its own mediality. Hence, intertextuality as the reference of a literary medium to another specific text, to a literary (sub)genre or to textuality per se figures as only one of the possible subcategories of intramediality. Interpictoriality, for instance, constitutes the corresponding intramedial phenomenon in the context of images. Transmediality denotes phenomena (such as themes or motifs, aesthetic aspects, types of discourse etc.) that extend beyond single media and thus appear in at least two distinct media, but without having a traceable origin in any one of these media (cf. Rajewsky 2002: 12 f.; 2004: 31; 2005: 46). Bearing in mind the distinction between ‘medium’ and ‘sign,’ one can distinguish between inter-, intraand transmediality not only according to the number of involved media, but also

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with regard to the use of sign systems. In both intermediality and transmediality at least two distinct media are involved. Yet whereas intermediality also refers to and sometimes actually combines their respective sign systems, transmediality only ever uses the sign system(s) of a single medium at a time; intramediality, however, only concerns a single medium and its characteristic sign system(s). If we apply these concepts to theatre, intermediality results from the actual use or mere reference to a distinct medium such as film, television, video etc. within a performance or from the transformation of another medium into a theatre performance or vice versa. Instances of intramediality in theatre can be observed in references (e. g. quotations, imitations or parodies) to another specific play or theatrical subgenre, or in a self-reflexive use of the theatrical medium per se (e. g. via a play-within-the-play). Finally, transmediality surfaces in the use of any phenomena within a performance that are as common for theatre as for any other medium and would therefore not be regarded as primarily theatrical in the first place, such as popular themes and motifs (e. g. unrequited love), the application of aesthetic principles (e. g. naturalist or realist style), types of discourse (e. g. dialogue) etc. In a second step, Rajewsky further distinguishes between media combination, medial transposition and intermedial references as three subcategories of intermediality. These are, however, not mutually exclusive and can therefore occur simultaneously (cf. 2002: 17; 2004: 39; 2005: 53). Media combination [“Medienkombination”], which figures as the central intermedial subcategory in the present study, is often also referred to as multi-, pluri- or polymediality, medial interplay or medial fusion (Rajewsky 2002: 15). As the term suggests, it can be defined as the combination of at least two conventionally distinct media, which are materially present with their respective sign systems and thus form constitutive parts of the resulting work of art. Sometimes these media only coexist side by side in mere contiguity or accumulation, but their combination frequently results in a close synthesis. Due to the potential fusion of the media involved, media combination may even generate new plurimedial or hybrid art forms and genres (cf. 2005: 52; 2004: 37), such as film, vaudeville etc. These are synchronically perceived as forming a single, composite medium, although they consist of historically distinct media from a diachronic perspective. The term ‘media combination’ can refer both to the process of combining media and the resulting intermedial work of art. Since media combination may occur momentarily or locally, but may also extend over an entire work of art, a hierarchical arrangement in which one medium dominates another is possible. Ideally, however, the involved media play an equally important role in a media combination (cf. 2002: 15 f., 201; 2004: 37 f.).

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Medial transposition [“Medienwechsel,” “Medientransfer” or “Medientransformation”] figures as Rajewsky’s second subcategory of intermediality in which a work of art is transformed into a conventionally distinct medial form. Media transfer thus mostly occurs in the form of adaptations. Since the source medium and its sign system(s) are transformed into a target medium with its corresponding sign system(s), only the target medium is materially present in the monomedial work of art. What is more, despite the genetic relation among source and target medium and their semantic parallels, the source medium is no longer constitutive for the understanding of the resulting work of art. Since the intermedial moment resides in the media transfer during the production rather than reception of the work of art, the term ‘medial transposition’ also refers to the production process rather than the finished work of art (cf. 2002: 16, 201; 2004: 37; 2005: 51). As the third subcategory, intermedial references [“intermediale Bezüge”] form the focus of Rajewsky’s research and are therefore sometimes referred to as intermediality in a strict sense (cf. 2005: 52; 2002: 17). They cover monomedial phenomena in which only a single medium with its characteristic sign system(s) is materially present while reference is made to at least one conventionally distinct medium. This reference may concern a distinct medium or medial subsystem per se and thus provide a “system reference” [“Systemreferenz”]. It may also allude to a specific, actual or fictional, work of art in terms of an “individual reference” [“Einzelreferenz”] (2005: 52 f.; 2002: 16 f., 76; 2004: 38 f.). Intermedial references may be brought about via an explicit mentioning of another medium [“explizite Systemerwähnung”] or via an indirect evocation, simulation or imitation of techniques of the absent medium [“Systemaktualisierung”] (2004: 66 ff., 46, 38 f.; 2005: 52 f.). In any case, in intermedial references, as opposed to actual media combination, the material co-presence of distinct media is a mere ‘as if’ illusion. The imitation or allusion to an absent medium with the means of the present medium leaves an “intermedial gap” that cannot be bridged entirely and therefore often highlights the differences rather than the parallels between the respective media (2005: 54 f.; 2004: 42 f., 69; 2002: 54). Since the extent and explicitness of intermedial references vary (cf. 2002: 38, 164, 172), it is difficult to define the minimal requirement for a sustained or marked intermedial reference as opposed to a casual, brief and possibly accidental mentioning of another medium or work of art (cf. 2002: 62 f.). This applies especially to non-verbal and hence less explicit media such as music without lyrics. Moreover, as opposed to medial transposition, the focus of intermedial references is on the reception process rather than the production, because it is up to the recipients to decode and identify the references to other media; but since not all recipients are equally competent and susceptible when it comes to identifying the references, less

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marked allusions may at times remain undetected and certain layers of meaning, that might be fairly obvious to other recipients, may therefore be lost (cf. 2002: 62 f.; 2004: 62). To sum up, the unique feature of media combination in comparison to medial transposition and intermedial references mainly resides in the fact that media combination actually combines or even fuses distinct media and their respective sign systems. Medial transposition and intermedial references, by contrast, are generally monomedial and do not actually adopt sign systems from distinct media (cf. Rajewsky 2002: 56 f.). This unique aspect of media combination also explains its relevance to the present study which will investigate instances of media combination in theatre and performance. Interestingly, theatre is an inherently plurimedial or hybrid medium that may fuse distinct media (such as music, dance, language etc.) and their respective sign systems (e. g. sounds, movements, words etc.) into a new form that is conventionally considered a single composite medium, but could also be regarded as a result of media combination in itself (see chapter 2.1). In addition to its plurimedial character, theatre may not only be involved in processes of medial transposition by adapting works of art from other media (e. g. by turning a film into a play) or serving as the basis for adaptations into other media (e. g. when a play is turned into a film); nor is it restricted to alluding to or imitating other media in terms of intermedial references (e. g. when simulating filmic techniques such as montage on stage); above all this, theatre can also expand its plurimediality and materially incorporate additional distinct media such as film or video. These media are not (yet) conventionally seen as integral parts of its established plurimediality, but could perhaps gradually turn into constitutive aspects of theatrical plurimediality once their use on stage is accepted as completely natural. Werner Wolf’s publications show a development from a narrow concept of intermediality that is restricted to intracompositional phenomena (e. g. Wolf 1996; 1999) to a broader notion that includes both intra- and extracompositional phenomena (e. g. 2002; 2004; 2005; 2008). The earlier limitation to intracompositional intermediality understands intermediality as “a verifiable direct or indirect participation of more than one distinct conventional medium in the signification of a human artefact” (1999: 231) and thus focuses exclusively on phenomena occurring within these artefacts. This early definition of intermediality disregards Rajewsky’s category of medial transposition as a phenomenon occurring between rather than within media. It also displays a narrow understanding of intermedial references that excludes the mere mentioning or discussion of distinct media (cf. Wolf 1996: 87 f.). As opposed to this, Wolf’s more recent approach considers intracompositional phenomena within media as well as extracomposition-

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al phenomena between media and is more broadly defined as “any transgression of boundaries between conventionally distinct media” (2008: 19). In this sense, it even exceeds the limits of Rajewsky’s definition by including transmediality within the concept of intermediality. Let us first consider Wolf’s concept of intracompositional intermediality which is central both to his earlier and his current notion of intermediality. As opposed to extracompositional intermediality, this type of intermediality is indispensable for the meaning or structure of the resulting work of art (cf. Wolf 2008: 29; 2002: 171 f.) because the participating distinct media form constituent parts of it and are materially, semantically or formally involved within its limits. Despite the use of the same prefix, intracompositional intermediality is therefore not to be confused with Rajewsky’s concept of intramediality which only applies to monomedial references rather than the involvement of distinct media. According to Wolf, intracompositional intermediality can be further subdivided into multi- or plurimediality and intermedial references. Multi- or plurimediality is roughly equivalent to Rajewsky’s notion of media combination, for which she also offers multi- and plurimediality as alternative labels (cf. Rajewsky 2002: 15). Wolf regards the mere combination of media [“Medienkombination”] and the fusion of media [“Medienmischung” or “Medienverschmelzung”] as two poles between which plurimedial phenomena are placed according to the intensity of the interrelation between the involved media.⁷ The media may thus occur in a combination that leaves them principally separable, or in a fusion that results in a hybrid medium whose components can no longer be separated. With time, this fusion may lead to the formation of a new conventional composite medium, such as opera or theatre (cf. Wolf 2002: 173). Nonetheless, Wolf repeatedly stresses that in both media combination and fusion the involved media are apparent or visible on the surface of the resulting heterogeneous work of art due to the actual combination of their respective signifiers or sign systems. Wolf therefore refers to this intracompositional variant of intermediality as being “overt” or “direct” (2008: 29 f.; 2005: 254; 2002: 172 f.). Wolf’s notion of intermedial references as the “covert” or “indirect” variant of intracompositional intermediality also corresponds to Rajewsky’s use of the same term. The covert nature of this type of intermediality is due to the fact that intermedial references do not actually incorporate distinct media but simply mention or imitate them to suggest their presence. The result therefore remains “medially and semiotically homogeneous,” “homomedial” (Wolf 2005: 254; cf. 2008: 30) or, in Rajewsky’s terminology, “monomedial,” because it

 Wolf’s term ‘media combination’ therefore has a more limited meaning than Rajewsky’s.

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only uses a single medium and its respective sign system(s) (Wolf 2002: 174). Like Rajewsky, Wolf subdivides intermedial references into “system references” that refer to a distinct medium or a medial genre as such and “individual references” to a specific work of art (Wolf 2005: 254; cf. 2002: 174). Still in line with Rajewsky’s argumentation, both system references and individual references may appear in the form of an “explicit reference” which directly mentions, discusses or alludes to another medium or work of art; they may, however, also occur in the form of an “implicit reference” (or “intermedial imitation”), based on (partial) reproduction, evocation or formal imitation (Wolf 2005: 254 f.; cf. 2008: 30 ff.; 2002: 175). Explicit and implicit references form a continuum rather than strict opposites (cf. 1999: 45 f.; 2002: 175) and correspond to the modes of “telling” and “showing” respectively (1999: 44 f.). In his earlier studies of intermediality focusing on multi- or plurimediality and intermedial references as intracompositional phenomena, Wolf further proposes a typology based on five criteria some of which could also be applied to the study of extracompositional intermediality. First of all, intracompositional phenomena can be differentiated according to the media involved in the resulting work of art (cf. 1999: 37; 2004: 296). Secondly, a distinction can be made between cases where the involved media serve as equally important components and cases where one medium is dominant. Such dominance of a medium may mean that it is independent from a subordinate medium or quantitatively superior, or that it is the only overt, i. e. materially present medium within the work of art (cf. 1999: 38; 2004: 296). Thirdly, intermedial phenomena can be analysed according to the quantity or extension of the intermedial parts which may range from “total intermediality” stretching over an entire work of art to “partial intermediality” that is of shorter duration or restricted only to a specific passage (1999: 38; 2004: 296). A fourth criterion is provided by the genesis of the intermedial relation which may derive from either “primary intermediality” where the involvement of distinct media has been conceived by the author or artist, or “secondary intermediality” where the intermedial relation was not initially planned to be part of the work of art (1999: 39; 2004: 296). Last but not least, intracompositional phenomena can be analysed with regard to their salience because their intermediality can be “overt” or “covert.” As mentioned above, multi- or plurimediality is generally overt or direct because all of the involved media and their sign systems are materially present in a hybrid work of art. Within this work of art, they remain discernible and, at least theoretically, separately “quotable,” though the intensity of their relation may range from mere contiguity to synthesis. In opposition to this, intermedial references are covert or indirect, because only the dominant medium and its signifiers are materially present and form a medially homogeneous work of art, while another medium or other media

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are only implied as the signified or referent (cf. 1999: 39 ff., 231; 2004: 296). Due to the material absence of the implied medium or media in cases of intermedial reference, covert intermediality is often harder to identify and thus needs to be marked properly (cf. 1999: 44; 2004: 296 f.). When applied to the present study of media combination in theatre and performance, these criteria of Wolf’s typology allow the following observations: the focus of my analysis will be on the incorporation of film, live or pre-recorded video in addition to the media conventionally associated with theatrical plurimediality. In this context, the composite theatrical medium occasionally figures as the dominant medium, but is mostly equivalent in importance and status to the use of film or video because live and mediatised action compete for the spectators’ attention. They repeatedly interact, complement and depend on each other and would often not be comprehensible in isolation. Although media combination does not necessarily persist throughout the whole performances in the sense of total intermediality, it extends to more than just a marginal scene and is thus relevant to the overall signification of the selected performances. Nonetheless, no exact minimum can be indicated with regard to merely partial intermediality. Since most of the performances analysed in the present study are devised works that are collaboratively developed by performance collectives rather than by individual playwrights and are sometimes no longer or only loosely based on scripts, it would be inappropriate to consider the criterion of primary versus secondary intermediality as a matter of ‘authorial intention’ in a narrow sense. Instead, the selected performances can be categorised as instances of primary intermediality in the sense of mostly collective decisions to incorporate other media within the performance from its moment of conception. The present study thus excludes the abundance of instances of secondary intermediality in theatre and performance where the use of film or video is only a later addition resulting from external interference, such as a director’s whim. Finally, due to the focus on media combination rather than intermedial references, the analysis will primarily be concerned with examples of overt intermediality. Notwithstanding this emphasis, covert intermedial references sometimes accompany overt media combination and shall also be considered in these cases. Since Wolf’s concept of extracompositional intermediality is of limited relevance to the present study, I shall only briefly outline some of its aspects which deviate from Rajewsky’s theory.⁸ As already mentioned, the notion of extracompositional intermediality is a more recent addition to Wolf’s definition of

 Due to their different nature, extracompositional relations are sometimes still excluded from definitions of intermediality as in Franziska Mosthaf’s approach (cf. Mosthaf 6, 8).

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intermediality which in its current, more extensive meaning includes both intraand extracompositional intermediality. Extracompositional intermediality serves as a hypernym for ‘intermedial transposition’ and ‘transmediality’ which both become manifest only in the comparison of distinct media because they occur between rather than within media. As a consequence, these processes result in monomedial phenomena whose intermedial aspects are not constitutive for their meaning or structure and need to be activated by the recipients’ interpretations (cf. Wolf 2002: 170 ff.). The first of the terms, intermedial transposition, corresponds to Rajewsky’s notion of ‘medial transposition’ and refers to a genealogical relation such as an adaptation that transforms content or formal aspects of an underlying source medium into a target medium. Though not constitutive for the understanding of the work of art, the medial origin is thus identifiable (cf. Wolf 2005: 253 f.; 2002: 171; 2008: 29). Intermedial transposition may apply to entire works of the source or target medium, to parts or to general aspects of a medial genre (cf. Wolf 2005: 254; 2002: 170). The latter term, transmediality, is directly borrowed from Rajewsky and, following her definition, refers to formal devices or content-related aspects that are not specific to a certain medium and can therefore appear in distinct media without having a verifiable or relevant origin in a specific medium (cf. Wolf 2008: 28 f.; 2005: 253; 2002: 170). In spite of this identical understanding of transmediality, Wolf’s and Rajewsky’s approaches differ: whereas Wolf integrates transmediality within a broader notion of intermediality, Rajewsky sees it as a phenomenon distinct from (though related to) intermediality, because it does not occur within but between media. In this respect, Rajewsky’s approach is less consistent than Wolf’s: excluding transmediality from her definition of intermediality on the basis of its position between rather than within media, she nevertheless includes medial transposition, although medial transposition also refers to a process located between rather than within media. In my opinion, Wolf’s solution of subsuming transmediality and intermedial transposition within the category of extracompositional intermediality is more convincing. It underlines the similar position of transmediality and intermedial transposition between media in contrast to intracompositional phenomena that occur within media. Furthermore, distinguishing between intracompositional and extracompositional cases of intermediality underlines their different effects on the perception of medial boundaries. Thus, transmediality and intermedial transposition as extracompositional phenomena extend beyond medial boundaries and highlight similarities among distinct media, proving that it is possible to take up identical aspects of content or form in distinct media or to transfer these aspects from one medium to another. As a consequence, the relevance

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of medial boundaries per se and the possibility of pointing out certain elements as being specifically ‘theatrical,’ ‘filmic,’ ‘musical,’ ‘literary’ etc. are questioned (cf. Schröter 8 f.). As opposed to this, intracompositional phenomena tend to raise the recipients’ awareness of medial differences. They combine ‘theatrical,’ ‘filmic,’ ‘musical’ etc. modes of presentation, but simultaneously set them apart from each other, because media combination may both fuse or contrast distinct media by placing them side by side, while intermedial references automatically emphasise medial boundaries and limits. This happens because such references only simulate or suggest another medium in an ‘as if’ mode without actually being able to bridge the remaining gap between the media. As mentioned before, intra- and extracompositional intermediality may moreover be distinguished with regard to the relevance of the intermedial relation. Since relations between media are looser than within media, the identification of extracompositional intermediality between media is less important and sometimes even irrelevant to the understanding. In turn, intracompositional intermediality within media is a constitutive aspect and thus relevant to the signification of the resulting works of art. The different ‘location’ of intra- and extracompositional intermediality, their contrasting effect on the perception of medial boundaries and their divergent relevance to the signification thus justify that they are placed in separate categories. Nevertheless, the parallels between the intra- and extracompositional categories should not be overlooked, because they justify the consideration of both intra- and extracompositional relations under the umbrella term of intermediality and can inspire both fields of study. Comparing and jointly analysing intraand extracompositional intermediality can therefore provide general insights into the nature of media, their conventional boundaries and intersections. Along these lines, the focus on media combination in the present study is not meant to reduce the notion of intermediality to intracompositional phenomena. This specific focus has been chosen to acknowledge the unique status of media combination as the only type of intermediality that materially incorporates distinct media within a single work of art. This fact renders media combination particularly interesting for theatrical contexts, because the generally plurimedial character of theatre as a hybrid or composite medium is supplemented here with the incorporation of additional media such as film or video, art forms which are already plurimedial themselves. In addition, the concentration on media combination serves to limit the scope of examples among the plethora of intermedial phenomena involving theatre in one way or another. The abundant cases of intermedial references, intermedial transposition and transmediality in the context of theatre and performance will therefore not be covered unless they are also accompanied by media combination.

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Since media combination is of such vital importance to the present study, it is inevitable to add some clarification with regard to the terms ‘media combination,’ ‘multimediality’ and ‘plurimediality’ (or ‘polymediality’; cf. Rajewsky 2002: 6) that are often inconsistently used. According to Wolf and Rajewsky, these terms can be seen as synonyms for a single subcategory of intermediality in which distinct media are simultaneously and materially co-present in mere contiguity or close interrelation. Frequently, however, a distinction is made between multimediality and intermediality. In most cases, this distinction derives from the terms ‘intermedia’ and ‘mixed media’ or ‘multimedia.’ Based on Dick Higgins’s definition, ‘intermedia’ can, on the one hand, be described as hybrid media whose component parts are fused and no longer identifiable so that they form a synthesis. On the other hand, in ‘multimedia’ or ‘mixed media’ the involved media can still be identified and separated (cf. Higgins 16 f.). By analogy, intermediality is frequently defined as an actual synthesis or fusion of distinct media as opposed to a mere multimedial juxtaposition or accumulation of distinct media existing side by side (cf. Spielmann 80; Müller 1996: 83, 89; Müller 1998: 31 f.; Meyer, Simanowski, and Zeller 7 f.). This common distinction, however, is problematic on several levels. Firstly, it implies a very restricted definition of intermediality in the sense of media combination and disregards intermedial references, medial transposition and transmediality as subcategories of intermediality that cannot be characterised as actual fusions or syntheses of distinct media. Secondly, the distinction between fusions and mere additions of media would require a reliable means of measuring the intensity of medial interrelations which, however, form a continuum rather than a binary opposition and depend largely on the recipients’ subjective judgements (cf. Schröter 4). Thirdly, the notion of intermediality as an inseparable fusion of distinct media raises the question whether it makes sense to talk about intermediality at all in this context; for if medial boundaries were completely dissolved and the medial elements were no longer identifiable, the result would not actually be situated between media any more, it would rather form a single new medium. Yet, even though media combination often results in the creation of new hybrid media such as theatre or film, the distinct medial elements still remain identifiable so that they can be – and in fact often are – separately analysed. I therefore propose another terminological distinction that neither sets multi- or plurimediality in opposition to intermediality, nor equates it with media combination. Instead, it contrasts multi- or plurimediality with media combination within the broader concept of intermediality. In the following, multi- or plurimediality thus refers to inherently hybrid or composite media such as theatre, whereas media combination describes only instances in which

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distinct media are deliberately rather than automatically combined. In this sense, multi- or plurimediality then denotes an already conventionally established state of hybridity, while media combination addresses the intentional process of joining or juxtaposing distinct media whose fusion is still in the making. From the recipient’s or user’s perspective, therefore, the interrelation among the medial components of multi- or plurimediality usually remains subconscious and is taken for granted, whereas media combination induces a certain level of media awareness because it is unconventional and often self-reflexive. Although, with time and frequent repetition, a certain type of media combination may establish itself and may engender a new multi- or plurimedial hybrid, this is not compulsory. More often than not media combination generates unique and unusual intermedial phenomena that break with conventions.⁹ It is clear from these observations that multi- or plurimediality figures as an additional intracompositional subcategory of intermediality which complements media combination and intermedial references. Of course, media combination and multi- or plurimediality are not mutually exclusive and should be considered as forming a continuum rather than a binary opposition because, first of all, it is impossible to identify the exact turning point at which a frequent media combination turns into a multi- or plurimedial composite medium. Moreover, it may sometimes be difficult to decide which components of a composite medium actually form part of its multi- or plurimediality and which appear as instances of media combination. In the case of theatre, for example, music could be regarded as a conventionally associated medium that forms part of the general multi- or plurimediality of theatre; yet, it could also be considered a media combination because it is not an indispensable component of theatre performances, which can perfectly exist without any music at all. With regard to the focus of the present study, however, the use of film or video within theatre can clearly be regarded as an intentional and conscious media combination that is not (yet) part of the general theatrical multi- or plurimediality, because it is still considered rather unconventional and sometimes unsettling – at least as long as it is not merely employed as a backdrop or meaningless gimmick. The proposed distinction between media combination and multi- or plurimediality is thus specifically relevant to and productive for the investigation of composite media such as theatre, opera, film etc., because it facil-

 The notion of multi- or plurimediality as historically derived from processes of media combination is also mentioned by Rajewsky (cf. 2002: 203), but she does not consistently distinguish between media combination as the less conventional arrangement of distinct media as opposed to multi- or plurimediality as the already established hybrid product. Instead she mostly uses these terms synonymously (e. g. 2002: 15).

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itates an analysis of inherent hybridity as a phenomenon that differs from particular instances of media combination, but can nevertheless be combined with them. As such, the distinction offers more detailed insights into the intricate workings of distinct media within theatre. The terminological distinction between media combination on the one hand and multi- or plurimediality on the other does justice to aesthetic practice. This becomes most evident when we look at instances where plurimedial media make additional use of media combination in a way that deliberately sets the media combination apart from their conventionally accepted and established multior plurimediality. Highlighting the unconventional nature of the media combination, such works of art increase its salience and emphasise the disparity of the added media. In their oscillation between seamless fusion and juxtaposition of the involved media, such cases can make the recipients take the conflation of media for granted until the transition of medial boundaries is hardly noticed anymore. Alternately, they can also stress the incompatibility and incongruity of the medial components by means of sudden ruptures. This contrast between moments of seamless mergence and occasional friction or hypermediacy of the media can remind the recipient of the unconventionality and malleability of the media combination in a way that is not equalled by multi- or plurimediality where individual components can be more or less dominant, but do not form such a contrastive relation with each other. How multi- or plurimediality may be contrasted with the unconventionality of media combination by means of paradoxical effects can be illustrated by some of the productions analysed in the present study. In Station House Opera’s Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest, for instance, the spectators gradually get used to the smooth transitions between stage and screen, so much so that they accept the doubling and tripling of performers on screen as part of the logic of the fictional worlds, although they contradict accepted notions of medial boundaries. The videos thus seamlessly merge with the live action and appear to be part of the general plurimediality of the productions. Occasionally, however, this fusion is suddenly interrupted when transitions between stage and screen are obstructed or the performers themselves begin to marvel at their own doubles. This reminds the spectators of the extraordinary nature of the fusion of theatre and video. Similar effects can be observed in Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes where the transitions and interactions between live and filmed action suggest a smooth blending of the media, only to juxtapose them suddenly by mediatised characters bumping into the screen that confines them, or by live characters crashing into animated cartoon walls. Such scenes illustrate the possibility of seamlessly combining theatre with film, but film is at least partly treated as an alien and unusual element in terms of media com-

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bination rather than as an established part of the general multi- or plurimediality of the productions. In most of the selected Gob Squad productions, by contrast, the combination of live performance and video is hardly rendered paradoxical, because the videos are simply meant to illustrate our habitual use of technological media to connect to and communicate with each other. With regard to its functions, media combination may serve several purposes. Within the limits of this study I can only illustrate some key functions that are also observable in the productions analysed later rather than provide an exhaustive list of the multifarious functions of media combination. The most obvious and straightforward function of media combination is the enhancement of medial expressiveness. The aesthetic power of a single medium can be increased by combining it with other media and their respective sign systems with the aim of taking advantage of their respective expressive potential. In an often playful mode, media combination thus transcends the limits of isolated media in order to create a multifaceted or multi-sensory experience. In the productions selected for the present study, for instance, the theatrical means of expression are complemented by the possibilities of film and pre-recorded or live video. This media combination often creates comic, confusing or unsettling effects of interaction between theatre and video or film, or it renders the productions multi-dimensional by juxtaposing live performers in opposition to their mediatised doubles. Media combination may also draw attention to aesthetic conventions of specific media by transferring characteristics of one medium to another where they may be less appropriate so that certain idiosyncrasies become more salient. The selected productions by Gob Squad, for instance, play with filmic and televisual subgenres and formats such as reality television (e. g. Room Service), Hollywood film (e. g. Super Night Shot), casting shows (e. g. Prater-Saga 3) etc., forms that are comically subverted once they are transposed into the live medium of theatre. Another function of media combination can be seen in the activation or even provocation and alienation of the recipients via an unconventional or subversive use of media. The recipients not only have to be more active cognitively to be able to split their attention among several co-present media or make decisions as to which medium to focus on. Additionally, they also have to renegotiate their conventional assumptions with regard to medial specificity and medial boundaries and reconsider their notions of mediality in general to accommodate the new media formations. Because of the conflicting medial impressions, the acts of mediation become visible to the recipients so that their acceptance of and blindness to the general mediation of reality is revealed to them (cf. Groot Nibbelink, and Merx 227). In this context, they are often required to reassess

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their own inconsiderate use of media and face up to the challenges and dangers of uncritical media consumption when the excess of involved media inevitably suggests a ubiquity and unlimited power of media. Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title), for instance, confronts the spectators with their own voyeuristic desire of invading other peoples’ private spheres by means of its intrusive use of extreme close-ups. Media combination may lead not only to an active reflection on the pragmatic use of media but may also serve to expose their material qualities by contrasting them with each other and highlighting their similarities and differences. Even if media often become invisible in the process of mediation, because the focus is on their content or message rather than on their form, Marshall McLuhan already observed that the “hybridizing or compounding” of distinct media helps to “notice their structural components and properties” (1964: 49). This happens, in McLuhan’s terms, because “[t]he moment of the meeting of media is a moment of freedom and release from the ordinary trance and numbness imposed by them on our senses” (1964: 55). As I will elaborate in chapter 3.2, Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin distinguish between transparent ‘immediacy’ and opaque ‘hypermediacy’ as two alternative styles of representation depending on the use of media (cf. Bolter, and Grusin 34). Media combination can thus be described as being capable of changing the mode of presentation and perception from immediacy as a subconscious “looking through” to hypermediacy in the sense of a conscious “looking at” a medium (41; emphasis in the original). With specific regard to intermedial performances, Peter M. Boenisch observes that intermediality replaces transparency with “alienation” by exposing the act of mediation and rendering “viewing conventions […] palpable” (Boenisch 2006: 114 f.). Yet, intermedial hypermediacy does not necessarily affect all involved media in the same way, but it may selectively foreground one (or several) of the involved media. This happens by using one medium as a framing device for the other media, by placing it in an unusual context or unconventional mode of presentation, or even by rendering it altogether dysfunctional so that its materiality or mediality is exposed as being defective. All of the productions chosen for analysis in the present study take advantage of this function of hypermediacy, at least momentarily, by rendering the theatrical elements or the use of film or video opaque. Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes, for instance, draws particular attention to the materiality of film by using unconventional projection surfaces many of which are destroyed and rendered ineffective during the production. Hypermediacy may merely render media visible in their materiality without necessarily making explicit comments on their mediality, but it is often accom-

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panied by metamediality.¹⁰ Metamediality is no inherent function of intermediality, but it presupposes “meta-aesthetic” or “metamedial self-reflexivity” (Wolf 1999: 48 f.). By reflecting on their own mediality and particularities, the involved media simultaneously comment on their mutual relations, similarities or differences. In doing so they not only self-reflexively cast light on their own mediality, but they also comment on the other media that form part of the combination. The metamedial effects of media combination tend to differ from those caused by intermedial references, because, as mentioned before, intermedial references can never completely bridge the gap between media. They only use the sign system(s) of a single medium and thus tend to underscore medial differences. In opposition to this, media combination may either juxtapose distinct media and thus stress medial boundaries, contrasting features and respective strengths and weaknesses, or it may induce a fusion that draws attention to similarities and makes medial boundaries appear as artificial constructs (cf. Rajewsky 2004: 69). Whenever media combination fuses or juxtaposes live and technological media, the function of metamediality is not limited to individual media but more generally involves a more or less explicit reflection on mediality and the relation between liveness and mediatisation in general. Allowing the recipients directly to experience the differences or similarities between liveness and mediatisation rather than only theoretically elaborating on them, such instances of media combination may question received notions of liveness and mediatisation. As chapter 4 illustrates, this is achieved by placing the focus on various aspects that are conventionally associated with liveness and by exploring to what extent these aspects apply to the live and the mediatised elements. Similar to the options of contrasting or approximating distinct media via general metamedial reflections, this may either lead to a confirmation of the presumed contrast between liveness and mediatisation, or it may result in a questioning of their binary opposition. The productions selected for the present study thus find their individual answers to the question of whether liveness and mediatisation are actually ontologically distinct or rather interchangeable. In all of the productions, the explicit and implicit discussion of the relation between liveness and mediatisation forms a central concern. Only Mary Oliver’s productions, however, explicitly turn the relation between liveness and mediatisation into a theme in the arguments between the live performer and her mediatised doubles.

 Rajewsky identifies this as a procedure relating to the level of “discours” rather than “histoire” of a medium (2002: 81).

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Metafictionality, finally, is yet another potential function that frequently correlates with metamediality. But whereas metamediality focuses on the nature and mutual relation of media or on the relation between liveness and mediatisation, metafictionality more broadly addresses the relation between media and our perception of ‘reality’ (cf. Rajewsky 2002: 183; 2004: 49). By juxtaposing or fusing distinct media and their corresponding modes of presenting reality, media combination may thus reflect on the ontological status of reality per se and explicitly or implicitly comment on the questions of whether an im-mediate access to reality is possible and whether or to what extent media shape reality. Metafictionality, however, does not necessarily highlight the fictionality of a medial approach to reality but may also support the illusion created by a medium (cf. Wolf 2004: 297). It can therefore either distance the recipients form the work of art or involve them even further in its fictional world. Both effects can be observed and, quite paradoxically, often appear in combination in all of the productions analysed in chapter 4. Although all of these functions of media combination are relevant to the present study, metamediality – specifically the discussion of liveness and mediatisation – and metafictionality are of special importance, because they illustrate how specific performances comment on the nature of media, on their mutual relations and on their relation to liveness and reality. Consequently, they shed light on the central question of how the mediatisation (and mediation) of reality is dealt with in theatre as a generally plurimedial, but nevertheless ‘live’ medium that can enter into intricate additional relations with other media via media combination.

2 Drama, Theatre and (Inter‐)Mediality 2.1 Theatre versus Drama In his seminal study The Semiotics of Theatre and Drama (1980), Keir Elam distinguishes theatre as a “performer-audience transaction” established by an actual performance from drama as a “mode of fiction designed for stage representation” (2). The present chapter will provide a closer analysis of the relation and the differences between theatre and drama that ensue from this distinction between performance and dramatic text. It will specifically focus on the status of theatre and drama as individual art forms and media and on their respective potential for intermediality. As outlined in the preceding chapter, theatre may display all possible subcategories of intermediality without exceptions: Not only does it allow for intermedial transposition and intermedial references, but it is also inherently multior plurimedial and has a special potential for media combination in addition to its already plurimedial nature. This sets theatre in contrast to drama as a generally monomedial art form that only allows for intermedial transposition and intermedial references. Yet the question as to whether theatre actually constitutes an individual medium by itself remains disputed among drama and theatre scholars. The fact that theatre is plurimedial and may involve media combination by incorporating any other media is sometimes considered as supportive of a classification of theatre as a blend consisting of various media rather than as an individual medium of its own. Thanks to its plurimedial nature, theatre in fact shares many qualities with its constituent media so that the boundaries to these media may become blurred. Pointing out that opinions on the mediality of theatre differ, Erika FischerLichte personally considers drama and theatre as distinct phenomena (cf. 2010: 93). Yet she denies theatre its status as an individual medium, arguing that it only combines various other media (cf. 2010: 214) rather than having its own medial characteristics. Fischer-Lichte further problematises the status of theatre among the arts and refers to it as an “interart” within which other arts dissolve into mere constituent elements (2010: 202 f.). In a similar way, eighteenth- and nineteenth-century debates initiated by philosophers such as Immanuel Kant, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Arthur Schopenhauer or by Richard Wagner’s notion of a synthesis of the arts [“Gesamtkunstwerk”] centred on the question whether theatre ought to be seen as an “autonomous” and “primary” art or rather as a “composite” and hence “secondary” art (Kattenbelt 2006: 29 ff.). As I argued in chapter 1.1, the terms ‘art’ and ‘me-

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dium’ can be seen as two sides of the same coin because an art form necessarily qualifies also as a medium. The current discussions of the status of theatre as a medium can therefore be seen as a resumption of the old dispute on whether theatre forms an individual art form. How a compromise regarding the status of theatre can be achieved is illustrated, for instance, by Chiel Kattenbelt’s analysis. His observation that “[t]heatre is the only art capable of incorporating all other arts without being dependent on one of these in order to be theatre” (Kattenbelt 2006: 32) as well as his and Freda Chapple’s classification of theatre as a “hypermedium that incorporates all arts and media” (Chapple, and Kattenbelt 2006b: 20) imply an understanding of theatre as a composite but nevertheless autonomous art form and medium. In fact, the multiplicity of theatrical forms and subgenres confirms Kattenbelt’s judgement that theatre remains an independent art form or medium, no matter which of its constituent elements are added to or extracted from it. Theatre essentially remains theatre, irrespective of whether dance, music or technological media are included in a performance, whether language is replaced by pantomime, whether the actors’ bodies make way for puppets or whether a performance dispenses with costumes, props or even a proper stage and scenery. If theatre was denied its status as an individual medium or primary art form on the basis of its variable components, this would further mean that all other plurimedial media such as film, television, video, opera etc. could also no longer qualify as individual media for the same reason. This, however, would conflict with the intuitive and conventionally established assumption of their specific and individual mediality. Irina Rajewsky therefore argues for a general classification of plurimedial art forms as individual media, although, from a historical point of view, their perceived media-specificity actually developed from a combination of distinct media (cf. 2002: 176). The autonomous status of theatre irrespective of which of its constituent elements are present, and the intuitive judgement in analogy to other plurimedial media thus offer ample evidence for considering theatre as an individual art form or medium. What makes theatre as a medium so special in comparison to other media, even to most plurimedial ones, is its ability to integrate other media without affecting their respective materiality and mediality. The remarkable versatility of theatre and its propensity to incorporate various media have been repeatedly emphasised by various scholars. In her semiotic analysis of theatrical intermediality, for instance, Petra Maria Meyer captures this quality by emphasising the characteristic ‘mobility of signs’ [“Mobilität der Zeichen”] observable in theatre (e. g. 77, 118). According to Meyer, this semiotic mobility is unique to theatre (cf. 118), which may actually integrate the signs of all other media without affecting their mediality or materiality. In this respect, Meyer claims, theatre differs

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from all other media, even from media such as film, video or photography, which are also plurimedial and may provide instances of media combination, but nevertheless transform the signs used by other media into their own media-specific sign systems (cf. 63). Rather than blurring medial boundaries, the semiotic mobility of theatre therefore leaves the semiotic particularities of media intact so that medial differences are retained (cf. 63). Yet, with regard to such observations, the essential distinction between sign and medium needs to be remembered. Although theatre is indeed capable of integrating any other media without affecting their materiality, the semiotic qualities of the incorporated media are in fact modified by their very inclusion within a theatrical performance, because their signs are additionally turned into theatrical signs. To be precise, ‘semiotic mobility’ therefore does not mean that the incorporated signs are left unaffected, it should rather be understood as a potential to incorporate any sign, an ability that theatre, however, shares with other plurimedial media such as film, television or video. What is unique to theatre is thus not its semiotic mobility as such, but what could in analogy be termed its ‘medial mobility,’ i. e. the ability to leave the materiality of the incorporated media intact while their respective signs acquire an additional semiotic quality as theatrical signs. The semiotic modification of the included media into theatrical signs finds its equivalent in other media that transform their incorporated media into filmic, televisual, computational etc. signs. The medial versatility of theatre, however, is only shared by other plurimedial live media such as opera and ballet. In her study Performing Television: Contemporary Drama and the Media Culture (2000), Elizabeth Klaver comments on the potential of theatre to integrate other media without affecting their “performative integrity” and singles out the “theatrical signification [as] highly transparent” (94). Yet she also points out the transformation of signs into theatrical signs. In comparison to other plurimedial media such as television or film, she therefore observes: Interestingly, theater is unique among the media in that it is the only one that can allow the actual embodiment of another medium to occur within its physical environs. When film or television incorporate other media, the other media have to be first translated into electronic beams of light before they can be visually represented. For this reason, film and television appear to absorb other media more completely into their performative grounds. On the other hand, a television set or film screen sitting on a stage still has its physical integrity even though it has also become a theatrical signifier – an icon – within the language of the play’s set. (2000: 93 f.)

The difference between medial and semiotic effects of theatrical plurimediality and media combination is similarly observed by Peter M. Boenisch. He argues

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that at first sight, theatre appears to be a “fully transparent medium” which does not seem to leave “any palpable fingerprints of its mediatization” (2006: 112) on the incorporated media, but points out that this impression is too simplistic. Although theatre does not alter the materiality of the incorporated media, an “aisthetic” effect transforms anything that is put on stage into theatrical reproductions, into “objects on stage that are present and representations at the same time” (114). Because of the added theatrical frame, other media and their respective signs are further removed from the world of the audience. Since theatre incorporates and frames other media without affecting them materially and without forcing its own medium-specificity on them, it may highlight the materiality of the incorporated media and induce an awareness of their respective medialities as distinct from each other, as well as distinct from theatre. Chiel Kattenbelt points out that theatre provides a stage for the presentation of other media and deduces from this observation that theatre is the example par excellence of a more general “performativity of intermediality” in the sense of a staging of other media (2010: 29). Theatre thus does not necessarily figure as a generally transparent receptacle for other media, but it may instead expose the workings of its own mediation as well as those of the media incorporated (cf. Boenisch 2006: 115; P. M. Meyer 118). It is this capacity of theatre that also allows it to stage its own liveness by contrast with other media. Admittedly, other plurimedial media are equally capable of incorporating and thus framing or commenting on other media by means of media combination, but only theatre leaves their materiality intact at the same time so that its medial mobility rather than semiotic mobility sets it apart from other plurimedial media. When considering not only the differences between theatre and other media in general but, more specifically, the relation between theatre and drama, the semiotic mobility of theatre, however, becomes as important as its medial mobility. Drama, on the one hand, is a textual medium that is entirely restricted to the use of verbal signs. As a generally monomedial medium, it is incapable of forming a media combination with media that are not based on verbal signs. Intermedial transposition and intermedial references are therefore the only types of intermediality drama allows. In theatre, on the other hand, anything can be turned into a sign when being presented on stage, so that the list of potential theatrical signs is in fact unlimited. Nevertheless, repeated attempts have been made to establish categories of sign systems under which any potential theatrical sign might be subsumed. These lists of theatrical sign systems generally include linguistic signs, paralinguistic signs or tone, mimic and gestural signs, proxemic signs or movement, make-up, hair-style, costume, music and sound effects, architectural aspects of the theatrical space, décor, props and lighting (cf. Elam 45; Fischer-Lichte 2010: 85). Keir Elam moreover mentions “technical op-

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tions such as film and back projection” (45) as further theatrical signs. It follows from the list of potential theatrical signs that theatre may integrate any medium that makes use of any of these sign systems so that it may incorporate media as diverse as language, the body, music, architecture, pictorial media, light and, additionally, any technological medium. All of these media contribute their specific sign systems to the theatrical experience in order to be transformed into theatrical signs. This variety of signs and media eligible for inclusion within theatre proves that theatre differs from drama both in its semiotic and its medial mobility. The specific conditions of production and reception of theatre offer a further criterion for the distinction between theatre and drama, because the coinciding production and reception processes in theatrical performances contrast with the separate processes of writing and reading dramatic texts. Because of the combination of media and their respective sign systems in theatrical performances, the type and variety of information that have to be dealt with by the recipients differ from those of drama. The reader of a drama only needs to process the verbal or textual information transmitted by the dramatic text, whereas the spectator is confronted with multiple types of information conveyed by the variety of theatrical signs. Furthermore, the time span for processing this information in drama differs from theatre because the act of reading can be interrupted at any time whereas a performance is a continuous process. Elam calls this the different “perceptual and temporal conditions” of drama and theatre because “[t]he reader is able to imagine the dramatic context in a leisurely and pseudo-narrative fashion, while the spectator is bound to process simultaneous and successive acoustic and visual signals within strictly defined time limits” (89). Despite the semiotic and medial differences and the distinct conditions of production and reception of theatre and drama, their status as distinct media has often been questioned. When comparing different approaches to the mediality of theatre, its relation to drama occasionally appears to be a matter of perspective. Depending on whether the researcher focuses on textual aspects of a performance or more generally on its mediality, theatre is either regarded as a literary subgenre identical to drama or as an individual and plurimedial medium. Before theatre and performance studies were established as an academic discipline in the 1970s, the literature departments of universities mainly carried out the scholarly analysis of drama and theatre. Consequently, the theoretical discourse centred on the text and treated drama mostly as a literary subgenre. Theatre in the sense of actual performances therefore tended to be disregarded or it was considered as a mere subordinate and dependent realisation of dramatic scripts. Apart from this, dramatic texts appeared to provide a sounder

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and more reliable basis for critical analysis, because the ephemerality of theatre generally complicates performance documentation. Such problems based on the ephemerality of theatre are still only slightly mitigated with the help of recording technologies and methods of performance notation, but it is safe to say that theatre today is generally recognised as being worthy of analysis in its own right, as the influence of the dramatic text on a performance is seen as being less restrictive or imperative. Since the dramatic text merely provides suggestions or guidelines for an actual performance, there is never only one possible interpretation of a drama that would lead to a single ‘correct’ theatrical production (cf. Fischer-Lichte 2010: 93 f.). Hence, an actual theatrical performance merely offers one possibility of staging a dramatic text, selected according to the discretion of director, company or cast (cf. Winkelmann 29, 109, 115). Apart from matters of interpretation, the transition from drama to theatre also involves obligatory changes due to the specific medial and semiotic nature and the requirements of a multimedial performance as opposed to a monomedial dramatic text (cf. Hess-Lüttich 13). Those involved in a production thus still have to find their own theatrical language and are free to digress from the textual source. Consequently, theatre cannot be seen as a predetermined one-to-one transposition of a dramatic text into a theatrical performance. That theatre is not predetermined by an underlying dramatic text and differs from drama in its semiotic and medial versatility, its specific conditions of simultaneous production and reception and its processuality, may be sufficient evidence to consider drama and theatre as two distinct media rather than as two variant forms of a single medium. Yet, if drama and theatre are to be understood as two distinct media, how can their mutual relation further be defined? Occasionally, scholars describe the transformation of a dramatic text into a performance in terms of an intertextual relation. Elam, for instance, criticises the “old belief in the supremacy of the written text over the performance” (206). He points out that while the dramatic text poses constraints on the performative options of a production, the drama is itself constrained and “radically conditioned by its performability” (191). Elam therefore concludes: “What this suggests is that the written text/performance text relationship is not one of simple priority but a complex of reciprocal constraints constituting a powerful intertextuality. […] It is a relationship that cannot be accounted for in terms of facile determinism” (191; emphasis in the original). This idea of an intertextual relationship between drama and theatre is further developed by Andreas Höfele. His intertextual model considers drama and theatre as interrelated pre- and post-texts respectively. Rather than assuming a hierarchic relation that would reduce theatre to a mere predetermined realisa-

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tion of a dramatic text, however, Höfele’s approach makes it possible to prioritise theatre and reduce drama to a mere preliminary stage or to ascribe equal importance to drama and theatre (cf. Höfele 12). Because of the intricate mutual relations between drama and theatre as pre- and post-texts, an actual performance is neither predetermined by, nor identical with the propositions and instructions contained within the dramatic text. Höfele therefore resorts to the notion of an ‘implied performance’ [“implizierte Aufführung”] as an intermediate “[i]nter-text,” which derives from instructions and references to the theatrical performance within the dramatic text and is thus situated between the dramatic text and its performance (18 f.). Despite their justified criticism of the normative supremacy of the dramatic text, Elam’s and Höfele’s approaches to the relation between drama and theatre still suggest that a dramatic text necessarily predates a performance and figures as its pre-text. Yet, on the one hand, phenomena such as closet dramas prove that drama does not need to be intended for a performance in the first place. On the other hand, devised performances that are collaboratively created by performance collectives rather than being conceived by individual dramatists are often no longer based on dramatic texts or fixed scripts at all or they only eventually develop a dramatic text in the rehearsals. This also applies to most of the case studies analysed in the present study, first and foremost to Gob Squad’s productions. Consequently, neither does the writing of a drama have to be followed by its performances, nor is a performance necessarily preceded by the act of dramatic writing. The intertextual understanding of the relation between drama and theatre is moreover problematic in so far as it is based on a broad notion of ‘text’ that covers not only verbal semiotic systems. It also subsumes theatrical performances with their use of verbal as well as non-verbal sign systems under the term ‘text.’ This understanding of theatre as a text is shared by Elam (e. g. 3, 206) and Höfele (e. g. 12, 18 f.) and is also common to many other semiotic approaches to theatre (e. g. Fischer-Lichte 2010: 94). In the preceding discussion of universal as opposed to more restricted notions of intertextuality and intermediality in chapter 1.2, however, the broad (post)structuralist notions of ‘text’ and ‘intertextuality’ have already been criticised for their blurring of semiotic and medial boundaries that renders the notion of ‘intermediality’ altogether superfluous. The distinction between ‘sign’ and ‘medium’ as established in chapter 1.1 further illustrated the importance of semiotic differences, since it defined the medium as a carrier of signs, which means that distinct media can be distinguished according to their characteristic uses of one or more semiotic systems. For this reason, a description of the relation between drama and theatre should not level their semiotic differences by undiscriminatingly treating both as ‘texts,’ but it should

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instead reveal the essential differences in their mediality and uses of sign systems. Instead of applying an intertextual reading to the relation between drama and theatre, their distinct semiotic and medial nature rather suggests an interpretation of the transition from dramatic text into theatrical performance in terms of an intermedial relation, namely as a form of intermedial transposition (e. g. Hauthal 75; Winkelmann 19, 23, 115; Jancsó 245 f.). What distinguishes this transformation from other instances of intermedial transposition such as adaptations, is the fact that the theatrical target medium is already implied or latently present in the dramatic source medium, because the intermedial transposition into a performance is already anticipated by the dramatic text (except for closet dramas). By means of its secondary text such as dramatis personae, speech prefixes or stage directions, the dramatic text conveys instructions concerning actors, scenery, props, lighting, sound etc. In doing so the dramatic text continually evokes its actualisation in form of potential performances so that these suggestions read like explicit intermedial references to the theatrical medium. In her analysis of metadrama and theatricality, Janine Hauthal therefore describes the anticipated performance inherent in the dramatic text as an intermedial reference (cf. 84, 88, 332 f.). Hauthal further identifies this kind of intermedial reference, which precedes the actual intermedial transposition, as a general characteristic common to all types of scripts or scores intended for theatre, radio plays, operas or films (cf. 334). However, as long as the actual transposition into a theatrical performance has not yet taken place, these intermedial references merely evoke the performance by means of the textual medium rather than actually including the theatrical medium itself within the dramatic text. The eventual intermedial transposition is thus preceded by the above-mentioned ‘implied performance’ situated between drama and theatre (cf. Höfele 18 f.). Hauthal refers to this cognitive construct evoked by the dramatic text as a ‘mental performance’ [“mentale Aufführung”] (332 f.; cf. 71). As we have seen already, the dramatic text does not necessarily have to be transformed into an actual performance, and the exact nature of the eventual intermedial transposition into a theatrical performance is not completely predetermined by the dramatic text, but open to individual interpretations. Even though the intermedial transposition from drama to theatre is thus neither obligatory nor predetermined, the interrelation between dramatic source medium and theatrical target medium is nevertheless exceptionally close and intense, because it is inscribed in the source medium from the moment of conception. In contrast, instances of intermedial transposition between other media are usually not anticipated by the author of the source medium. If we apply Werner Wolf’s criteria for the analysis of intermediality from chapter 1.2 to this process (cf. Wolf 1999:

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39; 2004: 296), it is the ‘primary intermediality’ or initial conception of the intermedial transposition by the dramatist that distinguishes it from the usually ‘secondary intermediality’ or retrospective genesis of intermedial transpositions in the case of adaptations between other media. Obviously, this primary intermediality may be complemented by forms of secondary intermediality conceived by those involved in the staging of a production. The predominantly primary intermediality of the intermedial transposition between drama and theatre justifies, nevertheless, why in the present study dramatic texts or scripts serve as a further basis for the analysis of how media combination is achieved in theatrical performances via the use of film or video on stage. Although drama and theatre are distinct media, and there is no guarantee that the suggestions for media combination within a dramatic text are actually put into practice when the intermedial transposition transforms the text into a performance, references to the ‘implied performance’ within the dramatic texts supply information on the media combinations as originally intended by the dramatists or companies. To sum up the findings of the present chapter, theatre can be described as a generally plurimedial medium that may make additional use of media combination. Since its plurimediality is not dependent on any of its constituent elements in order to remain theatre, it ought to be perceived as an individual medium, a judgement that is also supported by the conventional and intuitive notion of a distinctive mediality of theatre. As opposed to other plurimedial media, theatre is moreover capable of incorporating any other media without affecting their material quality, a unique ability that has been termed its ‘medial mobility.’ In addition to this, theatre forms a medium distinct from drama, from which it differs in its medial and semiotic mobility, in its consequential plurimediality, as well as in its simultaneous, but fleeting production and reception in an ongoing process. The relation between the distinct media of drama and theatre is neither predetermined nor can it adequately be expressed in terms of intertextuality; instead it ought to be analysed as an intermedial reference leading to an ‘implied performance’ of the dramatic text that may be further actualised in an intermedial transposition from dramatic text to theatrical performance.

2.2 Theatre and Technological Media As established in the previous chapter, theatre relies on the use of other media such as language, the body, music, architecture, pictorial media or light as components of its plurimediality. In chapter 1.2, I argued moreover that technological media do not (yet) figure as elements of this plurimediality but instead present instances of media combination, because their use in theatrical performances

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still appears to be more unconventional than that of other media. The exact nature of the relation between theatre and technological media, however, is not judged unanimously: some theatre or media scholars and artists see this relation in terms of rivalry and competition, while others argue that theatre and technological media complement each other successfully. Apart from this, some discussions of the relation between theatre and technological media do not centre on the actual integration of these media within theatrical performances, but, more generally, they address the more elusive and multifaceted question of their comparative aesthetic, cultural, social and economic value. When theatre and technological media are taken to be rivals, this notion is often accompanied by normative prescriptions or appeals to keep them apart. The Polish director Jerzy Grotowski (1933 – 1999) made one of the most influential calls for aesthetic purity of theatre when he enthusiastically promulgated a return to a ‘Poor Theatre,’ devoid not only of mechanical and technological devices but also of elaborate scenery and lavish costumes or makeup (cf. Dixon 27). His conviction that the emulation of film and television in theatre could only ever lead to poor imitations prompted him to build entirely on the unique and pure physical co-presence and liveness of theatre instead. In his well-known publication Towards a Poor Theatre he therefore argued: The theatre must recognize its own limitations. If it cannot be richer than the cinema, then let it be poor. If it cannot be as lavish as television, let it be ascetic. If it cannot be a technical attraction, let it renounce all outward technique. […] There is only one element of which film and television cannot rob the theatre: the closeness of the living organism. (Grotowski 41)

Such calls for a strict separation of theatre and technological media are frequently based on their allegedly insurmountable medial differences. According to Zander Brietzke, for instance, film and television essentially differ from theatre due to their capacity for realistic representation (cf. 28), their two-dimensionality (cf. 21), the intervention of a camera between actors and audience (cf. 20 f.) and the possibility of cutting and editing (cf. 3 f., 22). While one could equally expect that, when combined, theatre and film or television would successfully complement each other, Brietzke concludes that both are not compatible, and both should not try to emulate each other if their potential was fully to be exploited. He thus explains: The best plays and films exploit their respective medium: the best theater is theatrical; the best film is cinematic. By that, I simply mean that a theatrical event is suited for the theater and should be seen upon a stage. The best films are the ones that achieve distinction as projected shadows upon a blank screen. (xvi)

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Philip Auslander, whose concept of mediatisation will be introduced in more detail in chapter 3 of the present study, detects a cultural competition between theatre and the mass media, yet he does not subscribe to such calls for aesthetic purity and sees the increasing mediatisation as inevitable, but not necessarily deplorable or regrettable. His observations concern what he considers to be a general trend in all types of live events and the entertainment industry at large, but his statements also apply more specifically to theatre and its relation to mass media. Following Auslander’s argumentation, the increasing encroachment of mediatisation on live performances eventually leads to a complete “breakdown of the distinction between live and mediated performance” (1992: 65, cf. 79). However, although Auslander questions the persistence of ontological differences between liveness and mediatisation, he considers them as ideologically, historically, culturally and economically opposed forms (cf. 1996: 198; 1997: 54; 1999: 51, 54, 159). According to Auslander, mass media have consolidated their position and have marginalised live performances in this rivalry for cultural supremacy. Consequently, he describes liveness and mediatisation “as competitive, conflictual and agonistic” (1999: 159) and sums up the relation between theatre and mass media as follows: At the level of cultural economy, my own answer to this question is clear and unequivocal: theatre (and live performance generally) and the mass media are rivals, not partners. Neither are they equal rivals: it is absolutely clear that our current cultural formation is saturated with and dominated by the representations of the mass media. We have entered the era of what some theorists are calling the televisual. (1997: 50; emphasis in the original)

What Auslander describes here extends beyond what could be captured in terms of theatrical media combination or plurimediality, as it implies an ontological fusion of liveness and mediatisation in which the characteristic nature of live performances gradually disappears. As opposed to such notions of an antagonism between theatre and technological media, other scholars emphasise their similarities in order to claim that they may complement each other and coexist in harmony. Such approaches are often combined with a general criticism of the idea of medium-specificity. In “Film and Theatre” (1966), American literary, cultural and media theorist Susan Sontag already expresses doubts on the antithesis and respective medium-specificity of theatre and technological media with specific regard to the relation between theatre and film. Sontag questions the widespread assumption that there is “something genuinely ‘theatrical,’ different in kind from what is genuinely ‘cinematic’” (1966: 24). While she admits that film differs from theatre in terms of its “discontinuous use of space” (1966: 29; emphasis in the original), its manipulation of time (cf. 1966: 30) and its controllability due to editing

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(cf. 1966: 31 f.), she believes the distinction between theatre and film to disappear gradually, because theatre becomes increasingly cinematic. Steve Dixon also observes an increasing influence of cinema on theatre in the second half of the twentieth century when theatre took over filmic aspects such as short or parallel scenes, time leaps, background music or light effects (cf. Dixon 10). Phyllis Zatlin instead regards “spatial” and “temporal fluidity” as a “cinematic device” absorbed by theatre (Zatlin 159). With regard to the differentiation of theatre and film into a verbal as opposed to a visual medium, Robert Knopf also assumes a convergence. Asserting that theatre and film both use the verbal and the visual as alternative modes of presentation (cf. Knopf 2 ff.), he highlights their mutual influences in terms of a “trading of elements and stylistic conventions back and forth over the decades” (15). Overall, the complementary nature and the mutual influences of theatre and technological media can be observed with regard to all types of intermediality. Firstly, such mutual influences involve examples of intermedial transposition as illustrated by screen adaptations of dramas as well as by stage adaptations of films. Initially, this influence was mono-directional and restricted to the mere filming of given theatre performances (cf. Maintz 13; Mühl-Benninghaus 183) and later to proper film adaptations of plays; today the reverse form of adaptation also occurs increasingly so that films are more frequently turned into theatrical plays (cf. Maintz 25 ff.). Secondly, theatre and technological media exhibit implicit and explicit intermedial references to each other when, for example, theatre is turned into a theme in films or vice versa (cf. Maintz 29 f.). Thirdly, theatre and technological media are also linked via instances of transmediality whenever they display thematic, aesthetic or structural parallels (cf. Maintz 29 ff.; Klaver 2000: 3). Interrelations also exist in mutual repercussions on acting styles and actor training, the interchange of actors, directors etc. The relation between theatre and technological media abounds in such instances of intermedial transposition, intermedial references and transmediality. However, the following historical account of their relation will centre primarily on the actual incorporation of technological media, specifically film, within theatre in accordance with the general focus on media combination in the present study. With regard to such media combination via an incorporation of technological media within theatre, scholars frequently apply a diachronic perspective to point out that the use of technology in theatre is no recent invention, because theatre has always displayed a certain natural affinity to technology (cf. FischerLichte 2010: 200; Lehmann 2001: 423). According to these claims, theatre has never been ‘pure’ in the sense of being devoid of or isolated from technical influences (cf. Boenisch 2006: 113; Balme qtd. in Leeker, and Kaldrack 407). In-

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stead, theatre has always been complemented and influenced by mechanics or technology and evolving forms of stage machinery (cf. Lehmann 2001: 413). In order to support this argument, scholars sketch out earlier instances of mechanical or technical influences on theatre, including the technical complexity of ancient amphitheatres (cf. Balme qtd. in Leeker, and Kaldrack 407), the device of the mechanically produced dei ex machina (cf. Dixon 40) in ancient Greek tragedy and medieval plays, the use of perspective painting for stage designs (cf. Fischer-Lichte 2010: 200; Dixon 40), the general employment of stage machinery or revolving stages (cf. Fischer-Lichte 2001: 16) or the introduction of electric lighting into theatre (cf. Dixon 40; Fischer-Lichte 2001: 16) to name but a few examples. Seen from this point of view, the use of technological media in contemporary performances seems simply like a logical continuation of this general trend of including new technologies in theatrical performances. By now, however, the overall choice of available media has increased and offers various new possibilities of interaction between live performance and technology so that the current use of technological media within theatrical performances has not only become more and more extensive but has also changed in quality. Nevertheless, the current use of technological media within theatrical performances is by no means a new phenomenon appearing out of the blue. It has many historical precursors. Gwendolyn Waltz, for instance, observes four basic uses of film that already blurred the boundaries between film and theatre in performative contexts of the late nineteenth century such as “vaudeville and music-hall acts, magic shows, melodramas, motion-picture stage shows, ballets, comedies, and musical revues” (548). Her typology of intermediality between stage and screen includes “sound- or narrator-accompanied motion pictures,” “interacting live and filmed performances,” “alternating film and stage action” and finally “filmed scenery” (550). All of these formats can be seen as predecessors of the more refined current forms of media combination between stage and screen. With specific reference to the relation between film and theatre in Berlin at the beginning of the twentieth century, Wolfgang Mühl-Benninghaus illustrates similar early forms of combining film and live performance when analysing the established practice of screening film sequences to alternate with the live acts of variety theatres (cf. 169 f., 182). Greg Giesekam identifies the short film “Le Raid Paris-Monte Carlo en Deux Heures” by Georges Méliès (1861– 1938), French director and owner of the Théâtre Robert-Houdin, as the first instance of a film specifically shot for being included in a revue that was performed at the Folies Bergère in Paris in 1904. This was followed by another film by Méliès for the production The Pills of the Devil in 1905 (cf. 2007: 27 ff.).

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Steve Dixon also turns his attention to the beginning of the twentieth century but focuses on Italy and its Futurist movement which he regards as central both to the current use of technology in theatre and to the development of digital performance. Led by Filippo Tommaso Marinetti (1876 – 1944), the Futurists ascribed vital importance to ‘the machine’ and advocated a merging of different arts and technology in a “synthetic theatre” (Dixon 47). In the early 1920s, director Vsevolod Meyerhold (1874– 1940) developed a physical training for actors based on ‘biomechanics’ which considered the actor as a kind of robot reacting to certain stimuli (cf. Weise 23). Technology and mechanics, however, were not only essential for Meyerhold’s actor training but also extended to the actual use of technology and film techniques in his stage productions, in which he intended to strengthen theatre in the face of the increasing influence of film. Meyerhold thus commanded: Today we who build theatres in competition with the movies say: let us ‘cinematify’ the theatre, let us use in the theatre all the technical means of the screen – but not just in the sense that we install a screen in the theatre. We must move into theatre spectacle – and we shall stage productions attracting audiences as large as those in the movie theatres. (qtd. in Knopf 22)

Sergei Eisenstein (1898 – 1948), Meyerhold’s student and designer of several of Meyerhold’s productions (cf. Leyda, and Voynow 10, 13; Weise 23), eventually turned his back on theatre and is today widely known for his cinematic achievements. As director and designer of an early theatrical adaptation of A. N. Ostrovsky’s Enough Simplicity in Every Sage (1923), however, Eisenstein combined theatre and film. For this production, he shot the short film “Glumov’s Diary” (cf. Leyda, and Voynow 14) that was included within the performance to present the protagonist’s inner monologue and provided a direct transition between stage and screen by showing the performer “burst[ing] through the screen” (cf. Giesekam 2007: 38). Moreover, Eisenstein himself appeared on screen for a curtain call at the end of the performance (cf. Weise 28 f.). An account of the historical development of the use of technology in theatre also has to mention the design for a ‘Total Theatre’ initiated on demand of director Erwin Piscator (1893 – 1966) and developed by the founder and leader of the German Bauhaus School Walter Gropius (1883 – 1969) in 1927 (cf. Woll 15). The ‘Total Theatre,’ as conceived by Gropius, intended to provide the architectural and technological frame for Piscator’s aesthetic aspirations for a combination of theatre and technology (cf. Birri 168). Yet, Gropius’s plan for a mechanically transformable stage and auditorium surrounded by projection screens that would combine arts and technology while simultaneously integrating the audience in the performance (cf. Woll 15; Birri 169 ff.) was never executed. For Pisca-

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tor, nonetheless, ‘Total Theatre’ remained the ideal of his theatrical ambitions (cf. Woll 17). Though never performed in Gropius’s building, Piscator’s theatre productions nevertheless attracted admiration and occasionally criticism (cf. Woll 13) for his affirmation of technology as expressed in his extensive experimentation with stage machinery and various projections on different types of screens. To mention but a few instances of Piscator’s virtuosic use of technology, his production Der Kaufmann von Berlin [The Merchant of Berlin] (1929) made use of a revolving stage, treadmills, bridges and lifts on different levels of the stage, selective lighting and special sound effects. Film material was projected onto four screens and onto a gauze that facilitated smooth transitions from the projection to the action on stage by a special use of lighting (cf. Willett 100) so that characters seemed to step out of the screen onto the stage (cf. Pukelyte 51). In Des Kaisers Kulis [The Kaiser’s Coolies] (1930) documentary newsreel material was used next to specially shot film sequences and cartoon films (cf. Willett 103). Occasionally, Piscator also used projected text such as real and fake cuttings from newspapers as in Konjunktur [Boom] (1928) where he also placed real motor cars on stage (cf. Willett 96, 98). As Ina Pukelyte holds, the striking number of practical experiments and theoretical approaches to the use of technology and specifically film within theatre up to the late 1920s decreased in the following decades, as the attraction of the new media of film and photography lessened (cf. 41 f.). A prominent exception is provided by Josef Svoboda (1920 – 2002), the former artistic director of Laterna Magika in Prague. In addition to his use of film in theatrical performances since the 1950s, his production of the opera Intolerance (1965) made the first “extensive use of television in theatre” (cf. Giesekam 2007: 52, 57). The production combined broadcasts from remote television studios and from the streets outside the theatre with live recordings of stage and auditorium (cf. 2007: 57) and can thus be considered an early precursor of the use of live video relays from inside and outside the performance venue in Gob Squad’s productions such as Revolution Now! to be analysed in chapter 4 of the present study. Inspired by the invention of television and video and influenced by their use in video art by pioneers like Nam June Paik and Wolf Vostell since the 1960s and 70s, visual media eventually reconquered the theatre so that, from the 1980s onwards, monitors were increasingly used on stage in productions by John Jesurun, Squat, The Wooster Group, The Builders Association and George Coates Performance Works in America, by Robert Lepage in Canada, or by Giorgio Barberio Corsetti in Italy to name but a few examples (cf. Pukelyte 9 f., 126; Dixon 1). In contemporary performance practice including live and online theatre, dance, installations etc., numerous forms of analogue and digital technology such as film, television, video, computers, videoconferencing software, mobile

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technologies etc. are employed.¹¹ These technologies do not always play a major role in the actual performances themselves and are occasionally used only for broadcasting live performances to a remote audience or to facilitate remote rehearsals and production processes. At other times, such media remain imperceptible for the spectators or at least marginal because they are merely used off-stage. Frequently, however, they form integral parts of multimedia productions and visibly contribute to the performances. In productions by the Institute for the Exploration of Virtual Realities (i. e. VR) at the University of Kansas, for instance, the audience is equipped with head-mounted displays and the virtual scenery is “improvisationally manipulated” and produced in real-time in each individual performance so that interaction between performers and technology becomes essential (Gharavi 81). In Extended Theatre Experience (2009), the Pervasive Media Studio based in Bristol experimented with video and audio capture technologies by putting cameras on actors, props and sets so that the live performance could simultaneously be distributed as a multi-camera-edit to viewers in the auditorium, at a cinema or at their computers at home.¹² The Gertrude Stein Repertory Theatre in America, in turn, experiments with a “digital mobile projection system” that uses digital encoding, conferencing and display technology in order to superimpose digital live imagery from remote sites and actors onto the bodies of live performers.¹³ In other ‘cyborg performances’ such as the Phèdre-adaptation To You, the Birdie! (2002) produced by the New York-based Wooster Group, the live performers seem fragmented and intertwined with the technology, because parts of their bodies are replaced by their screened representations (cf. Parker-Starbuck 657 f.). The physical presence of performers is also partly or completely replaced by technology in interactive telematic projects by Stelarc (cf. Dixon 312) or by the British interactive media artist Paul Sermon who frequently uses live chromakeying, ISDN videoconferencing, Skype etc. to foster interaction among remote participants or with virtual avatars (see chapter 4.4).¹⁴ Similarly, the British performance company Station House Opera, which will be considered in more detail in chapter 4, creates international networked productions which combine live performance with live internet streaming and video links in order to connect remote sites in What’s Wrong with the World? (2008), Play On Earth (2006), The

 See Causey for a typology and examples of “cyber- or computer-aided theatre” such as digital scenography, smart environments, augmented reality and others.  Cf. http://www.watershed.co.uk/pmstudio/project/extended-theatre-experience.  Cf. http://www.gertstein.org/project1dev.html.  Cf. http://www.paulsermon.org/.

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Other Is You (2006) and Live from Paradise (2004– 2005). Here, the performances by actors at different locations across the globe are transmitted in real-time to distant audiences at these locations who experience the live performance alongside videos transmitted from the respective other locations.¹⁵ Still happening in real-time, digital theatre or ‘cyberformances’ completely transfer the performance space into virtual space, such as into visual chat rooms and virtual worlds, environments or platforms (e. g. Second Life or UpStage) while being distributed online or simultaneously screened for a live audience. This applies, for instance, to Adriene Jenik and Lisa Brenneis’s desktop theatre projects beginning with waitingforgodot.com (1997) in the Palace chat space (cf. Jenik 99), and to theatre productions in Second Life by the performance art group Second Front.¹⁶ Mobile technology, WiFi and computer games feature in interactive experiments that often leave theatrical spaces to make the participants follow a fictional journey guided by instructions transmitted via mobile phones, walkie-talkies or handheld computers. As a consequence, real and fictional or even virtual spaces are fused, as in Proto-type Theater’s Fortnight (2011; still ongoing), a two-week performance experience that guides the participants via Twitter and text messages.¹⁷ Similar examples are the experiments with pervasive gaming by the British artists’ group Blast Theory,¹⁸ or the mobile phone theatre Call Cutta (2005) by the German performance group Rimini Protokoll.¹⁹ Obviously, these are only few of the recent examples of media combinations of live performance and technology that go beyond the use of film and video. Though hardly representative of all recent international advances in this field, they at least offer a first insight into what is currently possible in terms of multimedia performances. In the general increase of the use of technology in performance contexts, scholars frequently observe that technological media have become completely established as components of theatrical performances and no longer appear as alien to either performers or audience. Steve Dixon argues that only few performance artists criticise the use of technology whereas the majority of them most readily embraces its new possibilities (cf. 140). From the point of view of the spectators, Ina Pukelyte suggests that the use of visual technology such as

    

Cf. Cf. Cf. Cf. Cf.

http://www.stationhouseopera.com/about.php?section=4. http://www.secondfront.org/. http://proto-type.org/fortnight/. http://www.blasttheory.co.uk/. http://www.rimini-protokoll.de/website/de/project_143.html.

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video and computer on stage no longer constitutes a provocation, but has turned into an everyday practice (cf. 7). Dixon’s and Pukelyte’s observations are correct insofar as performers and audiences have grown accustomed to the increasing presence and use of technological media both on stage and in their everyday lives in general. Spectators are thus no longer easily disturbed, provoked or caught off guard by such use of technology in theatrical performances, and the charm of novelty is in danger of wearing out. Nevertheless, technological media do not generally form established elements of the plurimediality of theatre and are not yet completely on a par with more regular medial components of theatrical plurimediality. Hence, they represent instances of media combination that have not yet merged with the theatrical medium into a new hybrid form and therefore remain discernible in the general plurimediality of theatre. How their relation to the theatrical medium is perceived in actual cases, however, depends on the respective media as well as on their specific use in individual productions. This can be adequately described in terms of Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin’s distinction between immediacy and hypermediacy as alternative conditions of media (see chapter 3.2): while more immediate uses create the impression that the technological media merge with the plurimediality of theatre, the hypermediate uses accentuate their heterogeneity as components of media combination. As Bolter and Grusin observe, immediacy and hypermediacy are “alter ego[s]” (Bolter, and Grusin 34) or alternative options. However, media differ in how easily they lend themselves to immediate or hypermediate uses, and they acquire characteristic degrees of immediacy or hypermediacy according to conventions regarding their habitual or ‘adequate’ use. Traditional films, for example, strive for transparency and immediacy, whereas television is more inclined to hypermediacy (cf. Bolter, and Grusin 93, 185; Kattenbelt 2006: 34) although its potential for live transmission may also create a sense of immediacy (cf. Bolter, and Grusin 187 f.). The different tendencies of distinct media become even clearer when we compare the internet as an extremely hypermediate medium to virtual reality, which generally aims at complete immediacy based on immersion and interaction (cf. Bolter, and Grusin 161 f.). Nevertheless, the conventional immediacy or hypermediacy of any medium can be increased or decreased and manipulated depending on how and in which context it is used. Moreover, immediacy and hypermediacy are no absolute concepts but are developed in relation to other media, so that the invention of new media may alter the perceived immediacy or hypermediacy of an older medium by comparison. Accordingly, Ralf Remshardt argues that with the rise of film, theatre could no longer be considered transparent or immediate because its ac-

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tual “theatricality” and “constructedness” were made apparent by comparison to film (41). More important in the present context, however, is the possibility of altering the degree of immediacy or hypermediacy of a medium by deliberately manipulating the boundary that separates spectators or users from it. With regard to material boundaries such as frames of screens or canvasses, Lev Manovich notes that emphasising the frame decreases the identification with the medium (cf. 96). A pronounced frame, in other words, serves as a reminder of the materiality of a medium and hence also increases its hypermediacy. I would argue, however, that such frames need not be material, but may also be provided by inserting a medium into another framing medium. When other media are incorporated, for instance, within a theatrical performance, the live action may manipulate the conventionally expected immediacy or hypermediacy of the inserted media. This can be achieved by making the transition from framing performance to insertion more continuous in order to divert attention from the distinct mediality of theatre and the incorporated media, or more abrupt in order to throw their differences into relief. The effect of this manipulation becomes more intense and striking, the more the immediacy and hypermediacy of framing and inserted media differ from each other or the more the altered immediacy or hypermediacy of a medium differs from its conventional use. Whether the use of technological media is perceived as being hypermediate and is thus recognised as an instance of media combination rather than plurimediality depends on several factors. It is determined by the intensity of contrast generated between framing and inserted media, by the centrality of the participating media for the performance as a whole, by their degree of saliency or unconventionality and by their relation to the performers. The more prominently technological media therefore feature in a performance and the more unconventional their use, the more they become visible or hypermediate. Where technological media are subordinate and merely support the performer, they remain marginal and transparent, but the more they dominate or even replace the live actor, the more they tend to become hypermediate and seem to disrupt the plurimediality of the performance. When restricted to mere illustrative props in order to substitute elaborate scenery or to set the atmosphere, technological media often recede into the background of a performance so that they mostly remain immediate or transparent and seem to blend in seamlessly with the general plurimediality of the performance. Pukelyte identifies such creation of scenery and virtual spaces via video projections and computerised images as the prominent function of visual technology in theatre, specifically in the 1990s, and observes that, in these instanc-

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es, technological media do not form constitutive but merely supplementary elements of the performances (cf. 10, 55, 59, 128). A primarily illustrative use as background scenery may indeed apply to earlier experiments with visual technology in theatrical performances, but the use of technology in theatre has increased over the years and has gained a new quality. The productions chosen for close analysis in the present study are representative of a tendency to foreground technological media as central aspects of the performance and to render them hypermediate. Technological media are therefore no longer merely physically incorporated within performances or interposed between stage and audience, but they are deliberately framed, unconventionally used or thematically explored with regard to their aesthetic features and their relation to the live performance. Their materiality and mediality are either presented as similar to theatre, as if they formed an integral part of its plurimediality, or they are exposed as being distinct and therefore only loosely connected to it via media combination. In this sense, the employed technological media bring into focus epistemological, ontological or metaphysical questions concerning the relation between concepts such as liveness and mediatisation, reality and fiction, presentation and representation, truth and lies, consciousness and subconsciousness etc. Pukelyte recognises this thematic exploration and transmission of social, philosophical or artistic messages as an alternative function of technological media, although she considers the illustrative use as background scenery as the primary function of visual technology (cf. 10). Any integration of technological media within live performances may at least partly render the involved media visible and draw attention to them and to the theatrical medium as such. Yet the explicit and hypermediate foregrounding of their respective mediality requires the participating media to be deliberately framed or contrasted with each other and with the general plurimediality of the performance and to fulfil a central and often unconventional role within the performance in order to increase their perceptibility to a maximum. This may be achieved, for example, by creating a contrast between distinct visual, fictional or virtual levels on stage and screens in terms of style, speed, space, scale, visual accuracy, colour, dimensionality, perspective, interactivity etc. Framing and inserted media may be played off against each other by drawing attention to their respective possibilities and limitations and by deliberately undermining and manipulating their smooth workings and their transparency. The analysis of individual productions in chapter 4 will, however, illustrate that it is equally possible to approximate theatre and technological media at least temporarily by focusing on their similarities and by blurring their boundaries so that the notion of

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the live performance as a framing or dominant medium is replaced by an apparent equilibrium of all medial components. The contrastive presentation of live performance and technological media does not have to follow conventional attributions of media-specificity; it may also blur or counter-intuitively reverse the conventional allocation of attributes. In this way, aspects that are conventionally perceived to be characteristic features of liveness may be attributed to the involved technological media, while the live elements may be provided with aspects generally associated with mediatisation, so that the conventional binary distinction between liveness and mediatisation may be reversed or at least challenged as having permeable boundaries. It is for these reasons that the intermedial play with technological media incorporated within live performances often results in an implicit confrontation or explicit discussion of aspects such as co-presence, ephemerality, imperfection, interaction and realistic representation, aspects which are often considered to be more or less direct variables of liveness. In chapter 4, I will analyse in more detail how individual productions whose media combination includes film, pre-recorded or live video address these aspects.

3 Mediation, Mediatisation and Liveness 3.1 Mediation and Mediatisation As we have seen, the scope of definitions of the medium and the range of phenomena these definitions regard as media affect and determine the way the relation between media and reality, mediatisation and liveness is perceived. The broader and more comprehensive the notion of ‘medium,’ the more media scholars tend to emphasise the ubiquity of media and their propensity to interfere with our perception of the world. Likewise, a broader understanding of the medium may, by extension, also question the existence of pure liveness as an experience of a performance that is not influenced by mediatisation. The definition of the medium is therefore inextricably linked to the conception of liveness and to the question of whether it is possible at all to access and experience the world in an ‘im-mediate’ way – a way that is not filtered by omnipresent media. As a consequence, the concepts of ‘mediation’ and ‘mediatisation’ play a pivotal role for the relation between media and human perception as well as for the search for liveness. Often, the terms ‘mediation’ and ‘mediatisation’ are used inconsistently or even interchangeably and without proper definition. Especially in his earlier work Presence and Resistance (1992), performance and media scholar Philip Auslander uses both terms synonymously (e. g. 1992: 65, 68, 79; 1999: 159). Only in passing and merely as a footnote does he offer an explicit definition of the term “mediatized,” which he borrowed from Baudrillard, as “refer[ring] to a culture dominated by the presentations of the mass media” and “to specific cultural representations that have been adapted or designed for dissemination by the mass media” (Auslander 1996: 210). From the use of the term in the general context of his work, we may deduce that Auslander intends mediatisation to refer to the use of technological and electronic media and specifically to recording and playback technologies. More or less implicitly, he therefore equates mediatisation with “technical mediation” (1996: 199) and “technical reproduction” (1997: 55, 53). Mediatisation is not restricted to phenomena such as electronic and photographic media, film, television, sound recording (cf. 1997: 54 f.; 1999: 51), “mixed-media performances” (1999: 36), “electric amplification” of sound (1999: 24) and the “videation” of live events via large video screens and monitors (1999: 35). It also refers to live re-enactments of originally mediatised events and to the exploitation of live events designed for the sole purpose of serving as “raw materials for subsequent mediatization” (1999: 162, cf. 158). On the whole, mediatisation not only implies the actual use of technological devices and mass

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media, but also suggests the more general aesthetic, formal or even epistemological influence these media exert on live events (cf. 1999: 33) as diverse as politics, rock concerts, theatrical performances, sports events etc. With specific reference to theatre, Auslander also distinguishes between a general mediation of theatre by means of traditional technologies²⁰ and the contemporary mediatisation of theatre via “mechanical and electric technologies of recording and reproduction” (1999: 52). Auslander may display a broader understanding of mediatisation than other scholars by including the mere adoption of technological aesthetics, strategies or modes of presentation in his concept, but his focus on technological or mass media resembles other definitions of mediatisation. Erika Fischer-Lichte, for example, also uses the term ‘mediatised’ to refer to performances that make use of recording or playback technologies (cf. 2001: 11, 16). In a similar way, Freda Chapple and Chiel Kattenbelt contrast mediation via signs as a general condition of all communication with mediatisation by means of “recording or playback technologies” or any other “technological transmission device” (2006b: 22 f.). Stefan Weber, however, introduces a different terminology by distinguishing ‘mediality’ [“Medialität”] as a basic ontological principle or “[c]onditio sine qua non” from ‘medialisation’ [“Medialisierung”] as an empirically perceptible or epistemological trend observable in reality to varying degrees (2003: 174), but not necessarily depending on the use of technological media. Departing from an intersection of all above-mentioned definitions, the term ‘mediatisation’ will in the following be used to refer to an experience of the world based on mechanical, technological or electronic (analogue as well as digital) media. It will therefore be regarded as a process that is measurable to a certain extent, in terms of the number of media involved or with regard to the duration or frequency of their use in a specific context. Even where mediatisation refers only to an indirect aesthetic or formal influence of technological media, the phenomenon can still be observed and identified. ‘Mediation,’ on the other hand, will be considered as an essentially imperceptible and inevitable aspect of our general experience of the world, based first and foremost on physical or cognitive sense perceptions. Assuming that theatre is mediated by default, but not necessarily mediatised, the present study focuses on instances of ‘mediatisation’ in theatre and investigates the use of technological media and their aesthetic and formal influence on theatrical performances.

 Cf. also Erika Fischer-Lichte’s brief historical account of stage machinery (2001: 16).

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3.2 What Lies Beyond Mediation and Mediatisation? The question of whether media are ubiquitous and therefore turn mediation or even mediatisation into a general condition of human perception, cognition and interaction has been repeatedly addressed by individual media scholars and has already been dealt with as early as in Plato’s allegory of the cave. With regard to the role media play for our experience of the world, it might seem logical to assume a binary distinction of positions depending on whether scholars rely on the notions of ‘mediation’ or ‘mediatisation.’ Accordingly, it could be expected that those departing from the concept of ‘mediation’ generally deny the existence of an unmediated reality beyond media, because for them the experience of the world is always filtered by sense perceptions, whereas those scholars concerned with ‘mediatisation’ regard technological media as marginal phenomena dispensable for the experience of a world that exists independently from media. Although this distinction may seem plausible, it does not apply to all media theories, as the matter is more complicated. On the one hand, scholars such as Martin Seel argue that although the world can only be experienced via mediation, it is not generated or constructed by media so that the existence of a reality beyond media – though imperceptible – cannot be denied. On the other hand, the increasing influence of technological media and their aesthetics on every-day life, as observed, for example, by Kittler and Baudrillard, leads to the assumption that both mediation and mediatisation have become inevitable for our experience of the world. For Auslander, this even extends to mediatisation infiltrating any type of performance, theatrical or other, so that unmediated live performance no longer exists. In this labyrinth of diverse positions, it is therefore worthwhile to attempt a more detailed investigation of individual approaches as well as a survey of related discussions. Yet, so far a systematic analysis of existing positions has only been provided in the area of ‘media philosophy’ [“Medienphilosophie”], a discipline that has recently established itself in Germany and Austria since the last decade of the twentieth century (cf. Margreiter 2007: 11, 20). In the general discourse on mediation and mediatisation the German philosopher and media scholar Sybille Krämer identifies two diametrically opposed positions which she terms ‘media marginalism’ [“Medienmarginalismus”] versus ‘media generativism’ [“Mediengenerativismus”]. ‘Media marginalism,’ on the one hand, represents the assumption that media are neutral and imperceptible phenomena that do not affect what they transmit and are therefore secondary to the messages or contents they convey. This position, in other words, assumes that there is an ultimate truth or objective reality beyond media which – al-

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though it may be accessed via media – is neither constituted nor altered by them (cf. Krämer 2004: 22; 2003: 80). In this sense, this approach takes up the notion of neutrality associated with the Latin root of the word ‘medium’ (cf. “Medium,” OLD, def. 7). Yet, this position has lost its proponents in current media theory, which is based on the general assumption that media are constitutive of processes of communication and in some way affect these processes, which renders media worth being analysed in the first place (cf. Lagaay, and Lauer 21 f.). ‘Media generativism,’ on the other hand, expresses an understanding of the medium as an a priori condition. According to this approach, media are seen as ubiquitous and antecedent to our experience of the world. In a constructivist line of argument, supporters of this position not only believe ‘reality’ to be inaccessible unless media are involved, but also assume that media are never neutral, because they produce and construct rather than simply transmit what is erroneously taken as a given or as objective ‘reality’ (cf. Krämer 2004: 22 f.; 2003: 80). Sometimes, the notion of an a priori state of media is even referred to as a ‘media(l) turn’ (e. g. Stefan Weber 1999). This term implies a paradigmatic change analogous to earlier historic shifts such as the ‘linguistic turn,’ the ‘semiotic’ or ‘symbolic turn’ and the ‘iconic’ or ‘pictorial turn’ (cf. Margreiter 2007: 31 f., 92). Whereas the earlier turns identified the constitutive function of language, signs or symbols, and visual information for our cognition and our general perception of the world, the ‘media(l) turn’ expresses the idea that reality can only be experienced via media so that mediality is seen as a basic condition of human existence (cf. Margreiter 2005: 241). Whether or not the term ‘media(l) turn’ is accepted,²¹ the notion of a primacy of media associated with it gained many staunch defenders even before the term was coined. The debates on ‘media generativism’ were initiated first and foremost by Marshall McLuhan’s groundbreaking expression of this idea in his influential phrase “the medium is the message” (1964: 7).²² McLuhan shifts the focus from the messages or contents of media to media themselves and to their materiality irrespective of their messages and argues that the “‘content’ of any medium is always another medium” (1964: 8). Moreover, as an “extension” or “self-amputation” of the human body and mind (1964: 7, 45, 49; 1967: 26; see chapter 1.1), “any medium affects the entire field of the senses” (1964: 45). Hence, media are no neutral channels of information but effect changes in the  Objections to a strict understanding of this term by analogy to the ‘linguistic turn’ are expressed, for example, by Münker (cf. 18 ff.).  McLuhan playfully modified this catchphrase in the title of his publication The Medium Is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects (1967).

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recipients so that “[m]edia work us over completely [and] leave no part of us untouched, unaffected, unaltered” (1967: 26). McLuhan therefore also refers to media as “‘make happen’ agents” rather than “‘make aware’ agents” (1964: 49) in order to stress that, while concealing their own materiality and hiding their mediality, media actually have a constitutive power to shape their messages and our experiences of the world. Although this means that media never facilitate a neutral perception of the world, McLuhan apparently does not altogether discard the concepts of reality or representation, which occasionally resurface in his analysis of individual media. Thus, statements that see photography as a medium that “mirror[s] the external world” (1964: 190) or describe the power of films to “roll up the real world on a spool in order to unroll it as a magic carpet of fantasy” (1964: 284) still assume the existence of an external reality, although this reality can only be accessed via media. Whereas McLuhan believes the omnipresence of media to be the original state of human experience, the French philosopher, sociologist and cultural theorist Jean Baudrillard argues that the construction of an alleged reality via media is only a contemporary phenomenon. In his seminal work Simulations (1983), Baudrillard introduces his theory of the ‘three orders of simulacra’ as three consecutive stages in the historical development of the relation between signs (or media as carriers of signs) and reality. Since each order is characteristic of a distinct historical period up to the present day, the succession of the orders traces the historical modifications in the relationship between signs or simulacra and what is perceived as ‘the real.’ As each order substitutes the previous order (cf. 1983: 101), Baudrillard observes a gradual erasure of the distinction between reality and simulacra or “the imaginary” (1994: 121 f.): the clearly defined opposition between the two poles in the first order of simulacra is superseded by multiple projections of reality in the second order until, in the third order, reality is completely substituted by the hyperreal. Thus, with the succession of the three orders of simulacra, it becomes increasingly difficult to “isolate the process of the real, or to prove the real” (1983: 41; emphasis in the original), and the initial belief in the possibility of creating representations of reality is eventually replaced by a denial of the very existence of reality per se. According to Baudrillard, the era of the first order of simulacra, the counterfeit, lasted from the Renaissance to the industrial revolution (cf. 1983: 83). Although the counterfeit was intended to resemble and imitate reality as closely as possible like a “double” or “mirror” (1983: 98), it never quite effaced the awareness of a difference between original and representation (cf. 1983: 93 f.) so that both remained ontologically distinct phenomena. With the industrial era, new means of mechanical and technological reproduction emerged and launched the second order of simulacra which was charac-

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terised by production (cf. 1983: 83) in the sense of a creation of identical serial replications of reality whose mutual relation was “no longer that of an original to its counterfeit – neither analogy nor reflection – but equivalence, indifference” (1983: 97). Thus, instead of the former supposed one-to-one correspondence between counterfeit and original, an infinite series of duplicates now competed with reality. These duplicates, however, were positioned at a further remove from reality because the reproductions were no longer signs which directly imitated reality, but they were signs referring to other signs which in turn imitated real phenomena (cf. Laughey 149). In a similar context and with reference to the excessive reproduction of reality by means of the new technologies of film and photography, Walter Benjamin observed a certain loss of the ‘aura’ that emanates only from original works of art (cf. 16 ff.). Judging from the contemporary distrust in the concepts of ‘reality’ and ‘representation,’ Baudrillard’s notion of both first and second order simulacra displays a problematic notion of reality as an objective given that precedes representation. However, with Baudrillard’s third order of simulacra, his concept of simulation, which he considers as the dominant mode of the contemporary era (cf. 1983: 83), the notion of reality is completely discarded and replaced by the ‘hyperreal.’ In the absence of actual reality, a nostalgia for ‘the real’ leads to attempts at concealing its absence and retrieving the real by a “panic-stricken production of the real and the referential” (1983: 13), a “hysteria of production and reproduction of the real” via simulation (1983: 44). Simulation thus has no more basis in reality but constitutes a “generation by models of a real without origin or reality: a hyperreal” (1983: 2). Hence, simulation is not simply a reversal of the first order of simulacra in so far as reality itself is now preceded by models instead of serving as a model for the creation of counterfeits (cf. 1983: 32; 1994: 122); for what is more, simulation completely substitutes the real by mere signs of the real (cf. 1983: 4). This necessitates a redefinition of the real as the hyperreal, which is no longer only “what can be reproduced, but that which is always already reproduced” (1983: 176; emphasis in the original). Baudrillard describes this as a “collapse of reality into hyperrealism” (1983: 141) by which the binary opposition between reality and the imaginary dissolves and merges into the new state of the hyperreal (cf. 1983: 142) as a usually unconscious substitute for reality. In light of the question of what lies beyond mediatisation, Baudrillard’s notions of simulation and the hyperreal therefore suggest that media technologies not only interfere with our perception of reality, but first and foremost construct what is erroneously perceived as reality so that there is nothing real beyond mediatisation any more. Yet, according to Baudrillard, simulation usually remains imperceptible, because the influence of media is so subtle and media have be-

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come so “intangible, diffuse and diffracted in the real” that “[t]he medium itself is no longer identifiable as such” (1983: 54). With this observation, Baudrillard refines McLuhan’s famous formula “the medium is the message” (McLuhan 1964: 7; 1967: 26) and explains that “there is not only an implosion of the message in the medium, there is, in the same movement, the implosion of the medium itself in the real, the implosion of the medium and of the real in a sort of hyperreal nebula” (Baudrillard 1994: 82; emphasis in the original). The medium, in other words, has become indistinguishable from the real. Friedrich A. Kittler with his notion of media as “anthropological a prioris” (1999: 109) is to be considered as a further supporter of media generativism. Kittler asserts that “[m]edia determine our situation” (1999: xxxix) and points out that technology enabled “the fabrication of so-called Man […] whose essence escapes into apparatuses” (1999: 16). Rather than being the inventors of information technologies, human beings are therefore seen as subjects generated by media (cf. 1997: 143) that control their understanding (cf. 1999: xl). Moreover, there is no end to mediatisation since even obsolete media always evolve into a new medium so that “[w]here one stops, another somewhere begins” (1999: 130). Yet, just like Baudrillard’s analysis, Kittler makes subtle distinctions between different historical stages of technological media: although media shape or determine us and are constitutive for our world-view, earlier phonographic media such as the gramophone and the audiotape still recorded “signatures of the real” (1999: 118) whereas cinematographic media such as films are “more real than reality” and produce rather than reproduce reality (1999: 145). The analogy between ‘linguistic turn’ and ‘media(l) turn’ is best illustrated by Neil Postman’s media theory which generally highlights the constructive role of media among which language or speech function as “the primal and indispensable medium” (9). This is summed up in Postman’s formula: “[O]ur languages are our media. Our media are our metaphors. Our metaphors create the content of our culture” (15). Accordingly, languages influence our “world-view” (9 f.), and media in general effect “a transformation of [our] way of thinking – and, of course, of the content of [our] culture” (13; cf. 9). Postman concludes: “Whether we are experiencing the world through the lens of speech or the printed word or the television camera, our media-metaphors classify the world for us” (10). The perception of our environment, in other words, is always determined and shaped by the chosen medium. One of the most radical expressions of ‘media generativism’ has been put forward in Matthew Causey’s analysis of techno-culture in Theatre and Performance in Digital Culture: From Simulation to Embeddedness (2006). While simulation merely masked and “replaced the real with the signs of the real,” he argues that the shift to an era of embeddedness results in “a dataflow that could inhabit

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the real itself and alter its essence” (3, 9, 165) and thus actually interferes with reality by “infecting the real from within information patterns and biological entities” (151). By means of innovations such as genetic engineering, cloning, transgenic animals, human-machine interfaces, technological interventions in the human brain etc., technologies become embedded within human or animal bodies (cf. 166) and eventually threaten to disempower and dematerialise the human body (cf. 4). Should this scenario become a general state of affairs, the question of a perception of reality beyond media would become completely obsolete because here media not only determine what lies outside the human body but directly interfere with the human body and its nervous system. As a compromise between media marginalism and generativism, many scholars within the germanophone field of media philosophy have by now settled on an intermediate position. Martin Seel, for example, describes his own approach as a conflation of moderate constructivism and moderate realism (cf. 255). For him, this means that reality can only be experienced via media but nevertheless still exists independently from them (cf. 255, 252 f., 250). Consequently, it is possible to imagine aspects of reality or alternative realities that have not yet been experienced via media and which are therefore still unknown. A complete rendering of reality via media would, in fact, be impossible. To put it differently, although all reality can potentially or principally be mediated, de facto some aspects of it remain unmediated (cf. 252 f.). Seel concludes therefore that reality as such is no medial construction as constructivism and media generativism would have it; however, it can only be made accessible via medial constructions (cf. 255) though being independent from them in its existence. Sybille Krämer also regards the options of media marginalism and generativism as too extreme and argues in favour of a compromise between them. Although she agrees that media do not simply transmit messages but shape the way we think, perceive, experience, remember and communicate (cf. 1998b: 14), she explicitly criticises the notion of an a priori state of media as implied by media generativism (cf. 2008: 40, 10). For Krämer, there is always something beyond media (cf. 1998b: 10) and she clearly opposes the idea that media produce or construct what they transmit (cf. 2008: 40). She does not follow McLuhan’s formula of the conflation of medium and message but rather believes media to be hidden behind the messages and meanings they transmit (cf. 2008: 27; 1998a: 81). This self-effacement or ‘aisthetic self-neutralisation’ [“aisthetische Selbstneutralisierung”] (2008: 28) is the defining characteristic of media and enables their smooth operation (cf. 2008: 274). In fact, the more transparent and unnoticed media are, the more effectively they function (cf. 2008: 27 f.; 1998a: 74). As a corollary, reality gives the impression of being un-

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mediated (cf. 2008: 28) because media completely recede into the background. From this it follows that media per se remain a ‘blind spot’ because they cannot be observed or analysed and always remain invisible (cf. 2008: 74; 2003: 81). Since Krämer moreover assumes that media can only mediate what is already transmitted via another medium, she regards intermediality as a basic phenomenon and even discards the very notion of separate media as an abstraction (cf. 2003: 85). Only when media are disrupted or break down in noise or dysfunction, i. e. when they fail to fulfil their function as neutral transmitters, do they become visible and accessible to perception (cf. 2008: 27; 1998a: 74; 2003: 81). In these instances, however, the medium loses its defining feature of invisibility and thus ceases to be a medium, only to turn instead into a mere sign or technology, i. e. into a ‘non-medium’ [“Nichtmedium”] (2008: 274). On the whole, Dieter Mersch agrees with Krämer’s point of view. Like Krämer, he rejects expressions of the ubiquity of media (cf. 2004: 75) by asserting that perception actually precedes the medium (cf. 2002: 53 f.). His ‘negative media theory’ [“negative Medientheorie”] (e. g. 2004: 79) centres on the problematic imperceptibility and self-concealment of media as already addressed by Krämer: if media disappear and become invisible in the process of mediation, they become difficult to grasp and render any distanced, detached or objective analysis of media impossible (cf. Mersch 2002: 56 f.; 2004: 76; 2007: 86). Media can neither self-reflexively mediate or mirror their own materiality or mediality in an intra-medial process (cf. 2004: 79; 2006: 222; 2002: 67), because they are bound to recede into invisibility as soon as they become their own content or message (cf. 2007: 87); nor can media mutually render each other visible in intermedial processes, because the medium that mediates or comments on another medium in turn becomes invisible in the process and would again require another medium to foreground it (cf. 2004: 79). In this process, the reflected medium would turn from subject into an object of mediation and would be visible not as the form but only as the content of mediation. Still in line with Krämer’s argumentation, Mersch thus identifies noise or breakdown of mediation as the only moment when media become visible and when their functionality can be subjected to scrutiny (cf. 2004: 63, 66, 83; 2007: 86). In this context, Mersch stresses the subversive potential of the arts to make media perceptible via deliberate and paradox interventions which undermine smooth processes of mediation and create fissures in the transmission where media suddenly become visible (cf. 2006: 228; 2002: 54; 2004: 75). The problem of the invisibility of media is also addressed by Reinhard Margreiter’s distinction between natural and externalised media. According to Margreiter, mediation based on natural or primary media such as the five senses (cf. 2003: 156 f.) is hardly noticeable, whereas externalised media, such as writ-

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ing, self-critically allow for an analysis of ‘reality’ and of one’s own perception and experience of it (cf. 2003: 160). Yet, Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin, who focus on mediatisation in the sense of technological (specifically digital) media and the arts, convincingly contradict Krämer’s and Mersch’s theory that media can only become visible when being dysfunctional, as well as Margreiter’s assumption that the visibility of media depends on the kind of medium involved. Instead, they argue that, depending solely on its use in a particular process of mediatisation, any medium can both hide and display its own materiality or mediality. Therefore the visibility of a medium does not imply its breakdown or failure, but merely presents one of its possible “alter ego[s]” (Bolter, and Grusin 34). This idea is elaborated in their notions of ‘immediacy’ and ‘hypermediacy’ as two interdependent styles of representation (cf. 6; see chapter 2.2) that rely on each other in “the twin logics” (5) according to which the one gains importance and can only be appreciated by contrast with the respective other. In the case of immediacy, the presence or materiality of the medium is forgotten so that immediacy creates the impression of a direct access to the content of the medium (cf. 272). This state is also referred to as the “transparency” of a medium (19), a state that seems to be more difficult to achieve than visibility. Although most media have, at least since the Renaissance, striven for immediacy in order maximally to immerse the user in the medium without being aware of its materiality (cf. 24, 53), immediacy usually cannot as yet be kept up permanently by any medium and eventually changes into an awareness of the mediality (cf. 236). In this case, immediacy becomes replaced by hypermediacy which creates “opacity.” Hypermediacy deliberately draws attention to the medium and makes it visible through a multiplication of the “signs of mediation” (33 f.) as, for example, in the “windowed style” or “CNN look” of many television news broadcasts (189). The opposition of immediacy and hypermediacy can therefore be described as the difference between the act of “looking through” a medium as opposed to consciously “looking at” a medium (41, 81; emphasis in the original). Although Bolter and Grusin suggest that some media favour immediacy or hypermediacy (cf. 161), they clearly point out that all media have the potential of being both immediate and hypermediate (e. g. 6) and often “oscillate” between both options (19). Yet, they repeatedly point out that there is no way of completely avoiding or getting beyond mediation because mediation – even if rendered imperceptible – is inevitable and always depends on previous acts of mediation (cf. 55 f.). This means that media always refer to an already mediated reality and

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always operate in relation to other media²³ which they ‘refashion,’ rework, compete with, emulate etc. (cf. 14 f., 55, 273). This so-called ‘remediation’ (see chapter 1.2) is a two-way process because new media refashion older ones and vice versa (cf. 48, 55, 105). Nevertheless, in this endless cycle of remediation reality still exists because media are themselves real phenomena and eventually still refer to an underlying reality (cf. 55 f., 59). Therefore Bolter and Grusin conclude: “Just as there is no getting rid of mediation, there is no getting rid of the real” (56). Grusin further extends the triad of immediacy, hypermediacy and remediation by adding the term ‘premediation.’ In his analysis of the current use of media, he observes a “prophetic” role of media and specifically news media (Grusin 23), i. e. a trend to premediate the future and prospective media before they arrive (cf. 36) and to provide mediated versions of anticipated events. He ascribes this phenomenon to a general fear of suddenly being confronted with unmediated events, which is based on shocking experiences of catastrophes such as 9/11 in America (cf. 21, 26). Grusin stresses however that the future, once it happens, is nevertheless not a mere simulation, as Baudrillard would have it, but a reality experienced via mediation and remediation as reality always would be (cf. 28 f.). The idea that reality may erroneously be perceived as being mediatised is expressed by Lydia Reeves Timmins and Matthew Lombard’s notion of “inverse presence” which they define as the “perceptual illusion of mediation” (496).²⁴ Although they observe that mediatisation has an ever-growing influence (cf. 499), they still insist on the existence of reality and presence (cf. 499). They argue, however, that real experiences now increasingly tend to be interpreted as being mediatised because people have lost touch with reality and can no longer perceive or appreciate the difference between reality and mediatisation (cf. 499) or have grown “cynical, distrustful, and apathetic about the nonmediated world” (500). Accordingly, such illusory perceptions of reality as being mediatised may serve as a “defence mechanism” (498) against negative experiences but may also result in disappointment with a reality that cannot compete with its mediatised idealisation (cf. 498).

 Nöth et al. similarly observe an inevitable self-referentiality of media: if media only mediate a world that is always already mediated, they do not represent reality but only refer to each other (cf. Nöth, Bishara, and Neitzel 55). Instead of allowing for representation and hetero-reference, media are therefore necessarily limited to self-reference (cf. Nöth 60).  Although they use the term ‘mediation,’ they refer specifically to technological media such as films, television, video games and virtual reality (cf. Reeves Timmins, and Lombard 499) which correspond to the concept of ‘mediatisation’ rather than ‘mediation’ as defined in chapter 3.1.

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Philip Auslander’s own concept of ‘mediatisation’ focuses on the relation between mediatisation and ‘liveness’ rather than ‘reality’ although these notions are obviously related, because liveness is generally experienced as being unmediated and therefore ‘real’ in some way (cf. 1999: 3). Not only does Auslander borrow the term ‘mediatized’ from Baudrillard (cf. Auslander 1999: 4), but his theory also bears resemblance and displays parallels to Baudrillard’s observations on simulation, implosion and the hyperreal. Auslander questions the alleged ontological distinction between liveness and mediatisation in terms of intrinsic traits. Similar to Baudrillard’s notion of the implosion of reality and simulation, he observes an increasing assimilation of live and mediatised events to an extent where “whatever distinction we may have supposed there to be between live and mediatized events is collapsing because live events are becoming more and more identical with mediatized ones” until mediatisation eventually replaces liveness (1999: 31 f.). In other words, liveness has become so infiltrated by mediatisation that the live event can often no longer be said to be live at all. Auslander therefore argues that a distinction between liveness and mediatisation is merely possible when based on ideological, historical, cultural, symbolic or economic criteria (cf. 1999: 51, 54, 159). Although, historically seen, liveness preceded mediatisation, the very notion of liveness only emerged and became indispensable as a contrast and in response to a proliferation of mediatisation (cf. Auslander 1999: 51 f., 54) so that “liveness was made visible only by the possibility of technical reproduction” (1999: 54). When technological and electronic media were initially introduced, they were therefore modelled on established live media such as theatre (cf. 1999: 23) and tried to compete with their perceived liveness. Television, for instance, used to be advertised as a live medium, and although it no longer only broadcasts in real-time nowadays, it still frequently attempts to create an impression of liveness by using a “live studio audience” (1999: 12, 22), live conferences etc. Meanwhile, however, the economic and cultural success of technological media has led to a reversal of the relation and symbolic value of liveness and mediatisation and has resulted in an emancipation of the now more desirable mediatised events from the live events (cf. 1999: 10 f., 27 f.). As a consequence, live events now increasingly emulate and are modelled on preceding mediatised events which, in turn, were initially modelled on live events, so that live performances “have become second-hand recreations of themselves as refracted through mediatization” (1999: 158). As with Baudrillard’s simulation as a “generation by models of a real without origin or reality” (Baudrillard 1983: 2), liveness thus no longer necessarily precedes mediatisation but is itself preceded by and modelled on mediatisation. Though Auslander believes that mediatisation has an ever-increasing influence on contemporary culture, he does not argue that liveness no longer exists at all. But, in practice, it has be-

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come marginalised (cf. 1996: 196) and has lost its importance and symbolic value (cf. 1999: 158 f., 162, 36) so that it is now depreciated as mediatisation’s other, as a secondary phenomenon that precedes, imitates or authenticates mediatisation and throws it into perspective as its alleged opposite (cf. 1996: 198, 202; 1999: 158). Auslander even suggests that live and mediatised events serve as a mutual proof of their respective authenticity. Even where, in fact, the mediatised event precedes the live event (as, for example, in the case of many music videos and subsequent live concerts), a live event that successfully imitates the mediatised version retroactively confirms the common assumption that mediatised events are only representations of prior live events and that, therefore, watching a mediatised event implies that there must have been a live event in the first place (cf. 1999: 38 f.). As Auslander puts it, this mutual relation in which the live event “naturalizes” the mediatised event, which in turn serves as a model for the live event, leads to a certain circularity: “[W]hereas mediatized performance derives its authority from its reference to the live or the real, the live now derives its authority from its reference to the mediatized, which derives its authority from its reference to the live, etc.” (1999: 38 f.). Whereas, according to Baudrillard, the relation of hyperreal and real is monodirectional in so far as the hyperreal masks the disappearance of the real, the relation of liveness and mediatisation is reciprocal: mediatisation masks the absence of liveness while liveness enhances the authenticity of the mediatised event. Auslander’s observations with regard to the ubiquity of mediatisation and its encroachment on liveness provoke the question of whether the current situation is due to an ideological devaluation of liveness and indicative of its cultural subordination to mediatisation. Auslander’s comments on this question are contradictory: although he asserts that, in general, “far more symbolic capital is attached to live events than to mediatized ones” (1999: 59), he claims at the same time that mediatisation is not only more profitable and culturally present but also far more prestigious than liveness (cf. 1999: 162). Yet, prestige may be a misleading criterion for explaining the dominance of mediatisation over liveness. Whereas in many cases mediatisation is the deliberate consequence of a delight in playing with media, the omnipresence of mediatisation in general is less a matter of its increasing prestige and symbolic status than an expression of an unconscious adjustment to mediatised perception: mediatisation is often so subtle and imperceptible as to be simply taken for granted by a public that has become immune to its effects and is no longer used to or even reluctant to a direct experience of liveness. Auslander moreover detects a “need for televisual intimacy” (1999: 159) and a corresponding “depreciation of live presence” (1999: 36). Since in large-scale

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live events, the audience cannot establish an intimate relation with the actors, musicians, sportsmen etc. who often perform at a good distance, the use of large video screens and monitors at live events combined with the technique of the close-up creates the necessary immediacy experienced through media such as television “which has become our model for close-up perception” (1999: 35). While this observation might help to explain the use of mediatisation in large-scale live events, it is not convincing or sufficient when applied to smallscale live events where the natural proximity does not necessarily need to be enhanced by large screens and close-ups. In these instances, therefore, other reasons have to be assumed to account for the use of mediatisation. Prototype Theater’s production Virtuoso (working title), which will be analysed in the following chapters, provides an example of a playful exploration of the excessive use of extreme close-ups, a use that suggests a voyeuristic desire for intimacy and establishes a hyper-presence that exceeds live presence. As the various positions presented in this chapter illustrate, there is no agreement or common approach with regard to the three interrelated questions of whether media are marginal phenomena or present an a priori condition, whether they are neutral transmitters of an actual, though possibly inaccessible reality or constitutive for the experience of a merely constructed reality and, finally, whether they are visible or invisible. Firstly, following the distinction between mediation and mediatisation, it can be argued that mediation is a basic anthropological condition because there is no chance of getting beyond mediation as an inevitable effect of sense perception. In contrast to this, although mediatisation with its reliance on technological and mechanical media also gains an increasingly central role in contemporary society and culture, technological media have not (yet) completely usurped any access to the world so that arguments for technological determinism and an a priori mediatisation as expressed by Kittler and Baudrillard must be considered as exaggerated. Admittedly, in the context of contemporary performance practice, mediatisation is increasingly present on stage in the use of technological media or in the mere imitation of a technological aesthetic as observable, for instance, in the productions by Gob Squad analysed in the following chapters. Yet such case studies also illustrate that mediatisation is no inevitable aspect of theatrical performances but is used deliberately and in a conscious way. Secondly, although mediation is an inevitable aspect of any experience of the world and is complemented by an ever-increasing mediatisation, Seel is convincing in his argumentation that although reality cannot be perceived without interference of media, this does not necessarily mean that reality per se does not

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exist at all. In fact, the existence of reality beyond media is as likely as its nonexistence, and there is no way of ever getting out of this quandary as long as mediation prevents any immediate access to the world. Thirdly, as far as the elusiveness of media is concerned, the fact that discourse on media is actually possible and that communication studies have elaborated diverse theories on individual media suggests that at least some media are tangible or perceptible and that this does not necessarily imply their breakdown or failure. Moreover, whether attention is paid to the mediality and materiality or to the ‘content’ of a certain medium is not a question of the type of medium, but it depends on the focus and specific interest of users or audience as well as on the presentation and use of a medium in a specific context. Consequently, although processes of mediation tend to be less noticeable than mediatisation, all media can be both transparent and opaque depending on their use. Applied to the analysis of the mediatisation of theatrical performances, Auslander’s theory of the assimilation of liveness and mediatisation implies that the use of technological media within theatre should not be perceived as a contrast of liveness versus mediatisation, because theatrical performances are no longer characterised by pure liveness anyway. Although Auslander’s theory is convincing in so far as theatrical performances increasingly make overt or covert use of technological media and are therefore often more mediatised than generally assumed, Bolter and Grusin’s notions of immediacy and hypermediacy suggest that the awareness or imperceptibility of mediatisation essentially depends on its foregrounding or framing in a specific context. Bolter and Grusin’s concepts of immediacy and hypermediacy are therefore particularly relevant to the analysis of the use of film and video in theatrical performances, because they suggest that both the theatrical medium itself and the incorporated media can be rendered immediate or hypermediate depending on how they are used. By deliberately directing the attention of the audience towards one medium rather than to another, media that are normally more inclined to immediacy may become more perceptible, whereas the spectators’ awareness of media that tend to be hypermediate may decrease. Whether the use of film or video within theatrical performances is perceived as an element of mediatisation opposed to the overall liveness of a performance or as an integral and hardly distinguishable element of its general mediatisation thus primarily depends on whether the technological or electronic media are consciously played off against each other and against the live action, or whether the transition from one to the other is deliberately presented as being seamless. Although this does not cancel out the actual existence of a given mediation or mediatisation, it changes its intensity and the attentiveness bestowed upon it.

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Consequently, a performance may generally aim at immediacy or hypermediacy, but it may also attempt to play off immediacy and hypermediacy against each other on different levels or layers of the performance. Such a foregrounding of individual media and their materiality may be brought about via an intentional disruption or breakdown of mediation or mediatisation as suggested by Krämer and Mersch above, e. g. by the deliberate use of low-resolution films or videos on stage or via the actual destruction of projection surfaces as in Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes that will be analysed in the following chapters. Yet, hypermediacy may also be caused by the mere intermedial combination of media which automatically raises the awareness of the respective materiality or mediality of both theatrical medium and technological media and results in a reflection of one medium in another, because intermediality has a general capacity of foregrounding the involved media by framing them. This clash of diverse media and art forms due to intermediality can be considered an example of Mersch’s above-mentioned potential of the arts to make normally invisible media visible. Combining Baudrillard’s idea of proving reality by hyperreality and Auslander’s observations on the authentication of mediatisation by liveness, the use of film and video within theatrical performances may thus not only decrease the overall impression of liveness but may instead also lead to a mutual authentication and enhancement of liveness and mediatisation: whereas the perceived liveness of a performance may be increased by contrast with inserted mediatised scenes, the authenticity of such mediatised scenes may in turn be increased by their interaction with the live action on stage. Irrespective of how liveness and mediatisation are combined and relate to each other in specific instances of intermedial theatre and performance, it can be assumed that the encroachment of mediatisation on live performances has affected the way we perceive theatre and live performances nowadays. Theatre may nevertheless remain a live medium, but its use of mediatisation renegotiates and stages its own liveness. As Matthew Causey argues without further specification of the exact effects of mediatisation, “the ontology of the performance (liveness), which exists before and after mediatization, has been altered within the space of technology” (6, 16) and the overlapping of theatre and technology “will change, considerably, our definition of the boundaries of the theatre and the ontology of performance” (29). Due to the variety of performance practices, however, no simple answer can be given as to how exactly the ontology of theatre and performance will be affected. Depending on individual cases, liveness thus either may be confirmed by contrast with mediatisation or challenged due to its approximation to mediatisation. The productions analysed in the present study only offer a selection of possible approaches and give individual yet substantial answers to the

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question of how liveness and mediatisation relate to each other in theatre and performance. While Auslander mostly focuses on the proliferation of mediatisation, his notion of ‘liveness’ remains vague and elusive. Since, obviously, a critical discussion of the relation between liveness and mediatisation in theatre and performance requires a clarification of what is actually meant by ‘liveness,’ the following chapters will explore potential characteristics of liveness with specific regard to the theatrical context. Theatre is generally and primarily defined by its liveness. This characteristic feature also distinguishes theatre as performance from its ‘sibling’ drama as literary text or written script (see chapter 2.1). When mentioned by theatre practitioners or scholars, liveness is rarely invoked as a neutral description of theatrical performances but usually implies a value judgement that automatically equates liveness with uniqueness, beguiling immersion and emotional intensity and thus claims superiority of theatre over other, allegedly less accomplished media. Especially in current theories on the ubiquity of mediatisation in contemporary society, liveness plays a pivotal role as a possibly unattainable, yet much striven for ideal. In spite of the vital importance of the notion of liveness for theatre and performance studies, or maybe just because it is such a much-cited and worn out key concept, it is an ill-defined and extremely vague term. It is best approached in a separate examination of its constitutive elements as well as of the aspects that are frequently mistaken for defining characteristics of liveness. The following chapters will therefore successively deal with concepts that are related to the notion of liveness, but that are sometimes equally hazy and disputed, such as copresence, ephemerality, unpredictability, interaction and the representation of reality. Yet, it needs to be pointed out that the present study cannot answer once and for all what constitutes theatrical liveness. Instead its purpose is to investigate how various notions or aspects of liveness are taken up by individual theatre or performance collectives who explicitly or implicitly comment on the relation between liveness, mediatisation and ‘reality’ via their use of film and video.

4 Liveness on Stage 4.1 Spatio-Temporal Co-Presence Station House Opera: substitution, exponentiation and fragmentation of presence A live performer walks about the stage while each of his steps is observed by another performer looking down at him from a video screen as if watching him through a window. After a while, the altogether four live performers repeatedly disappear through a door next to this screen and immediately become visible in the on-screen room. In the same way, they issue forth from the screen and return back on stage. Occasionally, they leave the stage and the audience behind while apparently being followed by cameras that transmit their backstage and outdoor experiences directly to the screen. Eventually, one of the performers is seen as he saws his way through the wooden platform supporting the screen and apparently also through the floor of the videoed room before climbing into its mediatised world. On the reverse side of the screen, by contrast, he saws a passage out of the videoed room back onto the stage. These scenarios are only few of numerous examples of seamless transitions between stage and screen in Mare’s Nest (2001– 2004), a production by the London-based performance company Station House Opera.²⁵ Co-founded by artistic director Julian Maynard Smith in 1980, Station House Opera’s core members are Miranda Payne, David Goulding, Alison Urquhart, Jo Miles, Pascal Brannan, Bruce Gilchrist and Susannah Hart.²⁶ Their projects, more than thirty in number, have toured internationally and are mostly created in collaborative devising processes. Many of these productions form more or less coherent groups by developing similar themes or techniques. Works dating from their first decade, for instance, repeatedly challenge gravity to explore “new ways of flying”²⁷ by suspending performers or furniture from ceilings or from edifices and public sites such as Brooklyn Bridge in New York. Since the mid-1980s, Station House Opera have produced a series of site-specific or “site-responsive”

 The analysis of Mare’s Nest is based on the DVD recording of the performance at Le Lieu Unique in Nantes, France, in March 2003 (Station House Opera 2003). Time codes are measured with Windows Media Player and, unless otherwise specified, refer to the first of the two video streams available on the DVD.  Cf. http://www.stationhouseopera.com/about/.  http://www.stationhouseopera.com/project/6022/.

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(Mermikides, and Smart 24) architectural or sculptural performances and installations using breeze blocks. Since their first experimentation with the combination of live performance and life-size videos in Snakes and Ladders (1998), they have also explored the use of technological media such as video and internet in their work.²⁸ One of the productions that merge live performance and video is the abovementioned Mare’s Nest whose specific arrangement of the stage facilitates the transitions between liveness and mediatisation (see fig. 1). A double-sided screen is mounted on a platform dividing the stage into two playing spaces for the live performers in which the action takes place simultaneously. The performers not only frequently walk around the screen to perform in both playing spaces, but also pass through the door at the side of the screen that can be accessed via steps leading onto the raised platform. The moment the performers walk through this door, they actually cross over from one playing space to the other but also immediately become visible on screen as if they had just entered its mediatised world. Throughout the performance, the spectators are free to walk all around the edges of the stage to watch the performers from whichever perspective they prefer. Depending on where the spectators position themselves, some parts of the stage are hidden from view by the screen, unless the spectators stand along the dividing line formed by the screen itself, in which case they can observe both playing spaces but no longer properly see what is projected onto the front and rear side of the screen. Apart from the moments where the screen exactly doubles what can be seen on stage or shows scenes presumably taking place in backstage areas or in the vicinity of the respective performance venue, it shows a non-descript room which the performers seem to enter or pass through when they walk through the actual door in the screen. With the help of the regular ticking of a metronome and a minutely planned choreography it is possible for the live performers exactly to coordinate each and every movement with the on-screen videos. As a consequence, live and mediatised performers not only seem to interact directly with each other although the video footage is in fact pre-recorded, but they can sometimes hardly be told apart any more. The apparent transformation of live into mediatised performers and vice versa and the seeming contiguity of live and mediatised presence that is suggested by these smooth transitions playfully explore the validity of physical presence as a parameter for the distinction between liveness and mediatisation.

 Cf. http://www.stationhouseopera.com/about.php?section=4.

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Figure 1: Stage setup with two playing spaces divided by a double-sided screen in Station House Opera’s Mare’s Nest (image used with permission of Station House Opera)

Like most Station House Opera productions, Mare’s Nest makes very restricted use of dialogue, is hardly plot-driven and does not use psychologically coherent characterisation. Rather than creating individualised and consistent characters, Station House Opera present ‘personae’ that are shown in everyday actions, appear in varying constellations and are situated somewhere between fictional characters and the performers’ selves (cf. Kelly 53; Giesekam 2007: 202). According to Maynard Smith, Station House Opera thus demonstrate the ambiguity of representation and create a “duality of the performer as an ordinary bloke and the performer as someone who is going to be read as being somebody” (203). While this complicates the relation between real performer and fictional role, Station House Opera also blur the contrast between live and mediatised personae. But what is it that renders the distinction between live corporeality and its mediatised representation so difficult that the spectators of Mare’s Nest occasionally lose themselves in their interplay, although they actually know about the mere two-dimensionality of the mediatised performers and are intellectually aware of their lack of corporeality? First of all, the rapid and seamless transitions

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between stage and screen blur the clear boundary between liveness and mediatisation. Moreover, stage and screen repeatedly show the live performers and their mediatised doubles as they simultaneously go through exactly identical routines. At other times, their movements are repeated on stage or screen with only slight delay or variation. By means of editing, this doubling effect is occasionally increased so that individual live performers are suddenly not only doubled but tripled or further multiplied by their on-screen counterparts (00:12:15; 00:50:45; video stream 2: 00:47:36; 00:51:58; 01:00:12). This exponentiation of doubles not only complicates the distinction between live and mediatised performers because of an information overload, but it also decreases the impact of the live performers’ presence on stage because their corporeality has to compete with several mediatised doubles. That the production intends to challenge the spectators’ ability of distinguishing live from mediatised performers is further illustrated by instances of delayed repetition. In these cases, the live action does not always precede the mediatised action but sometimes only imitates individual movements, gestures and actions such as yawning (00:11:25), applauding (00:11:50) or striking a pose (00:45:15) that could already be seen on screen beforehand. At one point, all props are even minutely rearranged on the stage in order to correspond to their positioning on the screen (00:46:50). This suggests that live presence is not generally to be seen as the original that is to be copied by mediatisation. Furthermore, live and mediatised performers not only mutually acknowledge each other’s existence, but simply fill in for each other the moment their counterparts disappear from view. Mediatised existence is thus not considered as being inferior to live corporeality but figures as its equally valid substitute. All in all, the simulated transitions between liveness and mediatisation are so convincing and the exponentiation of doubles is so confusing that the beings on screen sometimes appear to be equally tangible and corporeal, even more so since they are mostly life-size. Station House Opera’s earlier production Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998; still ongoing) similarly creates the impression that live and mediatised performers are interchangeable rather than forming a hierarchical relation or ontological opposition.²⁹ With hardly any dialogue and a “minimalist set” (Zajac, n. pag.) Roadmetal, Sweetbread explores unspectacular everyday behaviour such as eat-

 The analysis of Roadmetal, Sweetbread is based on the DVD recording of the performance at the Maison de la Culture de Nevers et de la Nièvre in Nevers, France, in January 2005 (Station House Opera 2005). The time codes are measured with Windows Media Player. In 2012, the production was entirely revised including a new cast (cf. http://www.stationhouseopera.com/ project/6130/).

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ing, making tea, replacing a neon tube etc. As the simple actions are repeated with variations, they soon reveal subliminal aggression and actual violence or turn into “psychosexual games” (Giesekam 2007: 207). The limited plot involves a nameless couple on stage that is complemented by its life-size videoed doubles projected onto a large screen at the back of the stage. These doubles are joined moreover by the appearance of a mediatised male nude (00:26:31) and by the man’s secret lover (00:39:19), who are both also enacted by the two performers playing the couple. Just like Mare’s Nest, the production repeatedly creates an illusion of live relay and an uncertainty about what is live by using a plainly audible metronome in order perfectly to synchronise the live action with what is actually a pre-recorded video. Occasionally, however, stage and screen show variations of the same action that are mirror-inverted, complement or contradict each other. As in Mare’s Nest, the live performers are easily substituted by their mediatised doubles so that mediatisation fills in for live corporeality. The doubles are thus in no way inferior to the live performers to whom their mediatised existence appears to be equally real, meaningful and corporeal. In a scene of love-making in Roadmetal, Sweetbread, for instance, the female persona does not discriminate between her live partner and his mediatised doubles but is equally aroused by all of them. In his review of Roadmetal, Sweetbread David Batchelor stresses the interchangeability of live corporeality and mediatised immateriality when referring to the production as a “choreography of […] shadows, which start behaving independently of the bodies that cast them and which then make the bodies themselves behave like shadows” (Batchelor, n. pag.). Interestingly, the non-hierarchical arrangement and blurring of live and mediatised personae also extends to inanimate objects such as pieces of furniture that occasionally serve as replacements for the live performers. In a scene that shows an argument between the couple on stage and screen, the personae manhandle each other and throw about furniture, but whenever a performer is dragged or thrown across the stage, a piece of furniture is instead dragged or thrown about on video with the same movements and vice versa. Although objects and performers have no outward semblance, their identical treatment in these struggles on stage and screen suddenly blurs their differences (00:35:00). Yet, the multiplication and substitution that subverts the live performers’ physical supremacy is balanced by the use of fragmentation when the mediatised performers suddenly are no longer life-size but presented in medium long shots or close-ups. This creates a contrast between the selectivity of the video images and the indivisibility of live corporeality that cannot be broken down into smaller fragments. At such moments, the blending of live and medi-

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atised personae is disturbed and the spectators are suddenly reminded of the distinct nature of live and mediatised bodies. Moments of perfect illusion during which the doubles seem to be as corporeal as the live performers thus alternate with deliberate discrepancies of live and mediatised bodies that emphasise their different statuses. Yet, even when liveness and mediatisation are clearly distinguishable, physical corporeality is in no way presented as being superior to mediatised immateriality. Instead, they complement each other and are presented as being equally valid. Though mediatisation is not conceived of as being completely identical to live presence, it thus appears to be an adequate substitute for actual corporeality. Station House Opera’s productions deliberately use mediatisation in order to draw attention to the concept of ‘presence’ and warn against simply putting it on a level with liveness. As Cormac Power complains in general, “equating the notion of presence in theatre with the concept of ‘liveness’ tends to be reductive” (7). Instead, he identifies the potential of theatre to question conceived notions of theatrical presence (cf. 7), especially when live presence is directly contrasted with the use of mediatisation on stage (cf. 12). This very potential is also exploited in Station House Opera’s productions. They encourage the spectators to reflect on what constitutes presence in live as opposed to mediatised contexts and thus stress the importance of the concept for understanding live performance. At first sight, an approach to presence and corporeality as adopted by Station House Opera’s productions apparently contradicts widespread considerations of presence as a defining characteristic of the liveness of theatre because most of the time, the mediatised personae seem to be as present as and interchangeable with the live personae. Yet even in Station House Opera’s playful approximation of live presence with mediatisation, the two-dimensional prerecorded images of the mediatised performers do not actually equal the concrete corporeality and three-dimensionality of the live performers and their copresence with the spectators. In the end, Station House Opera cannot unhinge the specific quality of live presence, for their use of mediatisation only more or less successfully imitates and simulates live corporeality rather than actually creating it. That the mediatised performers’ physical presence is only simulated becomes strikingly clear whenever live and mediatised action are momentarily incongruous. The essential difference between live presence and mediatisation not only applies to videos as used in Station House Opera’s productions but to any type of mediatisation. Even 3-D films and games merely simulate three-dimensionality of mediatised performers and scenery by generating an illusion of depth perception. Live presence and corporeality also differ from any kind of me-

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diatisation in that the live performers’ bodies are subjected to natural laws and cannot simply be modified in scale or broken up into individual body parts via close-ups, medium or medium long shots (cf. Brietzke 30). This difference between live presence and mediatisation is effectually illustrated in the use of close-ups and the ensuing fragmentation of Station House Opera’s mediatised performers who moreover seem invulnerable despite the occasional aggression directed against them. Furthermore, the experience of corporeality in theatre and live performances also extends to the spectators’ own physical presence, since live performances not only visually and aurally stimulate the spectator but have the potential of activating all five senses (cf. Knopf 7) and thus address the spectators in their complete corporeality. In its extreme, this may even culminate in actual physical contact between performers and spectators as tactile rather than mere ocular proof of the performers’ corporeality. Such physical contact, however, is not established by Station House Opera though the live performers repeatedly pass through the auditorium in close proximity to the spectators in both productions.

Gob Squad and Station House Opera: temporal tele-presence via mediatisation A fragmentation of bodies by means of close-ups, medium or medium long shots can also be observed in Super Night Shot, a production devised by the EnglishGerman performance collective Gob Squad.³⁰ Gob Squad were founded by graduates of the Creative Arts course at Nottingham Trent University and Applied Theatre graduates of the University of Giessen in 1994 and are currently based primarily in Berlin with another office in Nottingham (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 10).³¹ From the original members Johanna Freiburg, Sean Patten, Berit Stumpf and Sarah Thom have remained with the cast, to be joined subsequently by Simon Will (in 1999), Bastian Trost (in 2003) and Sharon Smith (in 2010). In addition to these seven permanent members, Gob Squad frequently collaborate with additional associated performers, sound or video designers.³² Gob Squad’s productions usually dispense with conventional fictional characters. Instead,

 The analysis of Super Night Shot is based on the DVD recording of the performance at the Phoenix in Leicester on 11 February 2006 (Gob Squad 2006). Direct quotations are transcribed from the DVD and may differ in other performances of Super Night Shot due to the improvisational character of the production. The time codes are measured with Windows Media Player.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/about-us.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/about-us/whos-who.

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they favour a self-dramatisation that is closely linked to the performers’ real-life identities and try “to present real life with real people doing real things” (Tecklenburg, and Carter 9). The performers’ use of their real names in their productions contributes to this illusion that they are just ‘being themselves’ rather than acting a character. Super Night Shot premiered on 13 December 2003 at the Volksbühne im Prater in Berlin and has been touring internationally ever since, including a first production in England at the LIFT Festival London in 2004 (cf. Gob Squad 2012, n. pag.).³³ It has been the most successful Gob Squad show so far, leading to spin-off projects in Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo³⁴ and Abidjan.³⁵ The production actually begins in the absence of the audience, with four cameras recording the action that will later be played back once the audience has arrived. As usual for Gob Squad’s productions, the performers introduce themselves with their real names (00:05:10) to create the impression that they are being themselves rather than acting a character. At the same time, however, they take on the fictional roles of “a hero,” “a casting agent” in charge of finding a co-star, “a promoter” and “a location scout” in search of the perfect location for a Hollywood kiss (Gob Squad, and Quiñones 118). The action of Super Night Shot centres on the four performers who separately stroll around the host city of the performance on a mission to wage “war on anonymity” by employing their hand-held cameras as “weapons” (Gob Squad, and Quiñones 186). Their aim is to capture a Hollywood kiss between the performer chosen to be the ‘hero’ and a consenting member of the public within a time limit of only 60 minutes. Once the mission is completed, their four videos are immediately projected onto a split screen divided into four segments at the performance venue where the audience has been awaiting the return of the performers. Since the performers carry the cameras themselves, head and shoulder close-ups and medium long shots are the dominant mode of filming. Except for a few moments where the cameras are put down on tripods so that the performers can move further away in order to be seen in rare long shots, the cameras thus focus on the faces or torsos of performers and passers-by and occasionally shift to the performers’ walking and running feet (e. g. 00:07:45) in order to underline their movement through the city and the increasing speed and time pressure.

 Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/super-night-shot-tour-dates.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/about-us/part-four-into-the-second-decade.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/le-coup-de-foudre.

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As opposed to Station House Opera’s occasional fragmentation of the performers’ bodies on video, Gob Squad’s use of zooming and close-ups primarily serves to create an impression of three-dimensionality by presenting the mediatised performers from multiple perspectives that combine to form a more complete rendering of their corporeality. The effect of this strategy is most apparent at the beginning of the performance when the performers prepare for their mission. While they directly address their cameras one after the other in order to introduce themselves and explain the rules of the performance to the still absent audience, one camera gives a distance shot of the entire cast, whereas the other cameras simultaneously focus on the respective speaker from different perspectives and zoom in on different body parts. As a consequence, the mediatised performers are fragmented as if dissected into smaller units while at the same time the different perspectives of single body parts render them almost three-dimensional (00:02:00; see fig. 2).

Figure 2: Performer Sean Patten is fragmented by the cameras and simultaneously shown from multiple perspectives in Gob Squad’s Super Night Shot (image used with permission of Gob Squad)

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At other moments, however, the impression of three-dimensionality of the mediatised bodies is deliberately undermined by drawing attention to the mediatised performers’ lack of corporeality. Shortly before the climactic kiss between the ‘hero’ Simon and his ‘co-star,’ he explains accordingly: “I’d maybe like to apologise at this point for being a little bit two-dimensional. That’s how it can be in the movies sometimes” (00:44:06), thus not only punning on the metaphorical meaning of two-dimensionality as a reference to a ‘flat’ character, but also reminding the audience of his actual lack of corporeality on the screen. Yet, the main difference between Station House Opera’s and Gob Squad’s approaches to the notion of presence as a distinctive feature of liveness lies in Gob Squad’s characteristic play with the temporal and spatial co-presence of performers and spectators. To some extent, this can already be observed in Super Night Shot. The performers’ videoed exploration of the host city begins exactly one hour before the audience is admitted into the auditorium and it ends with the four performers’ return to the performance venue and with the frenetic welcome afforded them by the spectators, all of this still being filmed on the 60-minute video tapes. Immediately after the performers have returned, i. e. just after the footage has been recorded, all four videos are simultaneously presented to the audience without prior intermission for cutting or editing. The quick succession of recording and replay thus generates an impression of temporal co-presence, which is also captured by the subtitle “Instant video journeys from the city streets” added on the performance DVD (00:00:34.). The production further intensifies the feeling of immediacy by repeatedly reminding the audience of the time pressure due to the inexorable limitation of the runtime of the tapes to 60 minutes within which the performers’ mission has to be completed (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 36, 39). The four performers draw attention to the time ticking away when they synchronise their watches before setting off for their separate journeys through the city, or when they occasionally mention the remaining time until the final countdown with increasing agitation (e. g. 00:07:00; 00:26:50). This not only builds up suspense during the performance but also allows the spectators more immediately and directly to relive the performers’ past 60 minutes and to witness the actual production process of the videos. The fact that all four videos end with the performers’ triumphant return to the performance venue and capture the performers being cheered on by the audience further enhances the notion of shared time and space; for in this scene the spectators watch a moment of their own immediate past during which they occupied the same time and space as the performers and they can actually see themselves on the screen next to the performers. Since the ‘costar’ is invited to witness the screening of the four videos (cf. Tecklenburg,

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and Carter 26), the performance not only connects the spectators with the performers but also with this passer-by from the streets. In addition to the momentarily shared space and the illusion of a shared time between performers and audience, the simultaneity of the four videos and hence the actually shared time among the performers themselves is foregrounded. Although the performers are spatially separated from each other during their mission, they remain linked by a shared time frame of minutely synchronised “Magic Moments” during which all performers simultaneously rap (00:15:28) or tap-dance (00:26:00), spin around with their cameras (00:20:46), put on animal masks and flashy costumes (00:30:49; 00:40:40) or use identical shots and camera angles (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 34, 137). Occasionally, contact among the performers is furthermore established via brief phone calls (00:33:12; 00:38:39) that are made in order to arrange the location for the final kiss. Although the production uses pre-recorded videos, the quick succession of production and projection of the videos, their synchronisation and the filming of the spectators alongside the performers in the final scene all combine to create an illusion of temporal and momentary spatial co-presence among the four performers as well as among performers, passers-by and spectators. Spatiotemporal co-presence with actual physical contact, however, only occurs between performers and passers-by. For not only do the performers involve their interlocutors in conversations, but they also establish physical contact as when the ‘hero’ holds hands with and kisses his newly found ‘co-star’ (00:46:02) or carries another passer-by in his arms (00:23:55). The play with temporal and spatial co-presence of performers and spectators is even more striking in the Gob Squad productions that use live video relays in order to create what I will refer to as ‘temporal tele-presence,’ i. e. a mediatised co-presence in time despite the spatial absence of the performers. This contrast between physical absence in space and mediatised presence in time forms a recurring aspect of Gob Squad’s use of live video relays. The first among Gob Squad’s productions that extensively use video as a constitutive element was also the first to establish temporal tele-presence by means of live video relays. The Great Outdoors premiered at the Podewil in Berlin on 9 October 2001 and was first presented in England at the NOW Festival in Nottingham on 2 November of the same year. While the performers one after another leave the stage and the audience behind in order to explore the streets outside the venue, they stay connected with the remaining performers and the spectators via live and pre-recorded transmissions from video cameras and webcams

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as well as via the use of mobile phones and walkie-talkies (Gob Squad, and Quiñones 184).³⁶ As a consequence, the performers’ physical presence and corporeality is substituted by their mediatised tele-presence on two video screens, while the simultaneity of production and reception that is characteristic of live performances is still upheld. A performance in the absence of the performers is the scenario explored in Gob Squad’s subsequent production using temporal tele-presence via mediatisation. Room Service (Help Me Make It Through the Night) ³⁷ was devised for the German Intercity Hotel chain of the Steigenberger Hotel Group (cf. Ernst 209). It was first performed at the Intercity Hotel Hamburg on 24 January 2003, received its UK premiere at the Park Plaza Hotel in Nottingham on 5 May 2005 and was last performed in October 2010 after having toured internationally.³⁸ The production takes the contrast between spatial distance and temporal simultaneity to an extreme by isolating the performers in individual hotel rooms where they are physically separated not only from the audience but also from each other, so that they never directly see each other and have only their respective cameras for company. Over the duration of several hours, the audience follows the performers’ nocturnal activities and inactivity via live transmissions from the cameras to four screens set up in the hotel lobby, without directly seeing any live performers. Wolf-Dieter Ernst describes this arrangement as a “semipresence” (205). Yet, in order to kill time in the long hours of the night, the performers occasionally communicate with the spectators by using the intercom. Sometimes, individual spectators are even invited to join one of the performers in their hotel room for one of the brief “Close Encounters” (Gob Squad, and Freiburg 105) during which they are assigned a specific role or task to fulfil for the performer. During these moments, the chosen spectators briefly share the respective performer’s time and space and are seen on the video screen alongside the performer while being physically absent from the rest of the audience. These occasional transitions of individual spectators from the ‘here’ of the audience into the ‘there’ of the performers underline the disparity yet also the permeability of the separate spaces and link them in the ‘now’ of real-time. In this sense, Room Service figures as an experiment that questions the conventional notion of spa-

 Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/the-great-outdoors.  In the following, this title will be abbreviated as Room Service.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/room-service-help-me-make-it-through-the-night-tour-dates.

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tio-temporal co-presence as a prerequisite for theatre (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 86). To a certain extent, Prater-Saga 3: In Diesem Kiez ist Der Teufel eine Goldmine [Prater-Saga 3: In This Neighbourhood, The Devil Is A Goldmine],³⁹ which premiered at the Volksbühne im Prater in Berlin on 10 December 2004,⁴⁰ is uncharacteristic of Gob Squad’s distinctive style. It is the first production to be based, if only loosely, on a written drama by taking as a point of departure passages from the third part of the quinquepartite Prater-Saga (2004– 2005) by German dramatist and director René Pollesch. In its use of live video relays in order to establish temporal tele-presence, however, it adheres to Gob Squad’s trademark approach. But whereas the performers in Super Night Shot are merely in search of a single co-star from the streets, Prater-Saga 3 is designed as a casting show in which the passers-by become the real stars and eventually take over the performance. The production begins on a stage set up as a television studio where a television presenter guides the audience through the ‘show.’ Via live transmission onto a screen, the scene soon shifts to the street outside the venue, where a performer as casting agent tries to find suitable candidates for enacting the roles in a film adaptation of Pollesch’s drama. The actual enactment of Pollesch’s PraterSaga 3 eventually begins with the newly acquired actors, dressed in makeshift costumes and prompted via headphones “as if by remote control” (Rakow 2014, n. pag.). Since the amateur actors perform in an “enclosed studio set,”⁴¹ they never directly address the audience. Instead, they merely act for a camera (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 76) that transmits their performance onto the screen where it can be observed by the spectators. The mere fact of knowing that these actors perform in real-time, however, affects the perception of their performance and renders them temporally present, though spatially remote. Furthermore, although the found actors are never actually seen live on stage, they appear to be more authentic in their unrefined acting than the slick and affected television presenter on stage. They therefore occupy an intermediate position between temporal presence and spatial absence, between trying to act and failing, between acting a part and being themselves, that attracts far more attention than

 In the following, this title will be abbreviated as Prater-Saga 3. The analysis is primarily based on the video clips available in the “Gob Squad Essentials” section on any of Gob Squad’s DVDs.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/prater-saga-3-in-diesem-kiez-ist-der-teufel-eine-goldmine.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/prater-saga-3-in-diesem-kiez-ist-der-teufel-eine-goldmine.

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what happens directly on stage. Through this combination of off-stage acting in real-time with live transmission, Prater-Saga 3 manages to create a hybrid performance that combines the aesthetics of television and film with the processuality and thrill of live performance. A climax of Gob Squad’s use of live video relays for establishing temporal tele-presence is reached in Revolution Now! which premiered at the Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz in Berlin on 4 February 2010 and received its UK premiere on 24 June 2010 at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London.⁴² The production centres on the attempt at instigating a mock revolution with the help of the audience and passers-by outside the performance venue. Once more, the live video relays allow the performers to leave the venue and interact with passers-by while still being connected to the audience. Yet, the cameras not only film the on-stage performers and their outdoor interaction with passers-by, but also repeatedly capture the whole auditorium in real-time or focus on individual spectators. What happens on stage, in the auditorium and in the street is thus alternately or even simultaneously transmitted onto a bipartite screen at the back of the stage as well as onto two monitors placed on stage and a monitor positioned on the side-walk outside the venue so that live relays of performers, spectators and passers-by are seen alongside each other (see fig. 3). Hence, the uncanny co-existence of mediatisation and live presence no longer applies to the performers and their video doubles only, but it also includes the spectators who suddenly see themselves on video next to them. At the same time, however, the actual physical co-presence of performers and audience is repeatedly stressed by moments of direct interaction. Eventually, even the spatial separation between spectators and performers within the venue and the passers-by outside collapses and a climax of the approximation of presence and absence, liveness and mediatisation is reached when a passer-by agrees to enter the performance space in order to represent ‘The People’ in the revolution. As the monitors go blank and the large screen is lifted, the volunteer is revealed live on stage in a revolutionary pose, waving a flag. As a final gesture, vodka and orange juice are served to audience, performers and the participant from the street in order to toast the revolution (01:17:57). At this point, for the first time in Gob Squad’s performance history, the boundary between performers, spectators and passers-by is completely dis-

 The analysis of Revolution Now! is based on the performance seen at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London on 26 June 2010 and the DVD recording of the same performance (Gob Squad 2010a, 2010b). Direct quotations are transcribed from this performance and may differ in other performances due to the improvisational character of the production. Time codes are measured with Windows Media Player.

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Figure 3: Performers, spectators and passers-by in the street are seen alongside each other on the bipartite screen in Gob Squad’s Revolution Now! (image used with permission of Gob Squad)

solved in an optimistic assertion and celebration of the co-presence and liveness of theatre when the production culminates in a general mingling of all participants. Despite its extensive use of technology, the production ultimately asserts the ability of theatre to unite people physically in real time and space while technology and mediatisation eventually fade away. Multifaceted and different in their choice of themes as they are, these Gob Squad productions exhibit a very similar approach to the use of live video relays for creating temporal tele-presence despite spatial absence. Firstly, the live video relays are used in order to allow the performers to leave the performance space while remaining connected to the audience via video transmission in real-time. Secondly, the live relays also project spectators and passers-by onto the screen where they acquire a mediatised presence. Whether the spectators or passersby completely take over the parts of the performers or are only momentarily filmed in order to be projected onto screens or monitors alongside or in substitution for the performers, they can see themselves or each other as participants in the performance. Though in most instances the on-stage presence of spectators and passers-by is merely mediatised, they are approximated to the performers whenever mediatised performers are seen alongside the projections of spectators or passers-by. In the context of theatre, such use of video demands a rethinking of the notion of presence as limited to the relation between stage and auditorium or between actors and spectators, as it highlights that people outside the venue may also be part of the equation. Thirdly, Gob Squad’s use of video splits off temporal from spatial co-presence because the technically mediated real-time and the simultaneity of production, transmission and reception still lack the essential component of spatial co-presence and thus merely result in tele-presence rather than actual co-presence. Even though the videos ex-

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tend the theatrical space to include spectators and people from the world beyond the performance venue in real-time, the cameras constitute an insurmountable physical separation and only facilitate temporal rather than spatial co-presence. Whenever mediatisation completely replaces the live performers or at least dominates the performance and makes the audience forget about the on-stage performers, the screens seem to take over the entire performance. Yet, even at moments when on-screen performers completely upstage the on-stage performers, the audience is at all times capable of distinguishing ontologically and intellectually between on-stage and on-screen appearances and remains aware of their spatial distance. As Gob Squad’s productions illustrate, temporal co-presence is no exclusive aspect of live performances but also proves to be an effect of live video relays. The combination of temporal and spatial co-presence, however, is restricted to live performances and figures as a defining characteristic and necessary prerequisite for theatrical liveness. In his survey of postdramatic theatre, Hans-Thies Lehmann accordingly alludes to time and space as constitutive aspects of theatrical presence when explaining: “Theatre means the collectively spent and used up lifetime in the collectively breathed air of that space in which the performing and the spectating take place” (Lehmann 2006: 17; emphasis in the original). That theatrical co-presence relies in equal measure on the variables of time and space is also argued by Chiel Kattenbelt who states that “[u]nlike film and television, theatre always takes place in the absolute presence of ‘here’ and ‘now.’ The performer and the spectator are physically present at the same time in the same space” (2006: 33). The temporal co-presence of performers and spectators also means that the processes of production and reception coincide in live performances because the spectators directly witness the staging of a live performance as a creative process that is still in the making rather than observing a finished product. Erika FischerLichte thus points out the characteristic nature of theatre as an ongoing process, emerging in the presence of the audience and disappearing again within a limited period of time. This temporal co-presence of actors and spectators and the resulting simultaneity of production and reception (cf. Fischer-Lichte 2004: 47, 115) form a contrast to the separate processes of writing and reading of dramatic texts. The simultaneity of production and reception further implies that the performance time or duration [“Aufführungszeit”] is always identical to the spectators’ lifetime [“Lebenszeit”] although both may differ from the experience of the fictional time represented on stage (Drewes 310, 414). Although – if examined in isolation – temporal co-presence can also be found in mediatised performative contexts, the combination of spatial and tem-

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poral co-presence in a shared ‘here’ and ‘now’ is a defining characteristic of live performances alone and therefore a distinctive feature of the liveness of theatre. Whereas film and pre-recorded videos, for example, offer neither temporal nor spatial co-presence with the spectators, live video relays and television may provide instances of temporal co-presence in the sense of a simultaneity of production and reception, without involving spatial co-presence: just as live video relays are simultaneously recorded and played back, television programmes may also be broadcast in real-time without delay. Sigrid Merx confirms the paradoxical nature of video when claiming that “video can take place in the absolute now, but not in the absolute here of actor and audience” (Merx 71). Martina Leeker puts even more emphasis on the difference between temporal and spatial copresence when describing mediatised interaction in the ‘now’ of real-time as a merely technical notion of liveness that cannot create physical corporeality (cf. 10). Another interesting case of temporal co-presence without spatial co-presence or corporeality is provided by productions created by virtual performance companies such as the Avatar Repertory Theatre, the Metaverse Shakespeare Company (formerly known as SL Shakespeare Company) or Adriene Jenik and Lisa Brenneis’s ‘desktop theater,’ all of which create online performances in real-time in immersive visual chat rooms and virtual worlds such as Second Life. The potential of the internet for the creation of temporal and the simulation of spatial co-presence in virtual space has also been explored in Station House Opera’s more recent productions Live from Paradise (2004– 2005), The Other Is You (2006), Play On Earth (2006), What’s Wrong with the World? (2008) and their current project Dissolved (scheduled for 2014). Here, Station House Opera go beyond their former use of pre-recorded video by experimenting with live video streaming via internet in order to combine live on-stage performances with the projection of performances occurring simultaneously at remote venues across continents and time zones. At each venue, the live audience thus witnesses the respective live action on stage combined with the transmission from the other venues on large screens.⁴³ Yet, although these productions establish actual temporal co-presence among distant performance venues, the fusion of faraway spaces is again only simulated. Occasionally, this simulation of spatial copresence may be rather convincing. With reference to The Other Is You, for instance, Jem Kelly mentions the creation of a Mexican wave involving actual and virtual spectators in three remote locations as well as the passing of a suit-

 Cf. http://www.stationhouseopera.com/about.php?section=4.

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case from screen to screen and finally onto the stage as successful moments of interaction (cf. 52, 55). Effects like these suggest a transgression of spatial boundaries and an elimination of physical distance via mediatisation. According to Greg Giesekam, however, such “occasional moments of congruence” form an exception in these productions, partly because technical problems render live and mediatised action less synchronous (2007: 214 f.). As opposed to the actual temporal co-presence facilitated by the use of live video streaming, Station House Opera’s promise of a shared “imaginary space”⁴⁴ therefore remains just that – imaginary. This confirms once more that the combination of temporal and spatial co-presence is exclusive to live performances.

Proto-type Theater: merged spaces and hyper-presence A more convincing illusion of mediatised spatial co-presence is evoked in Virtuoso (working title) (2009 – 2010), a production by the British-American Prototype Theater company. At its formation in 1997, the company was based in Brooklyn, New York, but meanwhile it has relocated to Manchester while the productions are touring internationally. The company was led by artistic director Peter Salvatore Petralia until 2012 when the performers Gillian Lees, Rachel Baynton and Andrew Westerside took over as co-directors.⁴⁵ Virtuoso (working title) premiered at Nuffield Theatre Lancaster on 22 April 2009⁴⁶ and further toured the United Kingdom in 2010 (cf. Proto-type Theater 2010b: 7).⁴⁷ Similar to Gob Squad’s approach, the production incorporates live video relays in order to create actual temporal co-presence of spectators, live and mediatised performers, but it additionally suggests spatial co-presence by means of an intricate combination of live and mediatised stage design. That the plot is set in an American suburban home is hinted at by means of selected props on an otherwise bare stage. Yet, the limited décor is complemented by a dolls’ house placed upstage. Whenever the three live performers re-

 http://www.stationhouseopera.com/project/6049/ and http://www.stationhouseopera.com/ project/6048/.  Cf. http://proto-type.org/category/company/.  Cf. http://proto-type.org/archive/virtuoso-working-title/.  The page references for Virtuoso (working title) refer to the unpublished typescript, courtesy of the author (Petralia 2009). The time codes are measured with Windows Media Player and refer to the DVD recording of the performance at Nuffield Theatre Lancaster on 23 April 2009 (Prototype Theater 2010a). At some points, the text spoken in the performance slightly differs from the script.

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arrange its miniature furniture to indicate scene changes, the four cameras placed on tripods on the stage produce close-ups of their seemingly giant hands inside the tiny, but otherwise naturalistic, rooms and outside in the front garden of the dolls’ house. These live video relays are shown on three flat-screen monitors that are positioned downstage facing the audience so that they form a dividing line between auditorium and stage (see fig. 4). Once the miniature furniture is correctly arranged, the monitors thus provide a perfectly realistic impression of the indoor or outdoor locations that the fictional personae are meant to occupy (e. g. 00:01:38; 00:19:03; 00:24:56; 00:40:02; 00:53:22; 01:07:03).

Figure 4: The three monitors connect live and mediatised space by showing a performer’s giant hand as he rearranges the furniture in the dolls’ house in Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) (image used with permission of Proto-type Theater and Peter S. Petralia)

Allowing the spectators to observe the creation of the fictional space via a fusion of live and mediatised scenery rather than providing an already accomplished naturalistic setting, the production generates an illusion of spatial contiguity of stage and monitors. The stage design merely hints at the domestic setting with the help of assorted props such as the dolls’ house, two chairs, a

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moveable window-frame with half-closed blinds, mats with pillows to suggest a bedroom and another two green mats with a flower box to indicate the garden. On the monitors, however, a more complete illusion is evoked because the cameras not only film the interior of the dolls’ house, but also zoom in on the performers and on certain details while leaving the bare spaces of the stage outside their focus so that the isolated props on the stage are transformed into an apparently complete mediatised space. The live video relays thus combine with the live action to create a more complete experience of the setting and merge the stage, the dolls’ house and the monitors into a seemingly unified space. Since the stage is barely and only provisionally marked off from the auditorium with white tape, even the spectators themselves feel included in this illusionary co-presence of live and mediatised space. The minute arrangement of the live transmissions by the on-stage performers, especially the live relays from the dolls’ house, deliberately reveals the mechanics of creation of each shot because the spectators directly witness the construction process of the mediatised world by means of disconnected live components (cf. Petralia 2010: 156). As a consequence, the live feeds on the monitors not only establish a simultaneity of both live and mediatised action, but they also underline the processuality of the performance and the simultaneity of production and reception by reminding the spectators that the entire performance is being produced in real-time. In addition to the illusion of spatial co-presence, therefore, the live video relays once more produce temporal copresence that merges spectators, live and mediatised performers. As opposed to this actual temporal co-presence of auditorium, stage and monitors that is facilitated by the use of live video relays, the spatial co-presence is merely simulated. As already observed with regard to Gob Squad’s productions, this illustrates that although live video relays surpass pre-recorded videos in their potential for suggesting liveness due to temporal co-presence, neither live nor pre-recorded videos are capable of producing spatial co-presence. Accordingly, the combination of temporal and spatial co-presence is once more confirmed as a distinctive feature of liveness that cannot be achieved via mediatisation – whether pre-recorded or produced in real-time. In addition to its experimentation with spatio-temporal co-presence, Virtuoso (working title) also offers yet another example of the above-mentioned use of video in order to fragment physical corporeality while attempting to retain its three-dimensionality. On the monitors, the images that complement the stage setting alternate with close-ups and extreme close-ups of the performers, whose bodies are thus dissected (e. g. 00:18:02; 00:57:33; 01:09:28), multiplied (e. g. 00:15:53; 00:33:55; 00:59:53; 01:13:31) and shown from additional perspectives that are only accessible to the cameras (e. g. 00:14:51; 00:22:05; 00:47:06),

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but the performers’ bodies are never entirely displayed on the monitors. Sometimes, the cameras even zoom in so closely as to capture only the performers’ eyes (e. g. 00:09:30; 00:15:27; 00:17:03; 01:04:46), mouths (e. g. 00:09:16; 00:23:58; 00:39:02; 01:02:38), hands (e. g. 00:23:14) or legs (e. g. 00:36:49; 00:39:38). Such a focus on the performers’ corporeality is most prominent in the “[f]acial flex choreography” (18) during which the monitors mostly display extreme close-ups of the performers’ mouths (00:39:02). Artistic director Peter Petralia explains the effect of such close-ups: “The cameras work as a kind of microscope […]. This invasive operation of zooming into the minutiae of the performer allows us to see their pores, their structural components […]” (2010a: 159; 2010b: 113 f.). The cameras thus reveal details of the performers’ bodies that the spectators’ unaided eyes would never see and thus seemingly bring the audience into closer proximity to the performers. Used in this way, live video relays could be seen as a remediation of the opera glass whose function of optical magnification they fulfil. With this magnification of body parts, the live feeds deconstruct the performers’ corporeality by getting closer to their bodies than the spectators’ eyes would otherwise permit. Virtuoso (working title) thus illustrates that videos can actually produce a heightened, abstract sense of presence, a ‘hyper-presence’ that exceeds physical live presence in the proximity to the performers’ bodies it allows. Although the monitors actually provide a physical barrier that separates spectators and performers because they are aligned between auditorium and stage, they also bridge the gap between spectators and performers. As Petralia observes, the monitors thus serve “as a membrane that separates performer from audience member while simultaneously bringing the fantasy of the piece’s fiction – and indeed the performers themselves – closer to the audience” (2010a: 156; emphasis in the original). Whereas such spatial co-presence is only simulated or merely constitutes a metaphorical bridge, the live video relays in Virtuoso (working title) produce actual temporal co-presence and focus on the performers’ corporeality by creating hyper-presence.

Mary Oliver: presence as charisma As the preceding examples illustrate, presence as a distinctive feature of liveness relies on the performers’ concrete physical corporeality and their spatio-temporal copresence with the spectators. In the context of theatre and performance, however, presence is also frequently used as a synonym for a performer’s “charisma” (Copeland 33) or for the intensity of sensation created by a performance (cf. Fischer-Lichte 2001: 23) and is perceived to be crucial for evoking “audience en-

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gagement and attention” (Dixon 132). In other words, it brings performer and audience metaphorically closer together by establishing a special connection or empathy between them. That such metaphorical presence, which depends on a performer’s specific talent, energy or acting technique, is no defining characteristic of theatre’s liveness but can equally occur in mediatised performances, where some actors also move and mesmerise us more than others, is humorously illustrated in Mary Oliver’s productions Wednesday, Wednesday (2005 – 2006; 2009) and Never Work With Animals, Children or Digital Characters (2006).⁴⁸ Like many of Oliver’s works, both productions were first presented at national and international conferences and can be considered as “performed papers”⁴⁹ or ‘practice as research.’ Wednesday, Wednesday was first performed at the Performance Studies International (PSI) Conference at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, in April 2005 and received its UK premiere during the Transversalities Conference at the University of Reading in September 2005; Never Work premiered at the Second International Conference for Digital Technologies and Performance Arts at Doncaster College, England, in May 2006.⁵⁰ Mary Oliver has held an appointment as Reader in Digital Performance and Head of the Performance Research Centre at the School of Arts and Media at the University of Salford since 2008.⁵¹ As performance artist, she has experimented with the use of video, digital technology and mediatised characters in performance for a long time. In Mother Tongue (2001– 2002), for instance, Oliver not only plays her own self live on stage but also enacts and interacts with the four female members of her family whose parts are pre-recorded.⁵² Almost (2007) shows a live performer interacting with a videoed miniature performer who can only be observed with the help of opera glasses.⁵³ In Fly Me to the Moon (2006 – 2007) Oliver is doubled by her CGI-animated cartoon self in a story set in a space station.⁵⁴ This technique is further elaborated in Blue (2008) which presents her as a live performer together with a shape-shifting animation.⁵⁵ Swimmers (2009) turns from CGI-animation back to the exploration of a video double

       

In the following, this title will be abbreviated as Never Work. http://salford.academia.edu/MOliver/CurriculumVitae. Cf. http://salford.academia.edu/MOliver/CurriculumVitae. Cf. http://salford.academia.edu/MOliver/CurriculumVitae. Cf. http://www.maryoliver.co.uk/#!/page_More. Cf. http://www.maryoliver.co.uk/#!/page_More. Cf. http://www.maryoliver.co.uk/#!/page_Three. Cf. http://www.maryoliver.co.uk/#!/page_Three.

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whose performance is mirrored by Oliver live on stage.⁵⁶ More recently, she has also exhibited interactive work in galleries that uses sensing technologies.⁵⁷ Both Wednesday, Wednesday and Never Work are performed by Mary Oliver herself who is seen in apparent interaction and competition with her prerecorded video double. Her double only appears in mediatised form but nevertheless stubbornly insists on being live. In Wednesday, Wednesday the double’s claim that there is no ontological difference between liveness and mediatisation eventually seems to be confirmed when the mediatised Mary presumably lures the live Mary into the television set and instead emerges live on stage herself. Never Work is closer in style to a lecture because explanations are directly delivered to the audience. Here, the arguments between on-stage and mediatised Mary thus more explicitly discuss the advantages and disadvantages of working with digital characters and debate on the role of presence (see fig. 5).

Figure 5: The live and the mediatised Mary discuss their respective presence in Mary Oliver’s production Never Work (image provided by Mary Oliver and used with her permission)

Yet, in both productions the corporeal notion of presence is complemented by an understanding of presence as the result of a performer’s charisma, acting

 Cf. http://www.maryoliver.co.uk/#!/page_Three.  Cf. http://www.maryoliver.co.uk/#!/page_One.

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style or technique that manages to fascinate, move and affect the spectators emotionally. According to this understanding, actors and characters may acquire presence irrespective of the medium in which they appear and no matter whether they are three- or two-dimensional, corporeal or immaterial, live or mediatised. The potential equality of live and mediatised performers and characters that this understanding of presence suggests is already implied when the live and the mediatised Mary in Wednesday, Wednesday introduce each other as “the other half of the act” (1 f./ 00:00:18).⁵⁸ This phrase makes no distinction between the two Marys, and although the eventual substitution of the live character by her mediatised counterpart is only fictional, there is an actual balance between the live and the mediatised Mary who both display an equal ability to relate to the audience. Throughout the performance they compete for the spectators’ attention, and the live Mary’s fear of being upstaged by her mediatised counterpart becomes more and more apparent. Repeatedly, her double interrupts her and steals the show so that the live Mary momentarily becomes marginal. Her increasing annoyance at her double’s craving for recognition eventually culminates in her exclamation: “get off, I warned you about upstaging me, ‘never’ upstage me” (26/ 00:20:47). Once the live Mary is apparently imprisoned in the television set, she is completely substituted by her double who silences her by switching off the television (cf. 29/ 00:24:02). Although in Never Work the mediatised Mary does not go so far as to substitute the live Mary completely, she occasionally seizes the reins and disobeys the live Mary when revealing secret information about the production (cf. 13 f.).⁵⁹ Again, the live Mary is afraid of being upstaged by her digital double and admonishes her to “[s]top doing things to draw attention to yourself” and to “try to be in the background” (3). More clearly than in Wednesday, Wednesday this production equates presence with the ability to affect and entice the spectators and draw them into the fiction of the performance irrespective of whether the performers are live or mediatised. According to Mary “[t]he good actor’s ‘presence’” – no matter whether live or mediatised – bridges the “physical and psy-

 The page references for Wednesday, Wednesday refer to the unpublished typescript, courtesy of the author (Oliver 2005). The time codes are measured with Windows Media Player and refer to the recording of Wednesday, Wednesday on the DVD Somewhere between Heaven and Earth (Oliver 2006b). This recording was made during the Australasian Association for Drama, Theatre and Performance Studies (ADSA) Conference “Being There: Before, During and After” at the Rex Cramphorn Studio of the University of Sydney in July 2006. At some points, the action and the text spoken in the performance slightly differ from the script.  The page references for Never Work refer to the unpublished typescript, courtesy of the author (Oliver 2006a).

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chological gap of pretence” (1) and induces an immersion that “transcends time and space” (15) or, in other words, successfully simulates spatio-temporal copresence. Yet, she concedes that such presence does not solely depend on the actor’s talent but requires the successful collaboration of writer, actor and spectator (15 f.). Though the upstaging or even substitution of the live performer by the mediatised double suggests that a performer’s impact is not necessarily directly related to corporeality and spatio-temporal co-presence, the latter concepts nevertheless carry great weight in both productions. For whereas metaphorical presence is a vague, unaccountable concept that does not throw light upon the distinction of liveness and mediatisation, essential differences still reside in the live performer’s physical co-presence with the spectators in time and space. In Wednesday, Wednesday the negative side effect of the mediatised Mary’s ability to “surpass the time space continuum in all sorts of ways” (20/ 00:15:26) is illustrated when the live Mary teases her double by rewinding and fast-forwarding the video (cf. 20/ 00:15:32), thus demonstrating the different temporal conditions of liveness and mediatisation. The spatial aspect of presence is addressed when the mediatised Mary’s insistence on being “definitely absolutely one hundred per cent here” (25/ 00:19:59) is contradicted by the live Mary’s assertion “if I am ‘here’ you can’t also be ‘here’ can you?” (26/ 00:20:04). By pointing out that the deictic particle ‘here’ is a relative term that depends on a speaker’s position, this exchange once more acknowledges that only the live action on stage is spatially co-present with the spectators’ ‘here,’ whereas the videoed action denotes a remote ‘there’ from the spectators’ and live performer’s point of view. That spatial co-presence is perceived as a desirable quality is clearly proven by the double’s reaction of shock at the revelation of her own lack of spatial copresence which contrasts with the live Mary’s “sheer joy and exuberance at being…well…here and now!” (24/ 00:18:21). Never Work also alludes to the relevance of spatio-temporal co-presence when the live Mary elucidates: “The digital character is in a liminal space all of her own […]. She’s in her own time and forcibly brought into ours” (4). This statement not only points out the spatial and temporal absence of the mediatised double but also implies the co-presence of live Mary and audience by uniting them in the possessive pronoun ‘our.’ Repeated references to the performers’ bodies or lack thereof finally assert the importance of corporeality as a characteristic feature of liveness. In Wednesday, Wednesday a song and dance routine that enumerates and celebrates individual parts of the body draws attention to the live performer’s corporeality. Although the mediatised Mary joins in the song, the close-ups, medium and

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medium long shots of the camera highlight the two-dimensionality of her fragmented body (00:18:25). Her pride in not being subjected to “the same neurotic concerns that the average human being has to cope with, what to eat, what to where [sic], when to expurgate [her] bowels” (7/ 00:03:55) further reinforces the physical differences of liveness and mediatisation. For as the live Mary in Never Work puts it, “there’s nothing organic” about her mediatised double (8). Associating presence with the ability to attract the spectators’ attention and induce empathy irrespective of the medium, Oliver’s productions Wednesday, Wednesday and Never Work convey the idea that mediatisation can be as present and (a)live as liveness, and playfully suggest that liveness and mediatisation are interchangeable. But although mediatised performances may be equally or more engaging and may come alive to the audience, they are not actually ‘live.’ For the liveness of theatre and performance does not depend on metaphysical and abstract notions of presence, but it rests on the performers’ actual corporeality and their spatio-temporal co-presence with the spectators due to the simultaneity of production and reception. By contrast, what exactly evokes metaphorical presence and makes a performance come to life remains vague even in Oliver’s productions. ‘Presence’ as a distinctive feature of liveness thus implies no value judgement with regard to acting techniques or a performer’s talent.

Summary It can be concluded from the analysis of the productions introduced in this chapter that presence plays a central role for the exploration of the relation between liveness and mediatisation and hence for the self-reflection of theatre with regard to its own nature as a live medium. Although the productions pursue distinct strategies of contrasting or approximating liveness and mediatisation and although they differ in their use of live video relays and pre-recorded videos, their approaches to the notion of presence all pivot on the same aspects, namely the performers’ corporeality or three-dimensionality and their spatio-temporal co-presence with the spectators in a shared ‘here’ and ‘now’ due to the simultaneity of production and reception. Mary Oliver’s productions Wednesday, Wednesday and Never Work further complement these aspects of presence by the additional concept of presence as a performer’s charisma and ability to relate to the audience irrespective of whether a performance is live or mediatised. Wednesday, Wednesday moreover forms an exception by presenting liveness as being more desirable than mediatisation, whereas the other productions are less biased and mostly do not imply any superiority of the live performers with regard to their mediatised coun-

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terparts. Similar to the approximation of live and mediatised performers in the other productions, however, even Wednesday, Wednesday finally suggests an inversion and interchangeability of liveness and mediatisation by allowing the mediatised double to substitute the live performer. In all of the productions, the constitutive aspects of presence are used in order playfully to question and blur the difference between liveness and mediatisation in general. This is primarily achieved by a more or less successful simulation of corporeality and three-dimensionality of the mediatised performers: firstly, they double or further multiply the live performers and seem to be interchangeable with them so that they directly compete with the live performers’ corporeality; secondly, the mediatised performers are simultaneously shown from multiple perspectives which lend them an illusion of three-dimensionality; and thirdly, the mediatised performers may even acquire a hyper-presence due to extreme close-ups that exceed live presence and make the spectators feel closer to the mediatised performers than they could ever get to the live performers. The simulation of spatio-temporal co-presence between live and mediatised performers and spectators forms a further strategy for blurring liveness and mediatisation. Here, an important difference between the use of pre-recorded and live videos becomes visible. Live video relays exhibit a potential for creating actual temporal co-presence and underlining the processuality of the mediatised action because their production, transmission and reception occur in the spectators’ real-time. Pre-recorded videos, by contrast, can only simulate temporal co-presence by means of a synchronisation of the live and the mediatised action or by an illusion of direct transitions and interaction between live and mediatised performers. The incorporation of live video relays into theatre performances thus ideally lends itself to a playful approximation of liveness and mediatisation because it facilitates temporal co-presence. The aspect of temporal copresence therefore is the key element of the productions using live video relays. When it comes to spatial co-presence, however, both live and pre-recorded videos can only simulate a convergence because live and mediatised spaces do not actually overlap. Even the temporal co-presence induced by live video relays thus merely constitutes tele-presence. The selected productions therefore illustrate that whereas temporal copresence is not necessarily indicative of liveness, the combination of temporal and spatial co-presence is a defining characteristic of liveness because mediatisation at best creates tele-presence. Similarly, corporeality is confirmed as an indicator of liveness because none of the productions create actual corporeality by means of mediatisation but merely use mediatisation to simulate multi-perspectivity and hyper-presence.

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The combination of theatre or live performance with pre-recorded videos and live video relays thus emphasises the importance of spatio-temporal co-presence and corporeality as distinctive features of theatrical liveness. Rather than using these aspects in order to juxtapose liveness and mediatisation, all of the selected productions playfully approximate liveness and mediatisation by reducing the effect of live presence while augmenting the illusion of mediatised presence. Nevertheless, the illusion of mediatised presence is never perfect and the deficiencies of mediatisation in this respect remain perceptible. In the end, the identified shortcomings of mediatisation only serve to affirm the singular status of live presence that becomes more meaningful and valuable the more mediatisation tries to imitate it, but fails in the attempt. That not only instances of media combination of theatre and technological media attribute such value to spatio-temporal co-presence and corporeality as indicators of liveness is illustrated by various other developments in theatre and performance that deliberately draw attention to these aspects of live presence. To name but a few examples, durational performances, site-specific theatre and endurance art isolate and enhance the effects of temporal co-presence, spatial co-presence and corporeality respectively. Durational performances that last for hours or even days highlight the time factor by taking it to extremes and by making the effects of time (such as fatigue, physical exhaustion, decreasing concentration etc.) perceptible for actors as well as spectators. Site-specific theatre in turn focuses on the aspect of space by closely rooting the performances in real spaces shared by the spectators, although these spaces acquire an additional fictional quality during the performances. Endurance art with its infliction of actual pain, physical injuries and deprivation finally draws attention to the performer’s real body and corporeality. Yet, only the incorporation of videos or other technological media into live performances and the resulting direct juxtaposition of liveness and mediatisation make it possible simultaneously to explore all of these aspects of presence and directly to illustrate their contribution to the perception of theatre as a live medium.

4.2 Ephemerality and Uniqueness Forkbeard Fantasy: ephemerality versus repetition “We are all of us in a loop. Every night […] we die. Who knows? Who cares? For we are all reborn again to die over and over and over” (01:22:50; cf. Britton, n. pag.). With this meta-theatrical statement, the protagonist Bernard von Earlobe summarises the playful approach to repetition and circularity in Forkbeard Fant-

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asy’s production The Fall of the House of Usherettes (1996; 2005; still ongoing).⁶⁰ Instead of following the widespread tendency of celebrating live performances for their ephemerality and uniqueness, the production suggests that liveness is subject to a distressful repetition whereas the medium of film dissolves into thin air. Forkbeard Fantasy have repeatedly been admired for their pioneering role in intermedial performance (cf. Giesekam 2003, n. pag.; Farmer, n. pag.). In addition to Tim and Chris Britton, who formed the British performance company in 1974, the core members are designer Penny Saunders and performer, sound technician and stage manager Ed Jobling, who have repeatedly been joined by filmmaker and editor Robin Thorburn (cf. Farmer, n. pag.).⁶¹ So far, they have produced stage and outdoor performances, site-specific performances, large-scale outdoor projections, experimental and animated films, online games and apps, mechanical installations, interactive exhibitions, poetry recitals etc.⁶² Despite their use of emerging and innovative technologies, their sustained fascination with more traditional technology and especially their use of film make their work stand out against most intermedial performance practice since the invention of video projection (cf. Giesekam 2007: 176) and set it apart from the use of videos in all the other productions selected for the present study. Moreover, many of their productions can be recognised by what they refer to as “Crossing the Celluloid Divide,”⁶³ i. e. their trademark interaction of and transitions between live performance and films or animated cartoons. Such transitions also form the basic principle in The Fall of the House of Usherettes which was devised to celebrate the centenary of cinema (cf. Britton, n. pag.; Giesekam 2007: 182). It premiered in February 1996 and toured nationally and internationally for two years before its revival in 2005 (cf. Britton, n. pag.). The plot, presented live and in 16mm film, deals with five characters who are all impersonated by Chris and Tim Britton and Ed Jobling. Protagonist Bernard von Earlobe, a film connoisseur, discovers the dilapidated Empire Picture Palace that is also referred to as the House of Usherettes because it is haunted by the siblings Nancy, Deirdre, Lucy and Roderick Lilyhair de Usherette. As a brief animated car-

 The analysis of The Fall of the House of Usherettes is based on Forkbeard Fantasy’s DVD recording (Forkbeard Fantasy 2009). Direct quotations are transcribed from the DVD and time codes are measured with Windows Media Player. The exact wording may differ in other performances of the production and it slightly deviates from Tim Britton’s storyboard (2005).  Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/peopleandskills.php.  Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/ and http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/forkbeardinfo. php.  http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/films.php.

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toon accompanied by live commentary claims, their father Edmund Lilyhair de Usherette invented ‘liquid film,’ a fantastic technique for spraying film from special projectors. The three sisters still guard the bottled master copies of the films in a crypt and they trap any intruders on the prowl for the liquid films in endless film loops. Their strategy is illustrated by a bank manager whose repeated attempts at escaping from his loop are momentarily projected onto the door of Roderick’s bedroom (cf. 00:43:22), and by the mention of Deirdre’s collection of looped milkmen (cf. 00:56:41). More importantly, the fate of being looped also befalls von Earlobe. At first, he is only momentarily exposed to repetition when he is forced to cross the same filmed corridor over and over again by entering through a filmed door on the left of the screen and disappearing through a door on the right, only to reappear immediately afterwards through the same door on the left in order to go through the same action again and again (cf. 00:25:26). Later on, Deirdre traps him in a loop while he is trying to retrieve the ‘master bottle’ of “The Fall of the House of Usherettes” from the crypt. In order to represent his attempts at finding a way out of the loop he is caught in, a projection shows his filmed double ramming his head against a transparent screen over and over again, as if he was trying to break out of the projection (cf. 01:07:51; 01:20:49). Holding on to Deirdre’s hair that is accidentally caught in the projector, von Earlobe manages to escape eventually. It seems that he grabs her hair as if clutching at a straw to save himself from eternal mediatisation with the help of liveness as represented by Deirdre’s corporeality. As the search for the ‘master bottle’ of “The Fall of the House of Usherettes” suggests, the characters’ existence only derives from a liquid film bearing the same name as the production itself. As opposed to the sisters who cling to this existence, Roderick is tired of its endless repetition that makes his life appear like a tiresome sequence of déjà vus, and he thus inquires of the still unsuspecting von Earlobe: “Bernard, do you ever get the feeling you’ve been through all this before? That terrible sinking feeling when the bottle tips and you know it’s all about to start again?” (00:58:53; cf. Britton, n. pag.). Von Earlobe’s complaint “Now I don’t call that much of a life” (01:23:03), uttered at the recognition of this repetition, hints at the conventional understanding of life or liveness as being unrepeatable. On a further level beyond their filmed existence, the characters also show a meta-theatrical awareness of the fact that they have already participated in previous performances and will also reappear in subsequent performances of the production (cf. Giesekam 2007: 185). Although the performance ends with the collapse of the Empire Picture Palace that buries the liquid films with it, the three sisters reappear on stage to close the performance with a song that is ac-

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companied by a filmed organ player and that looks ahead to the next performance with its promise that “we’ll meet again when the mighty organ plays” (01:28:42; cf. Giesekam 2007: 186). Furthermore, von Earlobe’s commentaries in the form of a first person past tense narration distance him from the events as if he was no longer part of them and – as Deirdre observes – make it seem “as though he’s been and gone” (00:32:43). Beyond the fictional level, this is actually true because the performer has already appeared in the role of von Earlobe in preceding performances. In a variation of the theatrum mundi topos, the notion of the characters and performers being caught in filmic loops or condemned to repeat the same performance over and over again ironically suggests that even the spectators’ lives may be mere loops controlled by an almighty projectionist. Due to the comically surreal style of the whole production, however, this idea is not treated as a serious ontological or existential question. In comparison to this notion of an endless repeatability of life or live performance, liquid film seems to be the more ephemeral medium in The Fall of the House of Usherettes. It is said to dissolve once it is sprayed from the projectors so that new copies have to be made from the concoctions preserved in the master bottles hidden in the crypt (cf. 00:16:10). With the collapse of the Empire Picture Palace all these master copies disappear and with them the only remnants of the medium of liquid film itself – at least until their reappearance in subsequent performances of The Fall of the House of Usherettes. The motif of the dissolution of liquid film is moreover complemented by the actual destruction of several projection surfaces. This occurs when von Earlobe tears down the screen made of cloth after the introductory film sequence (cf. 00:07:05) and breaks through a paper screen in his escape from his loop (cf. 01:22:14) or when the inflated weather balloon that shows a projection of Roderick’s head eventually bursts (cf. 01:24:43). These moments not only suggest the ephemerality of film but also visualise the material disappearance of screens. With their presentation of the live action as an infinitely repeatable performance caught in loops that contrast with the ephemerality of ‘liquid film,’ Forkbeard Fantasy playfully question and invert the conventional distinction between liveness and mediatisation in terms of ephemerality and reproducibility. Nevertheless, their focus on repetition actually confirms the central importance of this aspect for the distinction between liveness and mediatisation. The fictional inversion thus cannot disguise the fact that a theatrical performance – just like any live event (e. g. concert, opera, ballet etc.) – defies identical repetition and reproduction. Once staged, a live performance dematerialises, can never be retrieved and continues to exist merely in the performers’ and spectators’ memory rather than forming a lasting product. Other media, by contrast,

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have a permanent material existence, can be repeatedly consumed and are not altered by this repetition so that books can be re-read, films watched repeatedly, photos and paintings looked at again and again etc. Although such repeated reception may occasion new understandings of these artefacts, this does not in the least affect their materiality and mediality. Admittedly, a theatre production is usually performed several times within a repertory season, but it is always created anew and disappears again each time so that each individual performance is unique and never completely identical to any other performance. So even if repeatedly staged, each reenactment differs from all others in some detail, be it ever so slight as the actors’ articulation, gestures, movement, timing, the exact arrangement of props, the reactions of the audience etc. so that each staging is essentially a unique experience in itself. Despite the characters’ complaints concerning their repetitiveness, this certainly also applies to the live elements of The Fall of the House of Usherettes in repeated performances. Erika Fischer-Lichte specifically underscores the nature of theatre as an ephemeral or transitory medium, a continuously changing phenomenon that emerges in the co-presence of actors and spectators and disappears again afterwards, never to be repeated again in exactly the same way (cf. 2010: 32; 2004: 82, 127). As opposed to drama as a fixed and lasting artefact that is available in its materiality at any time, theatre is an event that comes into existence or happens only in the moment of its performance and is lost forever afterwards (cf. FischerLichte 2004: 53, 227, 283; P. M. Meyer 37). Whereas Fischer-Lichte refers to this characteristic of theatre as its aesthetics of process or event character [“Ereignishaftigkeit”] (e. g. 2010: 59 ff.; 2004: 55, 283), comparable observations are usually subsumed under the notion of ‘liveness.’ That the very essence of live performance lies in its evanescence has been most emphatically argued by performance theorist Peggy Phelan. The following often-quoted statement reveals her to be one of the most fervent proponents of the idea of ephemerality as a defining feature of live performance: Performance’s only life is in the present. Performance cannot be saved, recorded, documented, or otherwise participate in the circulation of representations of representations: once it does so, it becomes something other than performance. […] Performance’s being […] becomes itself through disappearance. (146)

Since people do not necessarily watch films, videos etc. repeatedly either, Susan Sontag is correct in pointing out that “[w]ith respect to any single experience, it hardly matters that a film is usually identical from one projection of it to another while theatre performances are highly mutable” (1966: 31). When being incorpor-

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ated into a live performance, moreover, any recordings are automatically affected by the transience of liveness because although they may still exist once the performance is over, they are no longer available for viewing to the audience, from whose perspective both the live and the mediatised parts of a performance equally vanish once the performance is over. However, broadening the focus from the single experience to the general potential of film to be infinitely repeated, the mere possibility of watching a film again affects its reception and cultural value as compared to the uniqueness of a theatrical performance. The relevance of ephemerality as a criterion for distinguishing live from mediatised performance is further questioned by Philip Auslander. Since audio tapes, films and videos gradually deteriorate with time and use, he argues that they cannot be identically or endlessly repeated and are therefore also affected by eventual disappearance (cf. 1997: 53; 1999: 45). With specific reference to digital media, this argument is complemented by Lev Manovich’s claim that the replication of digital data always involves “lossy compression” in the sense of a necessary reduction of data (54 f.). Forkbeard Fantasy’s invention of ‘liquid films,’ that vanish straight after their projection, playfully illustrates such arguments and takes them to an extreme. Yet, the degradation and disappearance in analogue and digital media are mere technical phenomena that are, in fact, partial and hardly perceptible for an audience, whereas the disappearance of a live performance is always complete and immediately noticeable.

Tim Etchells: variation versus replay That mediatisation contrasts with liveness due to its potential for repetition is also illustrated by Tim Etchells’s solo work Instructions for Forgetting (2001; still ongoing).⁶⁴ It not only identically replays some of its video material within a single performance but even recycles videos that years before formed part of Disco Relax (1999), a production by Tim Etchells’s company Forced Entertainment. Though mostly known as artistic director of Forced Entertainment, Etchells also collaborates with other artists, has produced solo performances, installations, videos, photograph col-

 The analysis of Instructions for Forgetting is based on the published script (Etchells 2006) and the DVD recording of the performance at the Künstlerhaus in Vienna, Austria, in June 2001. Page references and time codes are both given, except for scenes where script and performance diverge. Time codes are measured with Windows Media Player.

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lections, audio work, visual art etc. and has written works of fiction and diverse publications on contemporary art and performance.⁶⁵ Instructions for Forgetting was commissioned for the Wiener Festwochen in Vienna, Austria, where it premiered on 31 May 2001 at the Künstlerhaus Wien (cf. Etchells 2006: 113). It was produced in collaboration with Forced Entertainment’s designer and performer Richard Lowdon and regular collaborator Hugo Glendinning and builds on many of Forced Entertainment’s recurrent themes, concerns and characteristics. During this “performance lecture” (Helmer 58) that has also been aptly described as “[p]art storytelling, part videotelling” (Cooper, n. pag.), Etchells is seated at a table centre stage and presents fragmented material supposedly sent to him by friends, relatives and artists (cf. Etchells 2006: 112). These contributions comprise not only letters, e-mails and other textual materials that are simply read from a script by Etchells rather than being enacted, but also diverse videos. These videos are shown on three monitors and are played back to the audience by a clearly visible but silent on-stage technician, a position that is usually filled by Richard Lowdon, Johnny Goodwin or Vlatka Horvat (cf. Etchells 2006: 113; see fig. 6). Although there is often no clear connection between the oral and visual elements and the material is too fragmented and collage-like to offer a coherent story, recurring themes such as memory, story-telling or the relation between reality and its simulation or representation provide a loose structure. The performance begins with Etchells’s account of the origin of the gathered material: I ask my friends to send stories and videotapes. For the stories I ask for things that are true. The topic can be anything. I ask for short reports on things that have happened in the world. For the tapes I say, “Don’t make me something special – send what you have.” I say, “I’m sure that whatever you choose is bound to be right.” (Etchells 2006: 114/ 00:00:14)

This statement serves as a kind of refrain that is repeated several times throughout the performance (cf. 116/ 00:11:04; 118/ 00:23:09; 130/ 01:31:12). Hence, it not only stresses the semi-documentary character of the performance but also generates repetition. The exact choice of words, however, slightly varies with each reiteration so that this live repetition contrasts with the identical replay of some of the video clips. The slow motion videos of a toy caravan sinking in water (cf. 116/ 00:11:40) and of a cartoon figure falling into space (cf. 120/ 00:34:24) are presented in loops and are moreover played back again at a later

 Cf. http://www.forcedentertainment.com/page/3075/Tim-Etchells-Projects and http://www. timetchells.com/statement-%10-cv/.

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Figure 6: Tim Etchells presents collected stories and videos in Instructions for Forgetting (photograph © Hugo Glendinning, used with permission of the photographer and Tim Etchells)

moment (cf. 128/ 01:18:49; 01:19:16; 00:23:50). Other videos such as the greeneyed dogs (cf. 114 f./ 00:04:40) or the video of the moon (cf. 115/ 00:06:31) also reappear again (cf. 00:23:44; 00:24:18), though partly played back at different speed. Yet, the videos that show Etchells’s son doing a magic trick (cf. 122/ 00:48:58) and re-enacting the sinking of the Titanic (cf. 119/ 00:31:11) most clearly illustrate the potential for repetition inherent in mediatisation. They were already used in Forced Entertainment’s Disco Relax in 1999 (cf. Etchells, and Forced Entertainment, n. pag.), but this intertextual play remains unnoticed by those spectators unaware of the earlier production. Whereas Etchells’s live statement concerning the origin of the material is slightly modified with each repetition, the repeated videos thus only vary in their playback speed but are otherwise still identical and have not changed even over a period of several years as the Disco Relax videos prove. Etchells’s different versions of an anecdote from footballer George Best’s life similarly combine live and mediatised repetition and illustrate the contrast of identical mediatised playback as opposed to only approximate live repetition. While the oral renderings of the story use similar text modules to present contradictory versions of the same story, the accompanying videos show identical foot-

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age of the footballer over and over again (cf. 127 ff./ 01:13:16). The juxtaposition of mediatised replay with only approximate live repetition in Instructions for Forgetting thus confirms the contrast between identically reproducible mediatisation and ultimately unique liveness. Etchells’s concern with the ephemerality of liveness as opposed to the repeatability of mediatisation also forms the basis for his solo performance Words & Pictures (2005; still ongoing). Similar to his short works Down Time (2001) and Everything (2002), which complement single-channel videos of Etchells’s pensive face by recorded commentary,⁶⁶ Etchells attempts to reconstruct and verbalise his own thinking process by providing a live commentary to his mute mediatised face captured in close-ups on video.⁶⁷ Whereas the video identically and faithfully reproduces even the most subtle changes in his facial expression, the live commentary can only approximately rephrase Etchells’s past thoughts. Inevitably, this setup contrasts liveness and mediatisation, ephemerality and repetition, past and present. It also opposes the mediality of the verbal and the visual channels which – though revolving around the same thoughts – never completely correspond to each other. In this sense, the project brings to mind the relation between verbal and visual storytelling as explored in Instructions for Forgetting. In an interview with Florian Malzacher, Etchells reflects on ephemerality and disappearance in Forced Entertainment’s productions and suggests that “performance is always a game of making things appear and disappear,” though the disappearance is never total because a performance always leaves “traces in the space, on the bodies of the performers […] or simply as memory” (Etchells 2006– 2010, n. pag.). As his productions illustrate, however, such abstract traces clearly differ from the material artefacts left behind by processes of mediatisation and form a contrast to the potential for endless and identical repetition offered by recording and replay technology. In the same interview, Etchells also points out that the inevitable threat of disappearance stresses the ephemerality of live presence and thus increases the impact of liveness and underlines its uniqueness: […] it comes back again to absence and presence. We feel presence more acutely when the possibility of absence is raised. That’s why one’s interested in deletion, in absence. Because to think of it points back to the absolute uniqueness of presence. (Etchells 2006 – 2010, n. pag.)

 Cf. http://www.timetchells.com/projects/videos/down-time/ and http://www.timetchells. com/projects/videos/everything/.  Cf. http://www.timetchells.com/projects/performances/words-%26-pictures/.

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Mary Oliver: linearity versus rewind and fast forward “[T]he wonderful thing about being alive is that every second is different, can’t be repeated, can’t be repeated” (19/ 00:14:55). This statement uttered by the live performer in Mary Oliver’s production Wednesday, Wednesday (2005 – 2006; 2009) forms a direct contrast to the presentation of life as being repeated in never-ending loops in Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes. Whereas Forkbeard Fantasy’s production transfers the repeatability of mediatisation to its live action, Mary Oliver celebrates the ephemerality of live performance by contrast with mediatisation. Though the anaphora quoted above ironically undermines the statement by suggesting a repeatability even of the live character’s part, this merely verbal repetition clearly contrasts with the technological possibilities of repetition offered by the videoed action. With this in mind, the live and the mediatised Mary introduce the performance as “a one off special event,” “[n]ever to be repeated” and thus “[u]nique” (2/ 00:00:27). In Oliver’s production Never Work (2006), a similar point is made via the observation that a live performance is “never the same twice” (4). Although both productions have in fact been repeatedly staged, the characters are right in their assertions in so far as each individual performance of the productions is unique in itself. The notion of mediatised repetition, by contrast, is explored when the live Mary in Wednesday, Wednesday fast-forwards the video of the protesting mediatised Mary (cf. 20/ 00:15:33; see fig. 7). This scene relates repetition to nonlinearity as yet another aspect that distinguishes mediatisation from liveness. It thus reminds the audience that, generally, live performance has a linear progression in so far as it irreversibly proceeds from a beginning to an end with no possibility for the spectators to pause its development, to skip scenes, to rewind or fast-forward the action to previous or subsequent scenes or any means of retrieving the past moments on stage. In theatre, as a rule, the spectators attend the performance from beginning to end, possibly interrupted by an intermission, unless a performance is unexpectedly broken off by the actors, or the spectators decide to leave before it has actually ended. This may be due to personal reasons or to the nature of the performance itself which may be too extensive to be seen as a whole, as in the case of durational performances that may last for hours or even days. While this temporal linearity distinguishes theatre from other media such as film or video, it used to relate theatre to television which was initially considered as a live medium because it was often produced with a live studio audience and was broadcast in real-time. This also meant that viewers could not reverse the order of the set television programme and pause or repeat individual programmes until recently. New developments, however, have made it possible to

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Figure 7: The live Mary threatens her mediatised double with a remote control in Mary Oliver’s Wednesday, Wednesday (image provided by Mary Oliver and used with her permission)

disrupt the linearity of television. Thanks to television sets with built-in digital video recording facilities (DVR) and time-shift functions, television programmes can these days be recorded and repeatedly played back, paused, rewound or fastforwarded and allow to skip unwanted passages such as commercial breaks. Television on Demand (TOD) moreover offers the viewer free choice among programmes that no longer have fixed air times. As a consequence, the usage and flexibility of television now much more resembles that of other technological and digital media and contrasts with the linearity of theatre. Wednesday, Wednesday and Never Work juxtapose the ephemerality of live performance with the repeatability and nonlinearity of mediatisation. Yet, the productions do not present the evanescence of the live action as a drawback but welcome it as a desirable feature of live performance. As a consequence, the mediatised characters can only envy this ephemerality and linearity while they are forever caught on video and have to suffer an apparently endless boredom of mediatised repetition. In this regard, liveness is thus celebrated as not only being different from, but also superior to mediatisation.

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Station House Opera: unique experience versus documentation Whereas Oliver’s productions exhibit a clear preference for the ephemerality and linearity of liveness, Station House Opera’s productions Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998; still ongoing) and Mare’s Nest (2001– 2004) not only attribute equal value to liveness and mediatisation but even playfully question their binary opposition. Both the live and the mediatised action are based on frequent repetition of individual scenes and routines, but this always involves some form of variation so that neither the live nor the mediatised repetitions are completely identical. The recurrence of individual actions on stage such as eating, pouring drinks, fighting, passing through doors etc. creates a kind of echo and a circularity that questions not only the uniqueness but also the linearity of the live action. Since the performers’ movements are minutely choreographed and timed by the metronome, the live repetitions achieve a perfection that often renders it difficult for the spectators to identify discrepancies between individual repetitions of a single routine. When, for instance, the female persona in Roadmetal, Sweetbread repeatedly enters the auditorium through a side door, runs onto the stage and disappears in the wings, only to reappear again in the auditorium, her movements and pace seem to be identical each time (cf. 00:03:03). In fact, however, these live repetitions are of course not completely identical but unique in themselves though the differences may be indiscernible. The spectators are playfully reminded of this when, after several apparently identical repetitions, the live action suddenly shows deliberate alterations until the female persona is eventually tripped up by the male persona when running onto the stage for the sixth time (cf. 00:04:41). Interestingly, such repetition with eventual modifications equally applies to the videoed sequences. Initially, the production establishes the illusion of identically replaying video loops before revealing that the videos actually consist of several consecutive sequences. This is illustrated when, to use the same example, the mediatised woman in the accompanying video already stumbles when running onto the stage for the fourth and fifth time (cf. 00:04:10), or when the mediatised man reacts differently to each repetition and also differs in his behaviour from the live man. While it would have been possible just to play back the same video sequence again and again, this use of video rather follows an aesthetic of uniqueness which is conventionally associated with liveness. In fact, neither of the two productions uses video loops at any time so that none of the sequences are actually shown to the same audience more than once.

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When considering the reproducibility of videos not only within a single performance but from one performance to another, it could be assumed that Station House Opera’s videos are simply played back identically in all performances of a single production whereas the live action is staged anew each time. This, however, is only true as long as the productions are not taken to a new venue. Since the videos not only double the live performers but also the stage itself and include off-stage footage from the respective performance venue and its vicinity, the videos have to be produced afresh every time the productions are transferred to a different venue (cf. Giesekam 2007: 203). Station House Opera emphasise this uniqueness of live and mediatised performance in their description of Roadmetal, Sweetbread as being “each time especially recreated for the particular performance space” so that “every show is unique.”⁶⁸ Only the sequences showing the videoed room in Mare’s Nest can probably be reused at any venue because they bear no direct relation to the respective performance space. Though the discarded video footage filmed for performances at previous venues may still exist afterwards, it is no longer used and its potential for repetition is thus only of theoretical interest rather than practical importance to the individual performances. Admittedly, when considering only the performances given at a single performance space, the videos are recycled whereas the live action is always ‘fresh.’ Yet, as unique as the live elements of each performance may be, they closely resemble the other performances at the same venue, because they are timed and synchronised with the videos and follow the rhythm of the metronome. Once the videos have been recorded for a new venue, the performers have to repeat their live routines with as little variation as possible. Station House Opera thus approximate liveness and mediatisation by presenting similar though not identically repeated sequences of action on stage and screen. Yet they interrupt them by means of sudden modifications that render both the live and the mediatised repetition deliberately imperfect and therefore accentuate the uniqueness of the respective performance. The play with repetition is also transferred to the level of personae, for in the same way that sequences of action are repeated and no longer unique, the personae themselves no longer figure as unique individuals. The live personae are doubled or further multiplied by means of mediatised counterparts. Moreover, they are mutually interchangeable to a certain extent because the productions do not present psychologically coherent individuals. Instead, they use types – such as the cheated, unfaithful, sexually insatiable, submissive or dominant

 http://www.stationhouseopera.com/project/6130/.

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partner – that may change and are partly redistributed in the course of the performances.⁶⁹ However, although the audience may be confused occasionally, the productions achieve no actual inversion of the uniqueness of liveness and the reproducibility of mediatisation, but only playfully approximate live action to mediatised action. With analytical distance, it thus remains obvious for the spectators that the live action and performers are in fact unique, though very much alike in their repetition, whereas the videos are mere reproductions of actions recorded in advance, which can at least be reproduced and reused in all performances given at a single venue. Moreover, Station House Opera not only hint at the ephemerality and uniqueness of live performance by means of the ruptures inserted into their systems of repetition. In addition to this, Mare’s Nest deliberately accentuates and celebrates the ephemerality of the performance by offering a unique but necessarily incomplete viewing experience to each spectator. Due to the arrangement of the stage with the double-sided screen, the spectators cannot simultaneously observe both playing spaces and both sides of the screen. Individual scenes are therefore revealed or hidden depending on the perspective so that the spectators always miss parts of the action. Richard Malcolm comments on his own experience of Mare’s Nest as an “incomplete, interrupted” performance that “remains in process” (55) and he deplores “always missing a significant proportion of the performance, moments in time that [he] can never catch up with” (48). Depending on where the spectators position themselves, they therefore see individual versions of the performance that may differ widely from what other spectators experience. The incomplete experience of the performance necessarily also applies to all recordings of the performance because they can never simultaneously document the complete action. The DVD recording produced in Nantes, France, in March 2003, that forms the basis for the present study, therefore provides two distinct video streams, each of which shows one playing space and its respective side of the screen. Though on the whole, no sequence of action on stage or screen is missed in this form of documentation, it can still only be assumed how the two halves of the stage and the two screens interact in real-time. To a certain extent, however, the DVD may offer a more complete rendering of the performance than experienced by the live audience. Obviously, the incompleteness of the

 The notion of shifting or split identities is further explored in Station House Opera’s Mind Out (2008; still ongoing) where the performers’ bodies respond to other performers’ minds (cf. http://www.stationhouseopera.com/project/6138/).

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spectators’ experience and the limitation of the video documentation are no accidental shortcomings of the production but an intentional acknowledgement of the fact that a live performance is ephemeral and, once put on stage, is lost forever afterwards in its entirety. Many performance companies, including the ones selected for the present study, document their performances by capturing them on video and thus create lasting products that can be played back repeatedly and provide valuable material for performance research. Yet, these mediatised traces of live performances are only inadequate renderings rather than identical reproductions, because no method of recording can adequately capture the essence of a live performance in all its aspects. The live experience of roaming the stage with one’s eyes is thus inevitably reduced to the more or less static and limited points of view of the cameras. Whereas other art forms can be mechanically or technically reproduced in endless identical copies, theatre and performance therefore defy reproduction even when being filmed or otherwise documented. Walter Benjamin’s theory of the dissolution of the aura of works of art due to technological reproduction, as put forward in his seminal essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (1936), casts a light on this phenomenon. Following his argumentation, it can be observed that the aura or authenticity of theatre and performance, defined as a presence in the ‘here’ and ‘now’ (cf. Benjamin 13, 29), is guarded against identical reproduction because of its inevitable disappearance. In his publication Certain Fragments, Tim Etchells generally criticises attempts at counteracting the ephemerality of liveness when commenting on the documentation of live performance as “an attempt at capture, a dragging down of the ephemeral into the fossilising mud of all that is fixed and fixing” (71). As Miriam Drewes points out, however, Etchells and his company Forced Entertainment heavily rely on recording technologies and mediatisation in order to document their productions for posterity (cf. Drewes 349). Etchells’s criticism thus contrasts with his and Forced Entertainment’s actual trust in the self-same technologies when it comes to ensuring the longevity of their own artistic output.

Station House Opera, Tim Etchells and Forced Entertainment: mortality versus immutability That the ephemerality and disappearance of liveness are related to the evanescence and transience of life is suggested by the recurring theme of death and

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dying in Station House Opera’s productions. Although the personae allegedly inflict severe injuries on each other, the respective victims quickly forget these assaults. Towards the end of Roadmetal, Sweetbread the mediatised woman even strikes the male double with a concrete slab so that he collapses as if dead. While the live woman rearranges the stage in order to recreate the mediatised scene of crime, the live and mediatised ‘corpses’ repeatedly rise from the dead to change their positions (cf. 01:02:37) until they both chase their female partners into the backstage area (cf. 01:00:05). In a similar way, the death of one of the female personae is mourned in Mare’s Nest. The live woman and her two mediatised doubles, however, repeatedly rise from their deathbeds, observe each other lying dead and eventually come back to life altogether (cf. video stream 2: 00:59:49). It thus seems as if the female persona had several lives or was immortal. In both productions, stage and screen thus present physical injuries as reversible and make death appear to be no longer final. In Tim Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting the concern with death becomes manifest when Etchells reads out his brother’s account of having been mistaken for a ghost after his girlfriend had died in a car crash in Ghana. As his brother explains, people were mostly scared by the fact that, in his ignorance of the misunderstanding caused by his own presumed death, he appeared like “a ghost prepared to act like everything was normal, like [he] was alive” (119/ 00:29:42). For them, the frightening aspect was thus not death per se but the blurring of the clear distinction between life and death. On the videos, the brother’s spectral quality is represented by an extreme close-up of an eye that is eventually replaced by blank screens (cf. 118 f./ 00:25:56). Despite his brother’s presumed resurrection, his story and the blank screens remind the audience not only of the transience of life and by extension of the ephemerality of live performance but also suggest that mediatisation cannot call a halt to such evanescence. Etchells thus counters Station House Opera’s illusion of the reversibility of death by stressing the actual finitude of life. The final letter that is not reprinted in the published script of Instructions for Forgetting moreover expresses the idea that death is ultimately “beyond representation” in any medium (01:27:24). As an explanation for his decision not to reproduce this letter in the script, Etchells points out the permanence of writing as compared to the impermanence of speech and expresses his hesitation to leave this personal document to the public and to posterity (cf. 2006: 129). By disregarding the fact that the letter is captured forever on the performance DVD and is thus perpetually put at the disposal of the spectators after all, Etchells ascribes more importance to the lasting existence of written evidence than to the repeatability of mediatisation. His focus on the impossibility of saving mem-

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ories from oblivion further illustrates his doubts about the potential of mediatisation to prevent disappearance. In this context, the videos appear to be as ineffective as the textual memories of the respective contributors. The unreliability of personal memories is repeatedly illustrated via conflicting oral accounts of past events as in the diffuse memories of Croatia (cf. 123 f./ 00:53:19). Furthermore, the accompanying videos rarely directly illustrate the verbal material and thus offer no valid and authoritative representations of the past either. Sometimes, the monitors even go blank completely (e. g. 119/ 00:30:26; 00:48:30; 122 f./ 00:51:02; 126/ 01:07:26; 126/ 01:12:41; 129/ 01:23:09) and deny any glimpses of the past. According to Etchells, mediatisation thus offers no remedy for oblivion, death and disappearance. A similar attitude can be observed when shifting the focus from Etchells’s solo work to productions by Forced Entertainment, the Sheffield-based performance company Etchells coordinates as artistic director and co-founded in 1984 under the original designation Forced Entertainment Theatre Co-Operative (cf. Helmer 62). After minor changes in the company’s initial constellation, its further core members are designer and performer Richard Lowdon and the performers Robin Arthur, Claire Marshall, Cathy Naden and Terry O’Connor. Frequently, additional collaborators are recruited for the productions (cf. Malzacher, and Helmer 12; Drewes 346 f.; Bailes 206).⁷⁰ In many of their productions, death and dying form recurring themes that emphasise the inevitable finitude and ephemerality of human life. In (Let the Water Run its Course) to the Sea that Made the Promise (1986), 200% and Bloody Thirsty (1987), Some Confusions in the Law about Love (1989), Showtime (1996), Who Can Sing a Song to Unfrighten Me? (1999), The World in Pictures (2006) and Spectacular (2008) death is represented by awkward skeleton costumes as well as by repeated stage deaths. In First Night (2001), personifications of Death even predict how individual members of the audience will die and thus point not only to the performers’ but also to the spectators’ mortality. As Florian Malzacher observes, this echoes German dramatist and director Heiner Müller’s assertion that theatre not only presupposes the presence of a living though mortal actor but also of a “potentially dying” spectator (cf. Malzacher 2004: 131). In The World in Pictures (2006), any hope that death may be evitable is disappointed by Jerry’s prediction that in a hundred years’ time performers and spectators will be dead, and within five hundred years any recorded remnants of their presence will have become inaccessible due to old-fashioned information storage or

 Cf. http://www.forcedentertainment.com/page/3019/The-People.

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wilful deletion (cf. Forced Entertainment 2006, n. pag.). Once more, this statement explicitly includes mediatisation in the transience of life. Director and performance theorist Herbert Blau also confirms that liveness is defined by its evanescence which, in turn, is closely related to mortality. Blau believes theatre to be “predicated on disappearance” (1987: 198). His notion of disappearance revolves around the performer’s mortality and derives from the observation that death and decay are inextricably linked with being (a)live. From this it follows that every moment in life and on stage is immediately and irretrievably lost in the past, and performers and spectators will no longer be the same in subsequent performances. That “[s]omeone is dying in front of your eyes” is, for Blau, a “universal of performance” that induces its disappearance (1982– 1983: 156; cf. 1990: 366) so that “[o]f all the performing arts, the theater stinks most of mortality” (1982: 83). By comparison, performers captured on video, film etc. seem to become immortal and immutable in their mediatised existence. Station House Opera present death as being reversible. Etchells and Forced Entertainment, by contrast, underscore the finitude of liveness and mediatisation. Yet, by focusing on the performers’ and spectators’ mortality, they all paradoxically underline the sense of liveness of the respective performances because being (a)live is the basic prerequisite for death. The ephemerality of live performances is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, its resistance against reproduction turns the single performance into a unique and ‘auratic’ experience. But on the other hand, it causes a sense of loss, nostalgia or death. These two aspects also become evident in Milly Barranger’s comment that “[w]hat is unique (and even disheartening) about the theatrical event is that, even as it is taking place, it is lost forever” (5).

Gob Squad and Proto-type Theater: ephemerality of live video relays When comparing the productions analysed above to Gob Squad’s and Proto-type Theater’s productions, an essential difference can be observed between the incorporation of pre-recorded videos or films on the one hand and live video relays on the other hand. Only the use of live video relays has actual consequences for the ephemerality of the material because the live videos are made anew during each individual performance and can only be used once. Pre-recorded material, by contrast, may repeatedly be used in consecutive performances without any changes. In the case of Station House Opera the possibility of recycling the pre-recorded videos applies at least to all performances at a single venue.

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In order to emphasise the specific nature of their live video relays, Gob Squad deliberately draw attention to the one-off use of their video material. Since the performers themselves directly and overtly operate their cameras, they highlight the act of recording, and the spectators are able to witness the production of the videos in the moment of the performance. Gob Squad’s often extensive modification of the productions from one performance to another further underlines that the aspect of uniqueness equally applies to the live and the mediatised elements of their performances. Thus, they delete elements and add new rules to take up the experiences gained during previous performances of a production (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 26). Frequently, a production changes its cast and performers swap parts so that the combination of performers and the assignment of roles may vary from one performance to the other (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 57). Moreover, most Gob Squad productions exhibit a high level of improvisation, interaction and audience participation. This renders every performance a unique experience that is not entirely predetermined and can never identically be reproduced because it depends on the input and composition of the respective audience. Even in the Gob Squad productions whose alleged purpose is to produce a film or to document events for posterity, the resulting footage is only shown a single time so that its ephemerality is underscored. This is the case in King Kong Club (2005 – 2007), whose filming of a King Kong parody with the spectators as performers is advertised as leading up to “the premiere of a movie that will only ever be screened once.”⁷¹ Saving the World (2008 – 2011) follows the ambitious “mission […] to save the planet and preserve it for an unknown future”⁷² by filming a public space over the duration of 24 hours (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 91). But once more, the recordings are made and edited anew for each host city. The idea of recording a slice of life to save it from oblivion and disappearance as suggested by the title of the production thus only delays the eventual disappearance for the short time passing by between recording and one-time replay. The stated purpose of Gob Squad’s Kitchen (You’ve Never Had It So Good) (2007; still ongoing) is to resuscitate the 1960s as represented in Andy Warhol’s Factory films, to capture this attempt on video and thus preserve it for eternity.⁷³

 http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/king-kong-club.  http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/saving-the-world.  In the following, the production will be abbreviated as Gob Squad’s Kitchen. The analysis is primarily based on the DVD recording of the performance at Nottingham Playhouse in Nottingham on 31 May 2007 (Gob Squad 2007). Direct quotations are transcribed from the DVD and

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The production premiered at the Volksbühne im Prater in Berlin on 30 March 2007, was first performed in England at Nottingham Playhouse on 29 May 2007 and is still touring.⁷⁴ It essentially serves as a reconstruction as well as a deconstruction of several of Andy Warhol’s experimental Factory films from the 1960s, most of which are no longer publicly available for viewing. Warhol’s Sleep (1963), his Screen Tests (1964– 1966) and the eponymous Kitchen (1965) figure most prominently in the production, but other films and series such as Kiss (1963), Haircut (1963), Blow Job (1964) and Eat (1964) are also briefly referred to. During Gob Squad’s live reenactment of several scenes from these films, the performers themselves are hidden from the audience behind a tripartite screen on which they are simultaneously shown in three live video relays (see fig. 8).

Figure 8: The three live video relays of Sleep (left), Kitchen (centre) and Screen Tests (right) in Gob Squad’s production Gob Squad’s Kitchen (image used with permission of Gob Squad)

may differ in other performances of Gob Squad’s Kitchen due to the improvisational character of the production. Time codes are measured with Windows Media Player.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/gob-squads-kitchen-youve-never-had-it-so-good-tour-dates.

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Yet, the spectators are repeatedly reminded of the fact that the resulting live videos may not prove to be everlasting. A statement that seizes on the actual unavailability of Andy Warhol’s films after only five decades owns that “in fifty years’ time there’ll probably only be a few copies of this film left” (00:03:15). In a sceptical inversion of Norman Mailer’s commentary that in a hundred years’ time Warhol’s Kitchen would serve as a historical document of its time (cf. Stein 234), this idea is moreover linked to an awareness of the transience of life and the inevitability of death. Performer-as-character Simon (Will) pessimistically imagines the scenario: “In a hundred years’ time they’re gonna look at this film and we’ll be dead. And they’ll say: ‘Look at these people, just ghosts in a machine.’ They’re gonna say: ‘Look at him, look at this man here, he is dead now but he was there and he was really, really alive’” (00:51:19). So even if the performance could be saved on video forever, this would not prevent the actual death of the performers. The wish of vanquishing the transience of life via mediatisation is therefore bound to fail. Although the video recordings and the documentation of the production on Gob Squad’s DVD might actually still be available in one hundred years, unless they share the fate of Warhol’s films, the 1960s are already a matter of the past and the disappearance of the present cannot be suspended either. All in all, Gob Squad thus do not present their live video relays as a contrast to the ephemerality of liveness but stress the evanescence of both in equal measure. Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) (2009 – 2010) also draws attention to the process of recording of its live video relays and thus reminds the spectators that the videos are made anew for each performance. Yet, on the thematic level, it also establishes a threatening sense of circularity and repetition that equally applies to the live and the videoed elements of the performance. In their boredom, the personae seek relief in endless games of role playing and thus repeat the same routines and questions with changing identities so that ‘Man 2’ eventually wonders: “Didn’t we already have this conversation?” (14/ 00:34:30). Only the ‘Man’ is not affected by the other personae’s increasing weariness of the repeated role playing and their inescapable confinement in the house. He instead clings to his repetitive and stagnating existence and simply wants to “start over” again (32/ 01:11:03). Even when he is eventually shot in the role of John F. Kennedy, he simply recommences the games of identity with his question “Who are you?” (38/ 00:15:28). By contrast, the ‘Woman’ craves for change (cf. 31/ 01:09:15) and in a metafictional statement expresses her hope that “[i]t will all be over soon. […] This house. This spot. This fiction. This trap. We are over.” (34/ 01:13:13). Yet, no release is offered by either the live or the mediatised action so that the personae remain entangled in the same fears and imprisoned in a cir-

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cular plot without development or progress. This production once more assimilates liveness and mediatisation in terms of their repetition because the endless circularity of the live action is mirrored by the live video relays. Whereas Gob Squad turn their performances into unique experiences and highlight the one-off use of their live video relays, Proto-type Theater thus create an illusion of endless repetition. Yet, artistic director Petralia also acknowledges the ephemerality of the live relays that “are lost (they are not recorded in any way) just as in a live performance one moment gives way to the next without any sense of permanence” (2010b: 128). Moreover, Proto-type Theater’s spectators directly observe how the performers create the live relays by acting for the cameras and rearranging the dolls’ house to provide a mediatised setting. In this sense, both companies illustrate that live video relays are more similar to liveness than pre-recorded videos or films because of their production before the spectators’ very eyes and their actual one-off use. In the end, the live action and live video relays actually disappear in the course of the performance event and cannot be recycled in subsequent performances.

Summary The selected productions examine whether ephemerality and disappearance serve as defining characteristics of liveness. This is accomplished by means of a comparison with mediatisation as represented by the incorporated videos or films. Instead of establishing a binary opposition of ephemeral liveness and reproducible mediatisation and presenting them as irreconcilable, most of the productions try to approximate liveness and mediatisation or even invert their respective positions with regard to ephemerality. In order to achieve this approximation or inversion, the productions playfully address aspects conventionally associated with liveness such as ephemerality, disappearance, linearity, uniqueness and mortality. Only Mary Oliver’s productions form an exception and once more affirm the difference between liveness and mediatisation by highlighting the repeatability and nonlinearity of mediatisation. Her productions clearly assign ephemerality and linearity to the live action whereas the mediatised action is fast-forwarded. The live and mediatised personae’s disputes concerning their respective degrees of liveness and the mediatised personae’s anger at being fast-forwarded moreover indicate that the ephemerality of liveness is valued as being superior to the monotone mediatised repetition. Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes forms the strongest contrast to Oliver’s approach. It goes furthest in its subversion of the distinction

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between liveness and mediatisation and apparently inverts their respective features so that the live characters believe to be caught in circularity whereas the ‘liquid films’ appear to be evanescent. Accordingly, the live characters are aware of their reappearance in consecutive performances and even suggest that the spectators’ reality might also consist of endless loops. As opposed to this, the ‘liquid films’ disappear into thin air, and several projection surfaces are torn and destroyed. It thus seems as if mediatisation was ‘more unique’ and ephemeral than liveness. Station House Opera’s productions do not go quite so far as to invert the features of liveness and mediatisation. Instead, they simply equate the live and the mediatised action by presenting them as being equally repetitive and circular. In Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest simple routines are repeatedly shown on stage and screen with only slight modifications. Since no actual video loops are used and the videos are created anew for each performance space, the mediatised repetition can hardly be considered as being more perfectly reproduced than the live action. The live personae’s uniqueness is also questioned by doubling them on the screens and presenting them as interchangeable rather than individual characters. Moreover, their injuries and even deaths seem reversible and thus question the transience of life. Only the unique viewing experience due to the arrangement of the stage in Mare’s Nest alludes to the ephemerality of each performance because the spectators inevitably miss parts of the performance they can never retrieve. Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) similarly creates an impression of repetitiveness and circularity. The live action and the live video relays seem to be trapped in never-ending role playing games that create a claustrophobic atmosphere and illustrate the personae’s confinement in their fictional world. In fact, however, both the live action and the live video relays are ephemeral. Even the videos are never presented in loops and are only used once because they are remade during each individual performance. The repetition is therefore a purely thematic phenomenon based on recurring themes and motifs rather than an ontological aspect of liveness. As opposed to this, Tim Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting uses actual video loops. His live ‘refrain,’ however, is slightly modified each time it is proclaimed. Nevertheless, the production does not simply present liveness and mediatisation in terms of a binary opposition of uniqueness versus identical reproducibility. It suggests instead that mediatisation is as ineffective as liveness in overcoming disappearance, death and oblivion and is thus equally ephemeral. Gob Squad’s emphasis on the uniqueness of both live and mediatised action derives not only from their use of improvisation, changing casts and audience participation that turn each performance into a singular experience. It is primar-

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ily based on their use of live video relays that are created anew in the presence of – and occasionally with the help of – the spectators. Gob Squad’s Kitchen moreover explicitly argues that it is impossible to retrieve the past or adequately capture and document the present for posterity by means of mediatisation. The productions thus follow distinct strategies and make different statements concerning the ephemerality of liveness and the reproducibility of mediatisation. Nevertheless, they share a playful approach to this question that subverts the clear distinction between liveness and mediatisation. The productions often successfully create the illusion of conflating or inverting liveness and mediatisation in terms of ephemerality and repetition. Yet, the productions that use film or pre-recorded video cannot actually change the fact that the live action is ephemeral whereas the mediatised material has a lasting existence even beyond the single performance event. An actual assimilation of liveness and mediatisation in this respect is only facilitated by Gob Squad’s and Proto-type Theater’s use of live video relays whose existence directly originates from the live action so that they immediately vanish with it.

4.3 Unpredictability, Imperfection and Risk of Failure Mary Oliver: imperfect liveness versus perfect mediatisation? “L’Oreal perfection meets Vaudeville” is how Mary Oliver sums up the relation between the apparently immaculate mediatised double and the live performer in Wednesday, Wednesday (2005 – 2006; 2009) (Oliver 2008: 60). According to the mediatised double’s self-confident judgement, she is “practically perfect” (3/ 00:01:02) and “infinitely more gorgeous” (11/ 00:08:17) than the live Mary whom she considers to be “several light years away from perfection” (5/ 00:02:38). Indeed, whereas the live Mary has to deal with weight problems (cf. 4/ 00:02:00; 16/ 00:12:53) and is dissatisfied with her physical appearance (cf. 18/ 00:14:18), her double claims “always [to] remain a constant size ten” (12/ 00:08:54) and swings her shiny hair in “L’Oreal slow motion” (3/ 00:01:06; 11/ 00:08:20). In addition to her seeming physical advantages, the double is also intellectually superior to the live Mary. The latter’s gullibility (cf. 5/ 00:02:37) is illustrated when she is eventually outwitted by her double who imprisons her in the television set. Her double, by contrast, has “perfect memory recall” (20/ 00:16:22) and is “always line perfect, never a hair out of place, never a word spoken out of turn” (4/ 00:01:24). The mediatised Mary’s performance has been perfected in repeated takes (cf. 4/ 00:01:44), her swearwords or foul language have been deleted (cf. 13/ 00:09:30; 17 f./ 00:13:53), and the revela-

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tion of her indecent memories is simply skipped by being fast-forwarded (cf. 23/ 00:17:49). Any traces of imperfection are thus simply edited out. The possibility of improving mediatised performance via repeated takes is similarly alluded to in Mary Oliver’s production Never Work (2006) where the on-screen Mary complains that she had to endure twelve takes (15). The dialogue between Mary Oliver’s live and mediatised characters addresses unpredictability, risk of imperfection and susceptibility to failure as defining characteristics of live performance that contrast with the potential perfection of mediatisation. Unpredictability applies, above all, to interactive and improvisational live performances that deliberately leave certain elements of the action to be decided by the spectators or by incalculable circumstances. But even in tightly scripted performances and irrespective of how well rehearsed a live performance is or how professional its performers are, a certain risk and the possibility that something might go wrong always remain. Consequently, Steve Dixon points out that a specific tension arises from the fact that “live performance always carries with it the possibility that the unexpected may happen” (131). This is primarily due to the simultaneity of production and reception in theatre and live performance which leaves no time for post-production to eliminate flaws before they are detected by the audience. As Oliver’s productions illustrate, the linearity of live performances entails that the performers only have a single chance of getting a scene right, whereas mediatised performances offer the possibility of repeated takes and editing. Imperfection and failure as inherent and inevitable features of theatre and live performance have recently attracted increased interest. With Performance Theatre and the Poetics of Failure (2011), Sara Jane Bailes devotes an entire volume to the investigation of failure in theatre and live performance. Based on her analysis of forms of failure in the work of Forced Entertainment, Goat Island and Elevator Repair Service, Bailes claims that “the wrongness or the mistakeability of theatre – that it can and will make mistakes – is in part how we know it to be theatre” (73; emphases in the original). She explicitly links the inevitable risk of failure with the status of theatre as a live medium when arguing that theatre’s liveness – its still-auratic power which arguably sets it apart from other technically reproducible art forms – is intrinsically unreliable: a live event can never guarantee its outcome […]. Dogging the heels of all live performance is the ontological impossibility of preventing accident or error in the execution of an act. (99)

The notion of failure as an ontological property of theatre and direct consequence of its liveness is also expressed by Róisín O’Gorman and Margaret

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Werry who refer to failure as “the hallmark of performance” or “its innate condition” (2). They further elaborate that “its defining liveness and ephemerality marks performance’s ultimate failure to perpetuate itself” (2). Here, failure is not only understood as unpredictability and faultiness, but more generally refers also to the ephemerality of theatre and its inability to create a lasting artefact. These two aspects are linked because failure and the occurrence of the unforeseen prevent the perfect, identical repetition of performances, create slight variation and thus thwart identical reproducibility. Unpredictability and failure thus stress the unrepeatability of live performance and remind the audience of the uniqueness and fragility of the live event. What is considered a ‘faultless’ or ‘perfect’ performance in any medium, however, is a subjective question that moreover depends on medial conventions of representation. What can be measured more objectively, however, is the degree of controllability characteristic of a medium. Admittedly, mediatised performances such as film or video – unless based on animation technique – also rely on naturally fallible and imperfect human beings. But they allow for retakes during the process of production as well as improvement during postproduction by means of cutting, editing, computer generated imagery (CGI), special effects etc. Mediatised products can thus be optimised and are usually not released until they have been approved for the public and considered faultless by the producers (cf. Dixon 131). As Susan Sontag remarked with reference to film as early as in 1966, when digital imaging technology could not even be dreamt of yet, mediatised performances are “totally manipulable, totally calculable” and “determinate” (1966: 31), whereas theatre events “because they are performances, something always ‘live,’ […] are not subject to a comparable degree of control, do not admit a comparable exact integration of effects” (1966: 32). Of course, this does not imply a value judgement in the sense of a generally higher artistic quality of mediatised performances but merely attests to their potential for eliminating flaws. Yet, even though unpredictability and risk of imperfection can be eradicated during the processes of recording and production, the playback of mediatised performances to an audience carries its own risks because technology as such may be unreliable and a certain possibility remains that the playback might be disturbed by power blackouts, film tears, computer crashes or other technological failures. Although the mediatised product might be perfectly edited and flawless in itself, its eventual presentation to an audience therefore carries a residual risk of failure. Predictability and controllability thus apply primarily to the production of mediatised artefacts and less to their playback.

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That the use of mediatisation in live performances carries its own risks is also experienced by the live Mary in Mary Oliver’s Never Work. She explicitly debates on the question of perfection when asking herself: So why now do I choose to pit myself against artificial mediatized perfection? I’ve introduced characters onto the live stage who are line perfect, they never miss a beat, their sense of timing is acute, their reactions totally reliable. […] Why do I do this to myself […]? (2)

It soon turns out, however, that mediatisation is not as perfect as she imagined. The live Mary remembers problems with a defective video or DVD player in a previous performance of Wednesday, Wednesday (cf. 12) and recognises the risk of “technical failure” (4) and the general uncontrollability of technology. Moreover, she complains about more general disadvantages of working with mediatised doubles such as their restricted vocabulary and their lack of versatility once they have been captured on video (cf. 11 f.). In addition to these technological drawbacks, the live Mary also discovers flaws in her double’s personality. Contrary to her expectations, her double can therefore not compensate for her own fallibility but instead proves to be an unreliable and highly incompetent partner for the performance. Not only does her double get caught in her leads as soon as she appears on the screen (cf. 1), but she also seeks a quarrel with a member of the audience (cf. 2), is impatient and inattentive (cf. 3). Although the live Mary is afraid of forgetting her lines, her double is the one who actually misses her cue (cf. 4) and upsets the delicate timing because she cannot cope with her own “Bloody Technology” (10). Moreover, when finally allowed to take over the performance, she immediately digresses from the script and reveals secret information (cf. 13). While admitting that a live performer “will never be perfect, never totally reliable, never the same twice” (4), the live Mary therefore becomes aware of the fact that mediatisation offers no absolute guarantee for perfection either once it is included within a live performance. In a similar way, the mediatised double in Wednesday, Wednesday eventually turns out to be less perfect and contented than she would like to appear. While she praises the media for providing a world without hunger but full of love (cf. 13/ 00:10:13), she is obviously tempted by wine and cake (cf. 14/ 00:11:00) and is offended when being reminded that she cannot experience sex in her mediatised world (cf. 7/ 00:04:04; 17/ 00:13:44). The price she has to pay for her seeming perfection is a lack of spontaneity and an inability to experience or share emotions (cf. 18/ 00:14:05). Furthermore, despite her pride in her beauty, her appearance on screen seems hardly more beautiful than the live character’s

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appearance. Once she emerges on the stage, she assumes the live performer’s body but seems even more imperfect because she forgot to put on her skirt (cf. 28/ 00:22:43). In her productions Wednesday, Wednesday and Never Work, Mary Oliver examines whether unpredictability, imperfection and failure are defining characteristics of liveness. Just as the cartoon double in her production Fly Me to the Moon (2006 – 2007) serves “as a counterpoint to [the] ageing, weighty, unreliable mind and body” of the live performer (Oliver 2008: 65 f.), these productions initially establish a binary opposition of imperfect liveness and perfect mediatisation. Yet, this contrast gradually seems to dissolve as it is suggested that neither liveness nor mediatisation offer an absolute guarantee for perfection. Despite the mediatised characters’ bragging about their own perfection, the doubles are limited in their repertoire of actions or reactions, unreliable and prone to technological failure. These deficiencies cannot simply be edited out or be controlled otherwise. Oliver thus questions the possibility of attaining absolute perfection by means of mediatisation.

Mary Oliver and Proto-type Theater: the appeal of imperfection Even though the live character in Mary Oliver’s Wednesday, Wednesday is envious of her double’s self-proclaimed perfection, she recognises that perfection renders her double somewhat sterile, lifeless or even “[u]n-real” (4/ 00:01:31). As a consequence, she learns to prefer her own imperfect existence to the smooth perfection of the media (cf. 12/ 00:09:10) and accepts that “mistakes are part of the risk” (19/ 00:15:08). That her mediatised double proposes to change parts and forcibly carries this plan through when the live Mary refuses the deal also suggests that the double herself is not really convinced of her superior position either and happily trades her own perfection for the fallibility and temptations of an existence beyond the screen. Both characters are “frightened […] of being alive” (10/ 00:06:45) because this implies real relationships and hence the risk of getting hurt (cf. 9 f./ 00:05:14). Yet, to them the excitement of being alive and sharing one’s life with others is worth the imperfection, risk and unpredictability that go along with it. The live performer’s observation in Never Work that even spectators often prefer imperfection similarly illustrates that imperfection is not necessarily a drawback (cf. 2). Instead, it is the contrast between the hope for perfection and the inevitable failure that seems to make a performance worthwhile in the first place: “that’s why we keep doing it” (4). While it is human to strive for per-

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fection, it thus also appears to be essentially human never to succeed. In order to attribute this human quality of imperfection also to her mediatised double and render her more spontaneous (cf. 9, 12), “more vulnerable and more human” (10), the on-stage Mary even claims deliberately to have provided her double with “incompetence” and “eccentricities” (10). This explanation thus reveals that the double’s apparent imperfection, the flaws in her character and her unsatisfactory timing are intentional qualities that are “accurately” performed (10) rather than being inadvertent shortcomings. On the whole, Oliver regards imperfection as a quality that renders a performance more spontaneous and multifaceted and therefore makes it come more alive for the audience because mistakes form an inevitable aspect of being alive. As she observes, “imperfections […] make us human” and are necessary “in order to create a convincing equitable relationship” between live and mediatised characters (Oliver 2008: 63). Even the mediatised Marys prefer the imperfection of liveness to their boring mediatised existences so that both doubles display dissatisfaction with their own status. Oliver’s productions thus not only celebrate the human strife for perfection but playfully stress the inevitability and possible appeal of imperfection. That the notion of imperfection is also central to Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) (2009 – 2010) is already indicated by the choice of title. It suggests that the production is still incomplete and unfinished and makes it seem as if the spectators were witnessing a rehearsal rather than an actual performance. The boundaries of the stage are merely indicated by a square of white tape on the floor of the performance space, the setting is reduced to isolated props and the plainly visible cameras acknowledge and expose the workings of the production. Artistic director Petralia gives a detailed account of the arrangement of the stage that illustrates his attempt at creating a fictional space which still seems imperfect and preliminary: The space the performers work within (i.e. the area behind the screens) is arranged like a live television soundstage, with spaces mapped out that represent particular fictional locations within and around a suburban home […]. On the floor within the stage are nearly a hundred colour-coded pieces of tape that signify the placement of scenic elements and the positions of the camera tripods in relation to the scenes being shot. […] These small pieces of tape are not hidden or obscured in any way, nor are any of the mechanics that allow Virtuoso (working title) to take shape: any member of the audience can clearly see the fragmented scenic items that are used to create backgrounds for shots or the large dollhouse that sits at the far upstage portion of the stage […]. (Proto-type Theater 2010b: 14)

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As this quotation indicates, the production uses the seemingly provisional stage design to expose its constructedness and to remind the spectators of the fact that they are watching a performance that is extremely fragile. That the characters become increasingly weary of keeping up their role playing and are no longer able to hold the fiction together also illustrates how easily the performance could fall apart. All of a sudden, the nameless ‘Woman’ can no longer recite her lines correctly and has to recommence her monologue three times (cf. 24/ 00:50:55). She looks at the other characters for support because she not only mixes up individual words but is obviously struggling to figure out what role is actually expected from her. Though this failure to perform is obviously a mere performance itself, it reminds the audience of the risks of failure immanent in live performance. To complement the apparent imperfection of the live elements of the performance, its mediatised elements also seem to be deficient because the live video relays only reveal a fragmented fiction that often seems to be completely random. Although each camera angle is minutely planned and executed, the frames sometimes appear to be arbitrary because they select irrelevant details such as the performers’ feet and never show the performers in their entirety. In addition to this seemingly amateurish camera work that is in fact a work of precision, the complex interaction between stage and monitors demands exact timing and coordination so that the combination of liveness and mediatisation poses an actual risk of discrepancies and imperfection. Performer Andrew Westerside captures the risk of upsetting this balance by referring to the production as “a house of cards” that is highly sensitive to mistakes (qtd. in Proto-type Theater 2010b: 30). Finally, the notion of imperfection is also thematically explored by means of the recurring motif of a mysterious spot or hole of increasing size. It not only forebodes the destruction of the house (e. g. 30/ 01:06:14; 34/ 01:13:01) but metaphorically suggests a blemish in the characters’ existence and hints at the fragility of life and reality. Throughout the production, the characters’ fear of the spot contrasts with their desire for perfection. But although the characters repeatedly point out the perfection of their home, it soon transpires that their descriptions of their home as a paradisiac place are only wishful thinking. Their “paradise is in danger” (30) and does not actually satisfy them. Whereas ‘Man 2’ openly confesses that he is “bored like everyone else in paradise” (19/ 00:44:12), ‘Man’ is afraid of admitting his dissatisfaction and is torn between denial and complaint when explaining: “This is Eden. It is all perfect here and we are so happy. So very happy. No. We don’t have anything to do but make up ridiculous games. Shut up! I am very confused. No, this is the truth” (12/ 00:29:12). More than the other characters, the ‘Woman’ expresses a desire to leave the confines of their home but

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although “bored with the fiction of it all [she is] afraid of the consequences of what happens out there” (30/ 01:06:44; cf. 24/ 00:56:08). In addition to digging in the hole to explore and enlarge it (cf. 1/ 00:07:33; 19/ 00:46:00; 24/ 00:54:01), she is the first to venture beyond the premises (cf. 30/ 01:08:15). It is possible, therefore, to interpret her as a modern reincarnation of Eve who causes the final collapse of the house and the expulsion from Paradise – though in this fiction, leaving Paradise is a relief because its perfection is stifling and tiresome. Despite their fear of what lies beyond their existence, the characters are thus strangely attracted to the spot and regard the imperfection it represents as a welcome change. The ‘Woman’ even refers to the spot as being “alluring” (8/ 00:16:11). As a metaphor, the spot illustrates that fiction must not be perfect if it wants to resemble life. Imperfection has infiltrated into the characters’ fiction but they initially try to deny the existence of the spot. Eventually, however, they recognise that imperfection is an inevitable part of reality that they have to accept if they want to experience real life. In this sense, perfection and life are mutually exclusive, and imperfection equally applies to liveness and mediatisation, but also concerns both fiction and reality. The imperfection and failures of theatre and live performance are usually covered up because they are considered as disruptive, dangerous elements that are detrimental to the effectiveness of performances. Yet, artists occasionally also acknowledge the productive moment of failure and its fertile influence on the creative process (cf. O’Gorman, and Werry 2 f., 5). Such appreciation of failure is not restricted to the process of devising, developing and rehearsing of productions. It also applies to the eventual performances where imperfection and failure sometimes figure not as accidental flaws but as intentional and deliberately employed strategies. In Virtuoso (working title) as well as in Mary Oliver’s productions, both the live action and the videos embrace the notion of imperfection by being deliberately unfinished, fragmented or faulty. In these productions, imperfection is portrayed as rendering fiction and reality interesting and ‘alive.’ Absolute perfection, by contrast, is deemed undesirable and boring and belies the promise to create a paradisiac state. Yet, both live and mediatised imperfection are intentionally staged and explicitly addressed in meta-commentaries rather than being accidental failures. This suggests that imperfection alone does not necessarily indicate liveness because, paradoxically, even imperfection can be perfectly feigned or technologically produced.

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Tim Etchells and Forced Entertainment: staged versus actual failure Much more than to Mary Oliver’s or Proto-type Theater’s work, imperfection is central to Forced Entertainment’s productions. It constitutes a trademark of their performances that often seem to be at the brink of failure or apparently keep failing over and over again. The performers repeatedly struggle with the delivery of their lines, are at a loss as to how to proceed in chaotic and incoherent plots, or are even unable or unwilling to keep acting at all. At other moments, they are almost too keen on performing and employ inadequate costumes and crude props in order to succeed. Even though the productions are mostly scripted (cf. Forced Entertainment 2011: 5), they moreover retain an air of improvisation due to seemingly unrehearsed acting, colloquial language, minimalist scenery and makeshift costumes. Forced Entertainment’s staging of chaos in apparently disintegrating performances could be mistaken for actual failure in productions like Club of No Regrets (1993), Showtime (1996), Pleasure (1997), First Night (2001), Bloody Mess (2004), The World in Pictures (2006), Spectacular (2008) and The Thrill of It All (2010). But it is, in fact, a deliberate means of reflecting on the nature of theatre and performance by subverting conventions and disappointing audience expectations.⁷⁵ Paradoxically, Forced Entertainment’s productions stage imperfection so perfectly that their feigned failure could be, and sometimes is, mistaken for actual failure and bad acting rather than being recognised as a deliberate and artful strategy (cf. Gardner 2004, n. pag.; Bailes 57) or as a chaos that is in fact “tightly controlled” (Etchells 2007b: 168). Sara Jane Bailes refers to Forced Entertainment’s approach as a “‘radical amateurism,’ […] a highly developed but intentionally ‘poor’ delivery style” that is employed “in order to derail stage conventions, the ambitions of dramatic integrity, and the process of spectatorship” (Bailes 56). Such amateurism subverts accepted notions of what professional theatre is or should be like (cf. 104). Yet as she further observes, it also highlights the “artificiality” of the theatrical event, its processuality and “the labor that performance demands of the performer” and stresses “the overly charged live-ness of the harrowing onstage moment” (69). Imperfection and failure thus serve as a self-reflexive exploration of the workings of theatre and are often combined with explicit meta-theatrical commentaries or numerous re-stagings of a single scene that render the constructed-

 Though initiates to Forced Entertainment’s performance style probably no longer expect ‘conventional’ theatre anyway.

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ness of Forced Entertainment’s productions transparent. What draws further attention to the nature of acting is the performers’ constant oscillation between acting and feigned ‘non-acting,’ the shifting between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ acting (cf. Giesekam 2007: 118 f.), the switching between acting and observing one another (cf. Drewes 347), the redistribution of roles, the changes of costumes and the use of the performers’ real names. Forced Entertainment embrace failure and imperfection as inevitable characteristics and constitutive features of liveness which may render performance and performers more ‘real,’ authentic and genuine than any perfect staging. Tim Etchells accordingly explains Forced Entertainment’s strategy by referring to the spectators’ “desire […] for nakedness, defencelessness” and “exposure” (Etchells 2004b: 216) and provocatively proclaims: Down with poisonous slickness, defensive seamlessness and rhetorical authority. We’d rather have the provisional, the vulnerable and the playful. We’d rather have the event that unfolds and unravels. (2004: 211)

Etchells’s interest in performative and, more generally, human failure can also be traced in the “Institute of Failure” he founded together with Matthew Goulish, who is a core member of the Chicago-based performance group Goat Island. On its website as well as in live presentations, the institute investigates instances of failure across diverse disciplines in a “semi-intellectual” attitude (Goulish 258; cf. 262; Etchells, and Goulish, n. pag.). Among other facets, its online list of “types of failure” also includes “impermanence,” “decay” and “disappearance.”⁷⁶ This suggests that ephemerality in itself can be considered as a form of imperfection, an assumption that links these two aspects of liveness. When analysing failure and imperfection in specific performances, it is essential to differentiate between accidental or ‘real’ and intentional or staged failure. Bailes accordingly contrasts “scripted” with “non-scripted” manifestations of failure and elaborates that “despite our tendency to believe in its once-off authenticity, the failed moment or event isn’t necessarily improvised, original, or unrepeatable (not always accidental, then) but rather as susceptible to manipulation as any other outcome” (5; emphasis in the original). In other words, not even failure can be trusted anymore. As the productions analysed in the present study illustrate, failure may be intentionally increased and strategically used in order to manipulate the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation. It may enhance the overall  Cf. http://www.institute-of-failure.com/.

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impression of liveness in a spirit of resistance against the perfection of mediatisation. In this sense, imperfection can be seen as a political statement against society’s overemphasis on success and achievement (cf. Bailes 78), as a rebellion against the “normative tyranny of success” (O’Gorman, and Werry 2). Moreover, the strategic or professional “amateurism” (Bailes 93) may be perceived as a proof of authenticity or an element of reality from beyond the fictional world of a performance (cf. Bailes 99). Hence, the moments where the performance is disrupted and the performers no longer seem to perform are presumably more authentic. Finally, intentional failure may be exploited in order to alienate the audience and expose or subvert theatrical conventions (cf. Bailes 3, 14). In Etchells’s solo work Instructions for Forgetting (2001; still ongoing) the impression of failure is less evident than in his Forced Entertainment productions. The performance does not actually threaten to break down at any point or move into a direction not initially intended. Etchells moreover does not figure as the seemingly incompetent amateur performer typical of Forced Entertainment’s work but is in control of the performance. Yet, as a spectator of a performance in New York observes, “Etchells tended to look anything but comfortable at times” (Parker 13). Moreover, Etchells does not recite his text from memory. He instead presents it in a deliberately unaccomplished, unrehearsed and almost disinterested delivery style by directly reading out of his script and demonstratively shifting stacks of paper at the beginning of new sections of the performance (e. g. 00:30:25; 01:07:32). That this is an intentional strategy of creating imperfection is evidenced by his decision of “mak[ing] a show of ‘reading’” in order to create the impression of “working from notes” (Etchells 2006: 113). Furthermore, the “arbitrary mechanisms” (Etchells 2006: 111) of inviting contributions to the performance make the collected material seem random and without direction. The montage of diverse contributions and the apparently association-driven movement to and fro between individual stories result in a sense of fragmentation and a lack of coherence and causality. That this loose structure is meant to imitate the aesthetics of mediatisation is indicated by Etchells’s reference to the abrupt transitions from one story to the next as ‘jump cuts’ (cf. 115/ 00:07:18; 115/ 00:09:13; 121/ 00:41:55), a term borrowed from television or film editing. It remains impossible to assemble the disconnected fragments into a single theme, a coherent narrative or authoritative interpretation. This could be seen as indicating either an incompetent storyteller or an inept audience that is not capable of fulfilling its conventional task of making sense of what is presented to it. To a certain extent, Bailes’s commentary on Forced Entertainment’s Club of No Regrets (1993) thus equally applies to Instructions for Forgetting where, similarly,

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“[o]ne is faced not only with an amateur-performance but with oneself as amateur-audience, an audience that fails to see” (94). On the one hand, the sense of an imperfect structure and style of delivery is presented as a result of the liveness and authenticity of the performance. It thus underlines the claim of presenting ‘real stories’ that are not manipulated or distorted by theatricality but are read out by a performer who pretends not to perform at all. On the other hand, failure and imperfection are also associated with the use of mediatisation. Just like the live performance, the videos are apparently made by amateurs, an impression that is conveyed by their limited editing and occasionally poor quality (e. g. 00:16:03; 00:24:11). There are minor technical problems (e. g. 00:01:18) and the monitors repeatedly fade to black in order to indicate ruptures or pauses between the stories (e. g. 122/ 00:51:02; 124/ 00:59:26; 126/ 01:07:26; 129/ 01:23:09). As a consequence, liveness and mediatisation form no binary opposition in terms of their imperfection. Instead, the mediatised elements enhance the perceived lack of accomplishment of the entire performance. The deliberately staged imperfection thus serves to manipulate the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation and to assimilate them. By rendering both the live delivery and the video clips deliberately imperfect, Instructions for Forgetting proves that staged imperfection is not restricted to liveness but may equally apply to mediatisation. Intentionally augmented failure and imperfection may thus not only be used to contrast live imperfection with mediatised perfection. Instead, they may also approximate liveness and mediatisation by deliberately undermining the perfection of mediatisation that suddenly seems to share in the imperfection of liveness.

Forkbeard Fantasy and Gob Squad: deliberately imperfect mediatisation In Forkbeard Fantasy’s productions imperfection is also playfully associated with mediatisation. This becomes evident in their choice of technological media that contribute to what Nicolas Whybrow calls Forkbeard Fantasy’s “characteristic courting of incompetence” (10). Rather than taking advantage of the possibilities of advanced technologies, the company often deliberately reverts to more old-fashioned or crude equipment and prefers the lower resolution and grainy picture of 16mm to 35mm film (cf. Stickland, n. pag.) in order to expose the mechanics and materiality of projectors and screens. For Frankenstein (2001– 2002) the material produced on digital video was even transferred back to 16mm film (cf. Forkbeard, “Frankenstein,” n. pag.). In Invisible Bonfires (2007– 2008), a show that explores the effects of climate change, Forkbeard Fantasy for the first time incorporate a 3D-sequence in their media combination

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among other short films, live music, automata and puppetry.⁷⁷ Their production The Colour of Nonsense (2010 – 2011) more thoroughly explores the possibilities of numerous digital projectors that are located all over the set and operated by the three performers. Nevertheless, Forkbeard Fantasy still stay true to their principles by also incorporating 16mm film as well as two overhead projectors (cf. Forkbeard, “Colour,” n. pag.). Their productions that often centre on film-making and the film industry use technology mostly in a hypermediate way. The performers accentuate the mediality and materiality of the technology because they themselves operate the projectors that are placed directly on the stage. On the one hand, this makes technological shortcomings immediately visible to the audience. On the other hand, it allows the performers to improvise in their use of mediatisation and to intervene spontaneously in cases of actual technological failure. Possible inadequacies of technology can thus directly be compensated for by means of live (re)action. Moreover, the spectators are constantly reminded of the impending risk of failure so that the smooth running of a performance seems all the more impressive considering the close interaction between liveness and mediatisation and its reliance on exact timing. In addition to this, Forkbeard Fantasy frequently combine the actual risk of imperfection with a staging of imperfection as a deliberate strategy. As Whybrow observes: A significant part of Forkbeard’s craft lies in the tension created by visibly running the risk of failure or disaster in its shows. […] Added to that is the challenge of making everything appear to be out of control. In other words, everything functions to produce malfunctioning. Hence, the threat of disaster is one that has both a planned dimension, as a comic effect, and an unplanned one – a possible missed cue or a faulty projector. (8; emphases in the original)

How mediatisation is deliberately rendered imperfect so as to blend in better with the imperfection and risk inherent in liveness is best illustrated by Gob Squad’s productions Super Night Shot (2003; still ongoing), King Kong Club (2005 – 2007) and Gob Squad’s Kitchen (2007; still ongoing). According to Gob Squad member Johanna Freiburg “the perfect performance is a mixture of something uncontrollable […] and something pre-prepared,” and she considers Super Night Shot to be Gob Squad’s “ideal performance” in this respect.⁷⁸ As Georg Diez observes, Super Night Shot offers a “true moment

 Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/useoffilm7.php.  The quotations are transcribed from http://www.gobsquad.com/faq/Gob_Squad_FAQ/

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under the only law that really applies, coincidence” (qtd. in Gob Squad, and Quiñones 120). This is primarily due to the use of videos that facilitate interaction with passers-by. The loose structure of Super Night Shot is introduced in the opening scene when the performers prepare to leave the performance venue. They establish a framework or rough storyboard by reading out the ‘manifesto’ (cf. 00:03:01), presenting guidelines and rules concerning duration, location and other circumstances of the shooting (cf. 00:03:47) and distributing the tasks (cf. 00:05:11). Even when the subsequent action digresses or when the performers fail in their attempts to communicate with passers-by, the ultimate goal thus remains clear at all times. Moreover, the recurring synchronised moments, during which the four performers carry out similar actions such as dancing or putting on their masks, provide an additional sense of structure and coherence despite the spatial separation of the performers. At the same time, the interaction with people in the streets leads to a sense of risk and unpredictability. The performers are completely at the mercy of the strangers they encounter and depend on their willingness to cooperate in order to fulfil their tasks. Until the end of the performance, therefore, not only the spectators but also the performers themselves do not know whether they will be able to find a co-star for the ‘hero’ or whether they will fail to accomplish their self-chosen mission. Moreover, the performers carry out their tasks in a deliberately imperfect way: the ‘hero’ is far from heroic and is not involved in a touching romance with the co-star as a Hollywood film would have it; the advertising strategies of the promoter prove to be rather ineffectual; and the setting for the final kiss chosen by the location scout is only a deserted town square. The risky and imperfect interaction with passers-by in the street is only facilitated and captured by the four cameras that allow the audience to witness the performers’ journeys through the streets. Hence, mediatisation is used to increase the risk of the production. The time limit provided by the runtime of the video tapes adds further suspense to the risky endeavour. More importantly, the threat and thrill of failure are increased when Sarah (Thom) announces that “the cameras will shoot continuously” and that “there will be no cuts or edits” (00:04:00). For instead of taking advantage of the possibility to eliminate flaws in pre-recorded videos via post-production, Gob Squad accept the moments of failure and imperfection as elements that render the performance less perfect but all the more authentic and exciting. The unedited videos thus also include moments of unsuccessful communication with passers-by, and the hand camera

Does_the_perfect_performance_exist___Artistic_Development___Gob_Squad_FAQ.html.

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shots follow a self-made aesthetic since they are often extremely unsteady (e. g. 00:07:05), capture random fragments and retain a grey haze due to the night shot mode. The only accepted means of retroactive intervention are the instant mixing and selection of the four soundtracks and the addition of film scores during playback (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 39; Gob Squad 2012, n. pag.). They acoustically fade out irrelevant scenes and draw attention to the moments that advance the action. Though the performance is not actually live in the sense of allowing the audience directly to witness the performers’ interaction with passers-by, its mediatisation thus retains the imperfection and unpredictability of live performance because the four performers’ video recordings are presented in a ‘raw’ state immediately after their return to the performance venue – without cutting, editing or further post-production. Finally, mediatisation adds a further element of insecurity to the already unpredictable performance due to the risk of technological failure. The actual danger of a breakdown of the cameras is allowed for when Sarah instructs her fellow performers how to proceed “if the cameras stop running for any reason” (00:04:07). Yet, compared to this risk of technological failure, the live interaction with passers-by still poses the bigger threat, because the performers are equipped with replacement cameras and video tapes. No remedy exists, however, for the unpredictability of live interaction and improvisation (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 122) that are mercilessly captured by the cameras. Faced with all this risk, the performers’ last resort is a self-made manual whose title “NAÏVE BLIND FAITH” (00:04:56) ironically sums up the performers’ belief that, in the end, only faith may help (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 122) when technology and human power fail. This blind faith pays off when a costar is eventually found in time and when occasional moments of meaningful interaction occur despite all impending imperfection. Gob Squad’s King Kong Club ⁷⁹ premiered at the Theater Hebbel am Ufer (HAU1) in Berlin on 31 March 2005 and received its last performance in France in 2007.⁸⁰ The “interactive film event” (Gob Squad, and Quiñones 189; cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 152) begins with one hour of filming of the spectators

 The analysis of King Kong Club is based on the DVD recording of performances at Hebbel am Ufer in Berlin, and Kampnagel in Hamburg in 2005 (Gob Squad 2005). Direct quotations are transcribed from the DVD and may differ in other performances of King Kong Club due to the improvisational character of the production. Time codes are measured with Windows Media Player.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/king-kong-club-credits.

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who serve as lay actors and extras dressed up as apes, and it culminates in the resulting 45-minute King Kong parody that is screened after a brief interval.⁸¹ As the performers-as-movie-directors explain to the spectators, the remake “will not be a Monster Hollywood Blockbuster hit – it will just be a monster – but it will be our monster” (00:10:28).⁸² For rather than creating a perfect film, the production adheres to a self-made aesthetic. The general sense of imperfection partly comes from using the spectators as lay actors with non-naturalistic costumes and props such as masks and wigs, and it is further enhanced by the reliance on stock characters in a simple plot where the hero saves beautiful Blondie from Bad Guy’s assaults. Since the lay actors are repeatedly encouraged to exaggerate their performances for greater effect and to adopt stereotypical poses, their acting is also far from being perfect in the sense of achieving stage realism. The spectators in ape costumes die in agony, scream tremendously while collapsing (cf. 00:09:01), and are still encouraged by ‘director’ Sarah (Thom) to show yet “more overacting” (00:09:52) and “more crying” (00:21:39) when mourning Blondie’s putative death with dramatic sobbing. Furthermore, the sense of imperfection or even failure also derives from the amateur use of mediatisation in the form of crude special effects. Such inadequate effects emphasise the limitations of the pre-recorded material but also ironically reveal the possibilities of transforming basic elements into sensational effects. While the creation of special effects with the most basic means thus manifests a certain ingenuity and resourcefulness on the part of the ‘directors,’ it also contributes to the predominant impression of imperfection of the whole production. Considering the fact that Merian C. Cooper and Earnest B. Schoedsack’s original King Kong film (1933) was celebrated for Willis Harold O’Brien’s impressive special effects and his invention of stop-motion animation (cf. Morton 21), the clumsiness of Gob Squad’s King Kong Club is in stark contrast to the original. Instead of applying stop-motion animation or using slow-motion shooting to increase the dramatic impact of Bad Guy shooting Blondie, the pistol shot is actually decelerated in this scene as the camera zooms in on a fake ‘Magnum 44’ bullet that is slowly drawn on a wire past the bystanders’ masked faces as if flying past them in slow motion (cf. 00:20:24; 00:08:25). Such crude effects completely disregard the technical features and actual possibilities of the cameras and thus figure as deliberately imperfect parodies of O’Brien’s spectacular special effects. In an earlier scene in Gob Squad’s remake, moreover, Blondie’s drug-induced delusion of flying is filmed by a rotating camera that captures

 Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/king-kong-club.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/king-kong-club.

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her lying and making arm movements as if she was flying, while other spectators fan like wind machines, lift the hem of her dress as if it was fluttering in the wind and wave around toy birds and butterflies attached to strings (cf. 00:03:45). In the edited version of this scene, Blondie is seen flying above computer generated imagery of an idyllic landscape with the toy birds and butterflies still fluttering about the screen (cf. 00:16:53). In order to enhance the sense of imperfection and improvisation, the film is produced without time for rehearsals and with only “one take per scene”⁸³ so that the lay actors have no chance of improving their performances in second or third takes as it would be typical for film acting. By refraining from taking advantage of the composition of films out of individual and exchangeable takes, the performance instead adopts a mode of production that is more closely aligned to theatre in providing only a single chance of getting scenes right at the first attempt. With this setup, it quickly becomes obvious that Gob Squad do not aim at producing a faithful remake of the King Kong film in all perfection but create a deliberately inadequate parody. Admittedly, the film is edited and screened with opening credits, soundtrack⁸⁴ and voice-overs to give it a more professional appearance. Yet, the added voice-overs are deliberately taken out of context or are even nonsensical (e. g. 00:12:37; 00:15:34; 00:19:17). Similarly, Blondie’s sentimental rendering of Whitney Houston’s song “I Will Always Love You” (cf. 00:14:04) as well as Mariah Carey’s “Hero” as soundtrack for Blondie’s death, the ensuing explosion and the ‘grand finale’ (cf. 00:21:39) are not particularly suitable for this type of action film. On the whole, the editing therefore serves to increase the effect of parody rather than making the film seem more perfect. In addition to this intentional imperfection, the interactive character of the production adds an element of actual unpredictability and risk. Compared to Super Night Shot, the interaction is less open and thus more predictable because the basic outline of the film script directs the spectators’ reenactments and leaves fewer opportunities for free interaction and improvisation. Yet, even more than in Super Night Shot, the whole concept of King Kong Club presents imperfection not only as an inherent aspect of the moments of live (inter)action but as being equally striking in the eventual mediatised version that figures as a deliberately clumsy and imperfect parody of the original King Kong film. That imperfection figures as a central and intentional aspect of Gob Squad’s performance style and encourages reflection on the relation between liveness

 http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/king-kong-club.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/king-kong-club.

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and mediatisation is moreover indicated by meta-commentaries on failure and imperfection in many of their productions. Especially in Gob Squad’s Kitchen (2007; still ongoing) imperfection and failure are not only deliberately put on stage and screen, but are also explicitly discussed. The performers defend their own acting styles (e. g. 00:09:23; 00:10:53), criticise (e. g. 00:11:34) or encourage each other (e. g. 00:55:44) and discuss how scenes could be improved or rendered more authentic (e. g. 00:18:36; 00:25:00; 00:47:34). Again, the intentional imperfection and the corresponding meta-commentaries are not restricted to the live action on stage but also feature in the mediatised action on screen. Sarah (Thom), for instance, believes to have failed in reenacting Warhol’s Sleep and complains: “I can’t sleep. I’m meant to be doing Sleep […]. I’m too excited, I’m quite nervous” (00:19:48). When Simon (Will) assumes her role in the remake of Sleep, he equally fails and admits that he is not “very good at the role of Sarah” (00:41:57). Another example of the staging and discussion of imperfection is provided when Sharon (Smith) performs the second Screen Test. Instead of imitating Warhol’s Screen Tests by simply looking into the camera, she pretends to be suffocating under a polythene sheet that she has pulled over her face. In reaction to this, Sean (Patten) scolds her: “Sharon, what on earth do you think you’re doing? […] You just really, really just messed it up” (00:30:07). A moment of absolute failure seems to be reached subsequently when Sean, in his anger at Sharon’s misbehaviour, interrupts the whole performance by stopping all projections so that the three parts of the screen fade to white one after the other (cf. 00:31:13). When, later on, Simon walks onto the stage and refuses to keep acting on screen, the performance seems to be at risk again for a moment (cf. 00:51:50). Though the spectators surmise that the inept acting and the interruptions actually form part of the script, these explicit commentaries play with the notion of failure and imperfection by reminding the audience of what could actually go wrong in a performance. With its meta-commentaries and performers out of character, Gob Squad’s Kitchen alludes to the almost documentary nature and unpretentious style of Andy Warhol’s films. In the original Kitchen (1965) by Warhol, for instance, there is no actual storyline. Though the film was rehearsed (cf. Smith 164), its limited plot appears to be largely improvised and unscripted. On the one hand, the final product thus seems accidental and somewhat unpolished. On the other hand, however, there is no perceived risk of anything going completely wrong because nothing seems to have been planned in the first place. Chaos, disorientation and Edie Sedgwick’s repeated sneezing whenever she forgets her lines (cf. Smith 164) are thus no actual flaws but consequences of the performers ‘being themselves’ and hence essential features of the film. Gob Squad’s Kitchen is scripted (cf. sequence plan in Gob Squad, and Freiburg 138 ff.) and requires

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elaborate timing to coordinate the live transmissions on the three partitions of the screen. Nonetheless, improvisation still figures prominently, and the impression that there is no script to adhere to is artfully created by means of playing with the performers’ personae rather than using fictional characters. In this sense, unpredictability is purposely staged and imperfection actually turns out to be part of the very perfection of Gob Squad’s Warhol adaptation. Moreover, the moments where individual spectators are taken behind the screen to interact with the performers – and eventually with each other – cause additional risk. All of this contributes to the overall impression that both the live and the mediatised elements of Gob Squad’s Kitchen are as unpredictable as everyday life and everyday people really are. In many Gob Squad productions, therefore, imperfection is a pivotal aspect. It is openly acknowledged as an inherent feature of live performance that is not only inevitable but also desired as a constant reminder of the performers’ enduring struggle to stage an accomplished performance. Gob Squad delight in imperfection and failure that render the productions more authentic because they evoke the unpredictability of real life. Instead of striving for perfection, the performers “wish to show [them]selves as fragile people, people capable of making mistakes, people capable of getting things wrong.”⁸⁵ Gob Squad also extend the imperfection to their elements of mediatisation because they see a certain beauty in making mistakes as a means of resistance against the impeccable aesthetics of television and Hollywood cinema (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 127 f., 131). Their remakes of films and reenactments of medial representations of reality never attempt perfectly to recreate the original but deliberately stress discrepancies, mistakes and failures in order to deconstruct the perfection of mediatisation (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 46, 129 f.). Their production Live Long and Prosper (2009) is yet another example that accentuates the imperfection and self-made aesthetics of their remakes. Its reenactments of classic film deaths are transferred to unsuitable settings in the city of Berlin in order to juxtapose them with the original well-edited film sequences.⁸⁶ As a rule, even when using pre-recorded videos, Gob Squad reject cutting and editing as means of improving or eliminating scenes in post-production. Instead, they deliberately render their videos imperfect via their preference for ob-

 Transcribed from http://www.gobsquad.com/faq/Gob_Squad_FAQ/Irony_and_truthful ness___Themes_and_Concerns___Gob_Squad_FAQ.html.  Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/live-long-and-prosper.

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solete equipment, their ‘do-it-yourself aesthetics’ (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 89) and their use of crude special effects, unsuitable props and settings. In order to achieve a balance between fixed structures and moments of unpredictability and risk, Gob Squad frequently resort to improvisation, interaction and audience participation that open up the performances to the unforeseen (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 25, 36, 127 f.). This often means leaving the performance space and taking the action out into the streets to get a taste of the unpredictability of reality. But even the productions that are exclusively staged within the performance venues deliberately increase risk and disorder to counteract the sense of security provided by the strict ‘black box’ setting (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 36). As Wolf-Dieter Ernst points out, the increased level of risk that results from such open and interactive structures not only applies to the performers themselves. It equally affects the spectators who have to give up their secure passivity and anonymity and “get in touch with their vulnerabilities” (209). By allowing the spectators actively to contribute to the performances, strict adherence to scripts becomes impossible. The development of the action can thus no longer absolutely be predetermined and may take an unpredictable and unique course in each performance. In Gob Squad’s productions, interaction with spectators and the possibility of leaving the performance venue to transform passers-by into performers rely primarily on the use of technological media. Though normally unpredictability, imperfection and failure are inherent aspects of liveness rather than mediatisation, Gob Squad thus paradoxically use mediatisation to increase unpredictability and imperfection. Despite its general potential for perfection and manipulation, their use of video increases the level of actual or perceived risk rather than counteracting the latent unpredictability and imperfection of live performance. For Gob Squad, the notions of unpredictability, imperfection and failure thus equally relate to liveness and mediatisation. As Forkbeard Fantasy’s and Gob Squad’s approaches illustrate, the basic opposition between imperfect liveness and potentially perfect mediatisation may be playfully challenged and subverted by deliberately staging mediatised imperfection via the use of pre-recorded or live videos and film. Their productions technically simulate imperfection in order to assimilate liveness and mediatisation and to produce an overall impression of immediacy, authenticity and liveness. Even the mediatised elements thus suddenly seem to share in the inherent imperfection of liveness. The potential perfection of mediatisation, in other words, is effectively exploited in order to produce a convincing, and paradoxically perfect, illusion of imperfection.

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Station House Opera: risky interplay of liveness and mediatisation Station House Opera’s productions Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998; still ongoing) and Mare’s Nest (2001– 2004) primarily depend on synchronicity and smooth transitions between live and mediatised action. The performers thus strive for maximum perfection in their live imitation of and interaction with the prerecorded videos rather than staging the imperfection of both elements. The videoed sequences are pre-recorded so that unsatisfactory takes have already been edited or deleted prior to the staging. The live action – though obviously minutely rehearsed and choreographed – offers no such possibilities for improvement. Moreover, since the videos can no longer be modified or adapted to the live action on stage once the performance has started, it is the live performers’ responsibility to sustain the split-second timing with their videoed doubles. In a sense, the live performers thus compete with their mediatised doubles because their live performance is judged according to its correspondence to the mediatised performance. At times, the synchronicity is so impressive that the live performers almost seem to acquire a level of perfection identical to the pre-recorded videos. At other moments, time lags cause imperfection because live and mediatised action no longer absolutely correspond to each other. Such differences render the audience aware of the fact that it is in the very nature of liveness not to be perfectly reproducible. Since live performances can never be repeated in exactly the same way, the live performers cannot perfectly recreate their own previous performances and movements captured on video either. In these divergences, both productions thus illustrate the unpredictability and imperfection of liveness as opposed to the perfection of mediatisation. Artistic director Julian Maynard Smith owns up to this inherent variability and imperfection of liveness when accepting asynchronies as an inevitable “part of the game” (qtd. in A. Jones, n. pag.). Although the discrepancies and time lags are only minor, they negatively affect the illusion of a direct interaction between stage and screen. In Mare’s Nest, for example, the smooth transitions between liveness and mediatisation are slightly undermined each time a live persona passes through the door in the screen without immediately appearing on video as a mediatised double. Since most of the time the synchronicity is so perfect in both productions that it is hard to tell whether the videos are live feeds of the action on stage or pre-recorded, these discrepancies almost bring relief to the spectators who thus regain certainty that all videos are in fact pre-recorded.⁸⁷ In a way, the spectators need

 The spectators’ confusion is illustrated, for instance, by Richard Malcolm’s remark that in

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these ‘mistakes’ as an aid to orientation in the blurring of liveness and mediatisation so that they attentively observe the action in order to spot these slight variations. Such brief moments of unintentional asynchrony illustrate the difficulties the performers are faced with and thus also increase the suspense and raise the spectators’ awareness of the risk of failure of the live action. Rather than being detrimental to the appeal of the live action, such deviations stress the uniqueness of the live performance and the challenge this poses to the live performers. Moreover, the occasional time lags make the spectators more appreciative of the overall synchronicity and thus actually underline the live performers’ general proficiency. Some of the time lags and more salient differences between stage and screen, however, are deliberately introduced in order to toy with the spectators’ expectations, create comic contrasts or produce tension by playing off liveness against mediatisation. Whenever the live action precedes the mediatised action, it may even seem as if the videos were delayed and faulty compared to the live action, so that the general perfection of mediatisation is questioned. This applies, for instance, to a scene in Mare’s Nest in which one of the female personae appears on stage as if emerging from the screen, while her mediatised double is still seen in the videoed room as she is about to leave through its back door with a delay. When the live woman passes back through the door and should be seen in the videoed room again, the video instead still shows her walking around the platform that supports the screen (cf. 00:06:39). In such scenes, the time lag creates the impression that the mediatised action is a faulty imitation that can no longer keep pace with the live action. When this sequence is repeated immediately afterwards, however, the video in turn outruns the live action so that the live persona now seems to be delayed (cf. 00:07:56). As such examples illustrate, deliberate discrepancies between the action on stage and the videos serve as an intentional strategy. In his review of Roadmetal, Sweetbread David Batchelor accordingly identifies such deviations between live and mediatised action as essential features of staging imperfection which result in a “choreography of errors”: The live action more or less mirrors the projected action, and the key to the work is in the ‘more or less’ […]. It exploits and explores the uncertainty of the perceived lapse, of the ap-

Mare’s Nest “[o]ccasionally these images are from a live feed camera, though usually they are pre-recorded” (49). This statement is contradicted by Greg Giesekam’s assertion that sometimes “[t]he projected material […] was apparently (but not actually) live relay” (Giesekam 2003, n. pag.), and it also contrasts with my own impression, based on the DVD recording, that the videos are actually entirely pre-recorded.

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parent break in rhythm, the sensed loss of timing. At first momentarily and then dramatically, live and projected action fail to coincide, until they join up again in unexpected ways to form a kind of choreography of errors […]. (Batchelor, n. pag.)

Obviously, the videos – though possibly perfect in themselves – carry the risk that technical problems might arise during their playback. Yet, as long as they run smoothly, the spectators are hardly aware of this risk and instead focus on the susceptibility to errors of the live action which, by comparison, seems less reliable. It might be assumed that the perfection of the videoed sequences lessens the effect of the live action that cannot stand comparison to mediatisation and must always seem imperfect when judged by the accuracy of the video footage. Instead, however, the productions illustrate that liveness, though it can never match the predictability of mediatisation, can come very close to its perfection. What is more, liveness is assigned its own right to exist by means of the deliberate deviations. They emphasise that the live action is not slavishly tied to the timing of the videos and that live performance excels mediatisation in its uniqueness, flexibility and spontaneity, aspects that may be more important than perfect predictability. The comparison with the predetermined videos thus highlights the unpredictability of liveness. The overall predictability of the action, however, is increased by the interaction between stage and screen. What happens often no longer comes as a surprise because stage and screen frequently foreshadow each other’s action and allow the spectators to anticipate what will happen next so that the “‘narrative’ tension” (Malcolm 50) is relieved. Occasionally, an action that has already been shown on video may still take an unexpected turn when repeated on stage and vice versa. The murder of the mediatised man with a concrete slab in Roadmetal, Sweetbread, for instance, fails on stage because the live man has already escaped. Nevertheless, the focus of the delayed repetitions is less on what will happen than on when and how exactly it will happen in the respective other medium. As Station House Opera’s productions illustrate, perfect timing is required when live performers interact with pre-recorded material. This may prove to be a source of imperfection and poses an actual risk in terms of discrepancies between live and mediatised action. The line between unpredictable or faulty liveness and potentially perfect mediatisation can thus no longer clearly be drawn once mediatised products such as film or video are incorporated within intermedial productions. In this case, perfection is no longer a question of the individual live and mediatised elements but of their complicated interplay.

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In intermedial productions, the residual risk of imperfect playback of the mediatised sequences moreover adds to the unpredictability inherent in the live action. In this sense, mediatisation (though being potentially perfectly produced) may raise the level of imperfection and risk of an entire production. In turn, it may be ‘infected’ with risk the moment it is presented in a live context due to the fragile balance of timing between live and mediatised elements. Hence, technical risk and the unpredictability of liveness may reinforce each other in intermedial productions. In the productions selected for the present study, imperfection is therefore not restricted to liveness or playfully presented as applying also to mediatisation, but figures as a characteristic feature of their necessarily imperfect and fragile interaction. Imperfection may thus not only be employed to contrast liveness and mediatisation in a binary opposition but may paradoxically also assimilate them.

Gob Squad: increased risk due to live video relays Gob Squad’s production Revolution Now! (2010; still ongoing) raises no claim to perfection and is introduced as being a mere “rehearsal” (00:05:23) for the revolution which eventually is to “become reality” (00:10:52). In keeping with the rehearsal mode, scenes are repeatedly restaged and rearranged for the cameras until the performers are satisfied with the live video relays. Revolution Now! thus plays with the linearity of live performance where scenes cannot be repeated via rewind and replay. The production moreover adopts various elements of imperfection: the costumes and props are absurdly exaggerated, Bastian (Trost) is introduced as the only “fully trained actor” (00:04:43), and the performers’ knowledge of revolutions appears to be based merely on stereotypes borrowed from representations in the media. Accordingly, they need the support of the equally inept spectators to stage their revolution. The use of live video relays further introduces a sense of risk and unpredictability and creates a need for spontaneity and improvisation because it facilitates audience participation and interaction with passers-by outside the performance venue. Since Gob Squad are known for their interactive performance style and the production is announced as requiring “the help of the audience,”⁸⁸ most of the spectators know what to expect and are willing to cooperate in staging the revolution. This, however, does not apply to the unsuspecting passers-by outside the venue who are unwittingly drawn into the performance and signal less readi-

 http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/revolution-now.

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ness to be involved in this type of entertainment. Johanna (Freiburg) in her garish costume does not help gain the strangers’ trust either and sometimes seems to intimidate them even further. Fear thus spreads among the audience that the performers might not find a volunteer from the streets to instigate the revolution. This sense of risk brings in its wake unpredictability and suspense that could not be created by a similar performance using pre-recorded video, where a positive outcome could be assumed even before the screening starts. Moments in which passers-by refuse to interact with the performers and are unapproachable are thus perceived as setbacks that threaten the successful outcome of the performance. Although such unrewarding interaction is amusing for the spectators in the auditorium, it feeds the suspicion that the performance might turn out to be a failure. When a passer-by finally agrees to take part in the staging of the revolution and the spectators are praised as “the best random, […] temporary collective” (01:16:44), the relief among the audience is palpable. Nevertheless, the feeling remains that this could easily have gone wrong. Once more, it is the use of mediatisation that facilitates interaction and thus involves the public as an additional ‘hazard factor.’ In Revolution Now! the stakes are even higher than in Super Night Shot (2003; still ongoing), where the interaction with passers-by is only pre-recorded. This time, the spectators actually witness the attempts at interaction and the setbacks in real-time. There are no retakes and no intermediate phase of post-production between recording and playback which would allow to excise scenes of failed interaction. Although Gob Squad’s productions Super Night Shot and King Kong Club (2005 – 2007) use pre-recorded rather than live videos, these videos are recorded directly before or at the beginning of each performance so that, once more, there is little opportunity for post-production. By keeping editing to a minimum, even the Gob Squad productions that use pre-recorded material thus retain an effect of live relays. As productions like Revolution Now! illustrate, live video relays essentially differ from pre-recorded videos or film with regard to their risk of imperfection and failure. While they exhibit a danger of technical failure identical to that of prerecorded videos or film, live video relays display an additional risk and unpredictability inexistent in pre-recorded mediatisation because they are transmitted at the very moment of being recorded. Since recording and playback occur simultaneously and in real-time, there is no time for intermediate editing and hence no chance to eliminate potential flaws retroactively. As opposed to pre-recorded products, live video relays are therefore as unpredictable and as susceptible to imperfection as live performances or carry an even higher risk due to the additional threat of a technical breakdown. This observation even holds true if they

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are not used to facilitate unpredictable audience participation or interaction with passers-by as in Gob Squad’s case. The lack of post-production and editing due to the immediate transmission may moreover confer a low-tech quality on the live feeds. It follows from these characteristics that live video relays resemble liveness more than pre-recorded videos or film when it comes to their inherent unpredictability and inevitable risk of failure. As I observed in chapters 4.1 and 4.2, live video relays also display closer parallels to liveness than pre-recorded videos or film with regard to their level of presence and ephemerality. The unpredictable nature of live video relays now provides a further argument to explain why they particularly lend themselves to a playful blurring of liveness and mediatisation in intermedial productions.

Summary The preceding analysis of the selected productions with regard to their respective degrees of actual and perceived unpredictability, imperfection and risk of failure suggests that a distinction is to be made not only between accidental and intentionally staged imperfection but also once more between the use of pre-recorded video or film and live video relays. Pre-recorded material can generally be improved by means of retakes during the process of production and can retroactively be transformed by cutting and editing during post-production. It may even use computer generated imagery (CGI) that can be manipulated right down to the last detail. As a consequence, pre-recorded material is predictable, controllable and displays a potential for perfection that cannot be equalled by live performance which is never absolutely perfect. Although pre-recorded video and film may technologically be perfected in this way, most of the productions analysed above do not actually take advantage of this potential, but instead prefer a low-tech style with reduced editing. Moreover, pre-recorded videos and film are also prone to technical failure that may interfere at the moment of playback. Once the pre-recorded material is incorporated within intermedial productions, the risk of technical failure during its playback thus introduces an element of unpredictability into the live situation. Finally, the media combination of live action with pre-recorded video and film requires perfect timing so that the live performers have to tailor each single move to the predictable as well as possibly unforeseen aspects of mediatisation. That discrepancies of the fragile balance of live and mediatised action are an actual risk when using pre-recorded material can be seen first and fore-

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most in the complex interaction between stage and screen in Station House Opera’s productions Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest. As opposed to pre-recorded video and film, live video relay renders postproduction and retroactive editing impossible and hence equals live performance in its unpredictability. When combined with live performance in intermedial productions, live video relays thus increase the overall unpredictability of the productions and add further risk. Whether intermedial productions choose to incorporate film, pre-recorded videos or live video relays therefore has consequences for the actual unpredictability and susceptibility to failure of the productions. This can be observed in the use of live feeds in Gob Squad’s production Revolution Now! In order to increase the sense of risk and subvert the seamless workings of mediatisation, other Gob Squad productions such as Super Night Shot and King Kong Club simulate the use of live video relays by altogether skipping the post-production phase of their pre-recorded videos or at least keeping the editing to a minimum. These productions therefore play the videos back to the audience almost immediately after the recording. As the analysis of the selected productions proves, the actual risk or imperfection of a production may be complemented by a deliberate staging of live and/ or mediatised failure and intentional dilettantism in order to simulate further imperfection. Such professional amateurism often intends to feign authenticity and immediacy, to subvert theatrical conventions and to comment on the relation between liveness and mediatisation. With this strategy, a sense of liveness as characterised by unpredictability and imperfection may even be conferred on the mediatised elements of a production so as to approximate liveness and mediatisation in a shared imperfection. Thus employed, mediatisation not only shares in the unpredictability and risk of liveness but even serves to increase the overall level of imperfection. The means of deliberately enhancing and staging risk and imperfection in liveness and mediatisation are various. Strategies include the presentation of performers who are apparently insecure about how to enact their roles as in Gob Squad’s Kitchen or suddenly seem incapable of reciting their lines as in Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title). In both productions, this effect is combined with inadequate sets, props and costumes and with explicit metacommentaries that express the performers’ insecurities and imperfection. Another method may be improvisation, audience participation or even interaction with passers-by. As it can be observed in many Gob Squad productions, this leads to an increased risk because the outcome cannot be completely predetermined any more. That deliberate mediatised imperfection may also lead to a sense of authenticity that contrasts with the usual perfection of mass media is further illustrated by the shaky handheld cameras in Gob Squad’s Super Night

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Shot, or the crude special effects and limited editing in their King Kong Club. It can also be observed in the amateur footage in Tim Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting, the seemingly arbitrary camera angles in Virtuoso (working title) or the old-fashioned technology used in Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes. Mary Oliver’s Wednesday, Wednesday and Never Work as well as Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting even intentionally stage technological failure. Whereas Station House Opera’s productions only occasionally subvert their perfect interplay of live action and pre-recorded videos and thus assimilate liveness and mediatisation in apparent perfection, the other productions deliberately increase the imperfection of both liveness and mediatisation in order to suggest their similarity. In general, it can moreover be observed that imperfection and risk are not considered as drawbacks but are valued as rendering the performances more authentic, realistic, suspenseful and spontaneous. Oliver’s and Proto-type Theater’s productions even present perfection as being boring or stifling, artificial and unreal. As a consequence, imperfection and risk are staged or technologically produced to make live and mediatised elements seem more life-like or ‘live.’ Rather than contrasting unpredictable or imperfect liveness with perfect mediatisation, the productions thus tend to approximate live performance, pre-recorded material and live video relays in an overall unpredictability and imperfection.

4.4 Interaction and Participation Proto-type Theater: mediatised interaction In Proto-type Theater’s production Virtuoso (working title) (2009 – 2010) the female persona who is simply called ‘Woman’ seems to make a direct appeal to the audience in her desperate exclamation “I’m talking to anyone who will listen. Look at me” (13/ 00:33:41). These lines are spoken straight into the camera and are simultaneously shown as a live video so that she seems directly to stare at the audience from the central monitor. In another scene ‘Man 2’ looks straight into the camera when examining the size of the window. His image that is projected onto the central monitor thus directly faces the audience as if the screen was literally a window to the “outside” world of the spectators (6/ 00:13:44). In a similar way, a close-up on ‘Woman’ and ‘Man’ on the central monitor shows their eyes staring at the audience so that their invitation to ‘Man 2’ to “be comfortable here” and their explanations of how to build a house seem to be aimed simultaneously at the spectators (8 f./ 00:16:56). During all of these mediatised addresses ad spectatores, the live performers actually look away from the

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audience in order to face the cameras instead so that the contact with the spectators is established only via mediatisation. Since the mediatised personae are shown in close-ups, they moreover seem to be closer to the spectators than the live personae. These brief scenes already illustrate the general tendency of the production to concentrate on mediatised interaction at the expense of live interaction. Admittedly, the spectators occasionally also seem to be addressed or looked at by the live personae on the stage. At the very beginning of the performance, for example, the live personae briefly eye the auditorium before setting to work and switching on the cameras (cf. 00:01:06; cf. Petralia 2010a: 157). In their monologues, moreover, they not only speak to themselves but also directly face the audience (cf. 00:05:46; 00:26:58; 00:42:04; 00:50:55; 00:52:57; 01:06:02; cf. Petralia 2010a: 157). That interaction in Virtuoso (working title) relies primarily on mediatisation rather than liveness becomes more obvious when turning away from the interaction between personae and spectators to the interaction among the personae themselves and to the seeming interaction across the three monitors placed in front of the stage. Throughout the production, the performers or personae overtly operate their cameras and face them instead of directly talking to each other. Artistic director Peter Petralia describes the complex workings of this mediatised interaction as follows: These scenes are technically complicated and require the performers to stand in awkward positions, to face left or right to camera in order to affect the proper directional looks between the three screens […]. When a performer is speaking to another performer, they speak via the screen, turning to face the other performer in the place that they are on screen. This means that sometimes the live performers who stage these images are standing next to each other (or indeed, nowhere near each other) but not facing each other in the live space, thereby disturbing the conventions of naturalistic performer interaction. (Petralia 2010a: 157 f.; emphasis in the original)

Often, neither live nor mediatised personae look at each other. ‘Man’ and ‘Woman’ on the stage thus face away from each other during their initial greetings and exchanges, while the close-ups of their mediatised eye and mouth on the monitors face the audience (cf. 2 f./ 00:09:16). Occasionally, however, it seems as if the mediatised doubles were directly talking to and looking at each other while the live personae hardly relate to each other. As the scene progresses, for instance, ‘Man 2’ barges in on the conversation. While the live performers are positioned with their backs towards each other, ‘Man 2’ on the left monitor and ‘Woman’ and ‘Man’ on the central and right monitors now directly face each other (cf. 4 f./ 00:12:16). A more complex effect is created when

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‘Woman’ is seen on the central monitor flanked by ‘Man’ who is doubled on the left and right monitors. Whenever the mediatised ‘Woman’ turns her head from one side to the other, the male double on the respective monitor faces her, while the double on the other monitor looks away from her. This is due to the fact that the projections on the left and right monitors are identical so that the male doubles always face the same way. As the ‘Woman’ turns her head back and forth, an exchange among the three monitors ensues that has no equivalent on the stage where the performers have no actual eye contact (cf. 13 f./ 00:33:54; see fig. 9). On the monitors, however, the “images are aware of each other” in such scenes (Proto-type Theater 2010b: 14; Petralia 2010b: 102).

Figure 9: The mediatised personae interact across the monitors, whereas the live personae have no eye contact in Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) (image provided by Peter S. Petralia and used with his permission and permission of Proto-type Theater)

Frequently, a single monitor shows more than one persona so that interaction among the mediatised personae not only seems to take place across the distinct monitors but is complemented by interaction within a single frame. Sometimes, the necessity of fitting into a single frame forces the live performers to stand extremely close to each other on the stage (e. g. 8 f./ 00:16:56). Yet, such

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proximity does not necessarily lead to actual physical interaction on the stage but only serves to create the intended image on the monitor. Nevertheless, there are also moments of direct physical interaction between the live personae. Their interaction, however, often seems unnatural, selfconscious or forced as if the live personae were no longer used to physical contact or needed to compensate for the general lack of it in the somewhat sterile and isolated world on stage. Simply holding another persona’s hand therefore already arouses excitement (cf. 5/ 00:13:21). The personae even resort to extreme or violent forms of physical contact as when the ‘Woman’ uses gloves for protection to massage ‘Man 2’ (cf. 00:20:44), permits him to touch her breast (cf. 27 f./ 01:00:27) and is slapped by ‘Man’ (cf. 33/ 01:12:37), or when ‘Man’ presumably masturbates ‘Man 2’ (cf. 16/ 00:36:36). All in all, the ostensible mediatised interaction not only appears to be more natural but is also rendered more impressive by contrast with the limited live interaction because the monitors seem directly to relate to each other. As a consequence, the production creates the impression that mediatisation surpasses liveness in its potential for interaction across monitors, between monitors and stage, and between monitors and auditorium. Mediatisation is thus presented as a helpful, if not necessary, tool to compensate for the lack of live interaction. In Proto-type Theater’s Whisper (2007– 2009), a production that simulates a walk through a fictional city, only the shadows and silhouettes of the three performers’ bodies and body parts are seen behind a semi-transparent screen most of the time. To make up for their want of direct visibility, the performers are connected to the spectators via headphones that transmit live and pre-recorded second person voice-overs addressed to the audience as well as live sound effects generated by the performers (cf. Proto-type Theater 2010b: 19 ff.). Though no reciprocal interaction is created between performers and spectators, technology again establishes a connection between performers and audience. Proto-type Theater’s two-week performance intervention Fortnight (2011; still ongoing) invites the participants to explore the respective host city and to take part in events by following cues they receive via mobile phones, electronic or postal mail.⁸⁹ Mediatisation thus allows the participants directly to interact with and re-experience their familiar environment. The focus is on mediatised interaction in real-time: access to a Twitter account enables the participants to interact with each other, and each text message they reply to is answered again by producer Peter Petralia himself (Petralia 2012: 7 f., 10). Yet, these medi-

 Cf. http://proto-type.org/fortnight/.

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atised exchanges are also complemented by invitations to live gatherings or by coincidental encounters of participants (Petralia 2012: 12 f.). Just as Virtuoso (working title), the productions Whisper and Fortnight playfully explore the interactive potential of mediatisation. They present it as an inevitable aspect of contemporary life which often replaces direct interaction but at the same time also creates effects of immediacy, proximity and intimacy or even initiates live encounters. As I elaborated in chapter 4.1, liveness is defined by physical co-presence of performers and spectators in time and space. It is often assumed that such encounter of performers and spectators in theatre and live performance necessarily causes interaction. In this sense, Elizabeth Klaver emphasises the unique potential of theatre to facilitate “direct communication between the actor and the audience, a shared ‘live presence’ which allows the audience to interact with and modify the performance” (2000: 85). That theatre and live performance are per se characterised by a high level of interactivity, however, is an idealised generalisation. Interaction therefore does not actually figure as a distinctive feature of liveness. In fact, the potential for interaction in traditional theatre is usually limited by the separation between the fictional space of the characters and the actual space of the audience. Their dividing line is marked by the imaginary fourth wall, a dramatic convention that serves as an invisible barrier between stage and auditorium. In Virtuoso (working title) this imaginary separation is visually underlined by placing the three flat-screen monitors between auditorium and stage as an actual physical barrier. An audience, in other words, is not free to address, let alone touch, the performers or take part in the action unless this is explicitly intended to be part of a performance. Consequently, a spontaneous and uninvited intervention of the audience in a performance leads to its disruption, if not termination. There is still a slight possibility, a remaining “potential for the performer to see you, or speak to you, and break out of the stage frame to confront you directly” (Dixon 130). This type of exchange, however, cannot mediate between the fictional world of the characters and the non-fictional actuality of the audience. Keir Elam observes accordingly: performer-audience communication does not (except in the case of prologues, epilogues, asides or apostrophes) take a direct form: the actor-spectator transaction within the theatrical context is mediated by a dramatic context in which a fictional speaker addresses a fictional listener. (34; emphases in the original)

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Though Elam excepts prologues, epilogues, asides ad spectatores or apostrophes from the fictional communication, even these instances do not permit real interaction. The performers, even when speaking out of character, are in fact still acting and merely address an imaginary addressee, a fictional construct of a spectator rather than the real-life audience that is not actually expected to answer or react directly to the characters in most cases. This distinction between fictional and actual communication applies at least to conventional theatre and naturalistic acting which are based on a clear distinction between the actor’s self and the actor-as-character. In this naturalistic style of acting as promoted, for example, by Konstantin Stanislavsky (1863 – 1938), the actor-as-character conceals his actual identity. Instead, he assumes the character’s personality which is predetermined in its behaviour by a dramatic script. As a consequence, the actor-ascharacter is no longer free to react to spontaneous interventions from the audience (cf. Abubakar 175). As Florian Malzacher observes, however, there has been a historical trend towards involving the audience in theatrical performances: The shift in focus from communication that takes place within the play or across the stage to communication that takes place within the theatre itself – between actors and audience – has been a central concern for theatre reformers of all kinds. […] [M]any fights have been fought with (or for) the audience; they have been shouted at, insulted, engaged, put on stage themselves or even surprised on the street. There is no longer any guarantee that the dramatic convention separating actors from the audience will be honoured. (2004: 122)

As a consequence, the distinction between fictional and non-fictional communication, between characters and performers, between implied and actual spectators is increasingly blurred. Experimental theatre often permits spectators actually to become part of the fictional world of a performance by inviting them to assume the roles of fictional characters. The ensuing interaction between spectators-as-characters and actors-as-characters essentially differs from the interaction between spectators and actors because it occurs on the level of fictional action rather than of non-fictional communication and is thus based on a suspension of disbelief. Since, in this case, members of the audience individually or collectively participate in the creation of the fictional world, I will in the following refer to this mode of eliciting involvement from the spectators on the level of fictional action as ‘audience participation.’ It differs from ‘interaction’ which occurs between actors and spectators on the level of non-fictional communication or between characters and implied audience. Gareth White draws a similar distinction between these two modes when he differentiates “the participation of an audience, or an audience member, in the action of a performance” from “conventional audience response” or mere “emotional and intellectual engagement”

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(3). Yet, where the distinction between performers-as-characters and the performers’ real-life identities is blurred as in Gob Squad’s productions, it is no longer possible clearly to set participation on the level of fictional action apart from interaction in non-fictional communication. In A Theory of Adaptation (2006) Linda Hutcheon contrasts interaction with immersion by distinguishing between three modes of presentation. According to her categorisation, both the telling mode of written texts and the showing mode as in theatre and film are immersive because the first engages us imaginatively and the second aurally and visually. The participatory mode as in videogames not only evokes immersion but additionally facilitates interaction via physical and kinaesthetic involvement. Whereas both telling and showing mode may encourage imaginative, cognitive and emotional response and activity, only the participatory mode produces real interactivity (cf. 22 f.). Hutcheon’s differentiation between activity and interactivity, and her distinction between immersion in the sense of mental or cognitive involvement versus interaction in the sense of actual, physical involvement are convincing. Nonetheless, interaction and participation should not be narrowed down to physical or kinaesthetic activity but should also include forms of verbal involvement such as the possibility of expressing choices that will influence the further course of a story or action. Moreover, the boundaries between telling, showing and participatory modes are not impermeable because the assignment of a medium to either of these categories depends on its practical use as well as on its cultural context, which can generate hybrids such as interactive film. To regard theatre as an inherently immersive rather than interactive medium is therefore an oversimplified generalisation that does not adequately describe experimental theatre and phenomena such as happenings, improvisational theatre, British pantomime, one-to-one performances etc. Here, the spectators cannot only interact with and give feedback to the actors on the level of non-fictional communication, but can often physically or verbally affect the action by participating (or withholding their participation) on the level of fictional action. As Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) already suggests, liveness is no prerequisite for interaction or participation after all. This is illustrated by the fact that interaction also occurs and is often more effective and intense in contexts that are not defined by liveness and physical co-presence but by mediatisation. An obvious example is the telephone because it permits real-time communication and interaction without requiring spatial co-presence. The internet provides further instances: phenomena such as cyber-sex and cyber-rape (cf. Dixon 474 ff.) suggest that the users’ experiences sometimes transcend actual spatial separation so that they mistake the internet for a shared, intimate and physical space due to its high degree of interactivity. Virtual reality and video

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games are yet another example of interactivity in mediatised contexts. Since the users’ minds, bodies and sensory experiences are so focused on and immersed in the virtual world, they get the illusion of being active participants in an alternative reality. Even film, which generally provokes passive reception, can offer limited forms of interaction. In experiments with ‘interactive cinema’ as early as in the 1960s, viewers were invited to take action by choosing among various endings and voting for alternative plot developments (cf. Dixon 571, 573). Finally, experiments with so-called tele-presence since the 1990s facilitate physical interaction between performers and remote spectators in real-time and thus most closely resemble co-presence and interaction in live performances. In Fractal Flesh (1995), Ping Body (1996) and ParaSite (1997), for example, Australian performance artist Stelarc’s body was connected to a computer and received electrical impulses sent by users via the internet which activated his muscles (cf. Dixon 312). Paul Sermon’s Telematic Dreaming (1992) is another instance of tele-presence. In this installation two beds in remote places were linked via video cameras and a videoconference ISDN line so that a person lying on one of the beds was virtually projected next to a person lying on the other bed and vice versa. As a result, corporeal and virtual body were able to interact in realtime.⁹⁰ In these and other experiments with tele-presence, remote physical interaction feigns face-to-face presence and liveness. Yet, this simulation of presence and liveness is, in fact, only based on interactivity, not on actual corporeality. Consequently, Lev Manovich asserts that “the essence of telepresence is that it is antipresence” and therefore suggests using the term “teleaction” instead (167), thus identifying the role of interaction for the simulation of co-presence and liveness. Since interactivity is often mistaken for an indication of liveness, it is frequently exploited by mediatised performances in order to create an illusion of liveness. Theatre, in turn, often makes use of technological media in order to offer additional channels of communication and hence achieve an effect of enhanced interactivity. Interaction, therefore, is an essential aspect of intermedial theatre productions that combine live performance with mediatised material and attempt to blur the line between liveness and mediatisation. In such productions, interaction may not only be established between performers and spectators. It may also apply to their respective relation to the incorporated media or to exchanges among mediatised performers on distinct screens or monitors as observable in the use of live video relays in Virtuoso (working title).

 A detailed description and analysis of the blurred line between virtual and real body in Telematic Dreaming is given by Susan Kozel.

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Forkbeard Fantasy and Station House Opera: simulated agency and feigned causal connections That interaction in intermedial productions may not only occur between performers and spectators but also between performers and the incorporated media also becomes obvious when considering Forkbeard Fantasy’s work. In their productions, interaction pivots on the relation between stage and screens, whereas interaction between stage and auditorium is only marginal. The Clone Show (1979 – 1980) is Forkbeard Fantasy’s first production to employ an animated film in its media combination and to include dialogues between live and cartoon characters.⁹¹ Ghost (1985) takes the next step in the development of interaction between stage and screen. An alleged transition from film to stage occurs when the filmed ghost hunter is seen approaching on a screen that is disguised as a window before bursting through a door and onto the stage (cf. Giesekam 2007: 177).⁹² Who Shot the Cameraman? (1986) is one of the first shows featuring the Brittonioni Brothers, two fictional film directors who have since then reappeared in many Forkbeard Fantasy shows to present and interact with their films. In Who Shot the Cameraman? they seem to enter and re-emerge from a film in order to investigate the appearance of an on-screen intruder. They make phone calls from stage to screen and are even momentarily divided into partly live, partly mediatised bodies, while objects also travel from stage to screen and back again (cf. Giesekam 2007: 177 f.; Whybrow 7; T. White 111).⁹³ In this production Forkbeard Fantasy also develop their technique of “Crossing the Celluloid Divide” (cf. Giesekam 2003, n. pag.), which suggests a spatial as well as temporal contiguity of film and stage (cf. T. White 112). From 1987 onwards, the Brittonioni Brothers have reappeared in performances of An Experiment in Contraprojection where they present a failed attempt at eliminating the ‘Celluloid Divide.’ This leads to their endless multiplication on film and again to complex transitions between stage and screen (cf. Giesekam 2007: 178; T. White 112).⁹⁴ Invasion of the Bloopies (1991) explores the media combination of live action and animation. Here, film is moreover used for close-ups and also serves as an extension of the stage space by revealing scenes that occur off-stage.⁹⁵ In The Barbers of Surreal (1998 – 1999), a production dealing with genetic engineering

    

Cf. Cf. Cf. Cf. Cf.

http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/useoffilm1.php. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/films.php. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/useoffilm2.php. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/useoffilm3.php. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/useoffilm4.php.

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and the cosmetics industry, film is combined with live action in diverse ways. In addition to a ten-minute film that provides the background story (cf. Giesekam 2007: 188), film once more extends the stage space. It reveals action presumably taking place in the square outside a barber shop and projects it onto a screen that serves as a window of the shop (cf. Giesekam 2007: 187 f.). Doubling effects and interaction between stage and screen occur when Chris Britton is simultaneously seen as a live and a mediatised character who seem to talk to each other through the filmed window (cf. Giesekam 2007: 190) and when characters are apparently reflected in a mirror that, in fact, shows them in back-projected film.⁹⁶ Towards the end of the production, a projection of real and cartoon animals moreover combines live action, film and animated cartoon (cf. Giesekam 2007: 192). Based on William Shakespeare’s The Tempest and commissioned by the Royal Shakespeare Company, the production Rough Magyck (2006) once more features the fictional Brittonioni Brothers. As they get entangled in Prospero’s magic, they move back and forth between stage and screen where Timmy Brittonioni is temporarily turned into a miniature fairy.⁹⁷ In addition to the interaction between stage and screen, the perambulatory production moreover involves the spectators in a more active role by eventually inviting them onto the stage in order to support the filmed shadow of Pan as his spear carriers. The cast meanwhile watches from the stalls.⁹⁸ The focus on interaction between stage and screens rather than between stage and auditorium can also be observed in The Fall of the House of Usherettes (1996; 2005; still ongoing). Here, live characters seem directly to transform into mediatised characters and vice versa. These transitions are often based on shadow-like appearances of the live characters passing in front of the main screen, which renders both live and mediatised characters equally two-dimensional and thus apparently interchangeable (e. g. 00:23:15; 00:26:34; 00:30:33). More striking transitions in The Fall of the House of Usherettes are provided when the live characters actually emerge from the screens. The protagonist Bernard von Earlobe, for instance, initially enters the Empire Picture Palace by opening its doors on film, but gets immediately entangled in the cloth onto which the film is projected until he emerges from it live on stage (cf. 00:07:04). When he finally escapes from Deirdre’s film loop, he bursts through the screen onto which his loop is projected (cf. 01:22:14).

 Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/useoffilm6.php.  Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/roughmagyck3.php.  Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/roughmagyck4.php.

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The closest interaction between live and mediatised characters is achieved where the action on stage seems to have direct effects on the film sequences so that stage and screen appear to be causally related. This strategy is perfectly applied, yet at the same time parodied, when Roderick and von Earlobe attempt to confuse the mediatised Deirdre in a “tracking shot” by rotating the revolving stage with its screen. As the live characters push against the screen, their mediatised doubles are also seen pushing against the walls of the filmed corridor. This sends the mediatised Deirdre into a tailspin, and she eventually spins live across the stage as if actually tossed out of the circling screen (cf. 01:01:55; cf. Giesekam 2007: 185 f.). Such feigned transitions of characters from stage to screens and vice versa make their medial boundaries appear permeable. Yet, despite these strategies of creating an impression of interaction between stage and screens in The Fall of the House of Usherettes, the hypermediate use of the screens and the focus on the materiality of the different projection surfaces ensures that the spectators nevertheless remain constantly aware of the actual difference between both media. The moments of interaction are thus identified as mere technical effects, and the enjoyment of these scenes resides as much in the resulting illusion as in the awareness of how it is brought about. The production thus illustrates how an impression of interaction between liveness and mediatisation can be simulated but also acknowledges that this is neither a real merging of stage and screens, nor reciprocal live interaction. Similar to Forkbeard Fantasy’s productions, Station House Opera’s work includes examples of interaction between stage and screen that by far exceed the interaction between stage and auditorium. Station House Opera’s first use of video projections to double and interact with live action occurs in Snakes and Ladders (1998) where the live performers meticulously imitate what is shown on video.⁹⁹ Yet, the strategies of interaction are much more refined in Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998; still ongoing) and Mare’s Nest (2001– 2004) where the live personae on stage and their pre-recorded mediatised doubles on video interact in multiple ways. They mutually acknowledge each other’s existences, they complement, imitate and react to each other’s actions, they mirror or foreshadow their respective behaviour, and they transform into or are layered onto each other. They even seem to interact physically by kissing and feeding each other, chasing each other about the stage and into off-stage spaces, fighting and inflict-

 Cf. http://www.stationhouseopera.com/project/6044/.

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ing pain on each other. Though they are actually separated by the screens, liveness and mediatisation therefore do not figure as two self-contained worlds. Compared to Roadmetal, Sweetbread, the interaction between stage and screen in Mare’s Nest is more intensive and complicated by the frequent direct transitions between stage and screen via the door that is inserted into the screen. These transitions involve not only the personae themselves but also inanimate objects that are seemingly carried onto the stage from within the videoed room and vice versa. Not only small props such as bottles, plates and cups are thus transferred between stage and screen, but even larger objects such as a table or a ladder are pushed through the door (cf. 00:15:45). In order to pass from one playing space to the other and provide a passage between stage and screen, one of the live men moreover saws a hole into the wooden platform that supports the screen and seemingly also into the floor of the videoed room (cf. 00:20:47; video stream 2: 00:21:00). The same effect, though less extended, is then repeated by the other live man who equally disappears underneath the stage, emerges in the videoed room and eventually appears live on the other side of the stage by passing through the holes (cf. 00:23:19). On the simplest level, however, it is the synchronicity of stage and screen in both productions that creates the impression that the personae on stage and screen acknowledge each other’s existence by exchanging glances and observing each other. In Roadmetal, Sweetbread a scene of love-making seems to involve the live woman and her mediatised double with their respective male counterparts. In their identical movements on stage and screen, both women seem to interact simultaneously with their live and mediatised partners though, in fact, the live man eventually withdraws to observe the scene (cf. 00:19:04). The live woman, however, ignores her live partner in favour of a physically absent mediatised partner. In the rivals’ competition for the woman’s attention, the mediatised double thus appears to be the better lover even for the live woman and thus seems to be more involved in the live action than the live man himself (see fig. 10). Such blurring of liveness and mediatisation suggests an interpretation of their interaction as a mixing of dreams and actual desires, an infiltration of sexual fantasies into the female persona’s reality. Roadmetal, Sweetbread’s interaction between live and mediatised personae becomes even more complex in the spoon-feeding scene. Here, the live and mediatised couple are initially presented sitting at the table and spoon-feeding each other (cf. 00:31:07). But due to changes of positions with otherwise identical movements, it seems for a while as if the live man was not only feeding the live woman but also his own video double (cf. 00:31:29). This is followed by a sequence where the live woman seems not only to feed the live man but also her own video double (cf. 00:32:49). Subsequently, the live personae continue

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Figure 10: The live man observes how his lover apparently kisses his mediatised rival in Station House Opera’s Roadmetal, Sweetbread (photograph © Hydar Dewachi, used with permission of the photographer and Station House Opera)

feeding each other, while the mediatised couple fights for one of the seats at the table so that only one of them at a time is apparently involved in the mutual spoon-feeding on stage (cf. 00:33:13). During the entire scene, the corresponding position of the live woman is occasionally taken by the mediatised man and the other way round. Yet, this gender reversal does not decrease the accuracy and synchronicity of their movements and thus, surprisingly, does not reduce the impression of interaction. In all of the above-mentioned examples, the interaction between stage and screen is based on identical or perfectly synchronised actions of the live and mediatised personae. An illusion of interaction based primarily on aural rather than visual information is created when the live woman in Roadmetal, Sweetbread apparently assaults her partner’s lover, who this time is only represented by a mediatised double, and drags her to the floor. Their ensuing fight is not actually seen on stage or screen but presumably occurs underneath the table and hidden by the table cloth. The women’s screaming and struggling, however, can be heard from underneath the table so that the illusion is created that the mediatised lover has actually been dragged underneath the real table (cf. 00:46:33).

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Yet, the impression of interaction in Roadmetal, Sweetbread is most effective when the live personae are not only synchronous with their life-size doubles but occupy the raised platform that supports the screen so that they are completely level with their doubles. After an extended game of appearance and disappearance between the live woman and her double behind a wooden board placed directly in front of the screen, both women suddenly seem directly to struggle for the board (cf. 00:12:01). This effect is not only created by synchronised live and mediatised action as in the earlier instances. It is primarily produced by a layering of the projection of the mediatised board onto the actual board so that the live and the mediatised object are equated. Later on, live and mediatised personae repeatedly pass through an actual and two mediatised doors in the screen in an attempt to hide from or pursue each other. The frequent repetition and the layering of one of the mediatised doors onto the real door render the changes between live and mediatised personae and doors so confusing that they can hardly be told apart any more. The interaction between stage and screen is therefore perfectly convincing (cf. 00:43:16). In Mare’s Nest the interaction between live and mediatised personae is occasionally rendered even more complex when an additional level of mediatisation is created. This is achieved by a mediatised reduplication of the stage that seems to be acknowledged both by the live personae on stage and the mediatised personae in the videoed room. Towards the beginning of the production, one of the male personae on the stage carries a ladder from one side of the screen to the other by repeatedly walking around the platform that supports the screen. Meanwhile, his movements are observed by a mediatised man in the videoed room (cf. 00:01:13). When the live man eventually approaches the door leading through the screen, the mediatised man stares at him through the videoed window so that the former is intimidated and withdraws from the door (cf. 00:04:14). The effect of this scene is complicated by the fact that, after the live persona’s first appearance, the screen not only shows the videoed room itself but also doubles the playing space in front of it. Each time the live man appears in front of the screen, his mediatised double is therefore also seen in the mediatised playing space in front of the mediatised screen. As a consequence, the exchange of glances involves three distinct levels because it occurs not only between live and mediatised personae but also between the mediatised personae in front of the screen and in the videoed room. A variation of such interaction between an additional mediatised playing space and the screen can be observed when the video shows a mediatised couple making love on the mediatised stage until they notice that they are being observed by the other mediatised man from within the videoed room (cf. 00:46:48). At such moments, Mare’s Nest

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adds the mediatised reproduction of the stage as an additional level that intervenes between the actual stage and the screen and creates a mise-en-abyme. At another moment, the interaction between stage and screen in Mare’s Nest is upheld with the help of mobile phones. On one half of the stage, there seems to be a phone call between a live and a mediatised persona (cf. 00:37:45). On the reverse half of the stage, the screen alternates between the video of a male persona and the video of a female persona who answers his phone call while having a drink at a bar. Interaction thus no longer seems to take place only between stage and screen but also between two distinct videos (cf. video stream 2: 00:37:56). In both cases, the personae do not directly interact and seem to be linked only technologically so that it is the mobile phone as an additional medium that seems capable of connecting not only remote spaces but also liveness and mediatisation or distinct videos. Occasionally, the parallel world on the screen moreover gives the live personae a premonition of what might also happen to them. In Roadmetal, Sweetbread the empathy with his mediatised double even saves the live man’s life because he escapes from the stage when the mediatised woman has struck his double down with a concrete slab. When, with a time lag, the live woman wants to imitate this assault on her partner, she is therefore disappointed to find him gone (cf. 00:56:46). A similar awareness of the existence of alter egos can be perceived when the male persona peacefully sits at the table and reads a book, while the screen shows his double being forcefully crammed into a cardboard box and kicked off the stage by the mediatised woman. Although the live man himself is not assaulted, he leaps to his feet in terror at the violence inflicted upon his double (cf. 00:12:54). In Mare’s Nest the interaction between stage and screen is also based on instances of foreboding in which the mediatised action figures as a preview of what is about to happen on stage with a slight delay. It thus seems as if “the mirror ‘awaits’ the live body” (Malcolm 50), but the live action often only follows the mediatised action with ironic inversions. At one point, for instance, the mediatised woman pets a chair just like a dog. Live on stage, the position of the chair is soon taken over by a male persona who kneels down in a dog position to be similarly petted by the live woman. Soon, however, the mediatised woman kicks the chair with her foot, and the live man on stage immediately winces as if also expecting to be kicked. For a moment, it seems as if the preview on video was misleading because the woman on stage simply keeps caressing the man. Yet, once he has regained confidence and the spectators are equally relieved not to see him hurt, she kicks him away just like the chair on screen. The delay between video and stage thus plays with the spectators’ expectations. It demonstrates that reading the action on video simply as a foreshadowing of

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the action on stage may be too simple an interpretation of the more complex interaction between stage and screen. (cf. 00:11:09). In other scenes, the mediatised action seems to have more direct repercussions on the live action than merely figuring as a foreboding. This becomes most obvious when a mediatised male persona in Mare’s Nest is seen on video as he takes over the technician’s studio and messes about with the monitoring desk so that the lights on stage actually flicker and loud music is heard all of a sudden (cf. 00:27:07). The mediatised man is then seen running along corridors to a gantry above the stage from where he drops a chain onto the table seen below. Immediately, a real chain drops onto the table on stage and smashes a plate (cf. 00:27:27). When the mediatised man is next seen as he unties a rope with which he swings down onto the stage, his shriek is heard but he is not actually seen landing on stage (cf. 00:27:40). At this point, live and mediatised action are thus disconnected again. In both productions, interaction is also based on a splitting of cause and effect into liveness and mediatisation that suddenly appear to be causally related (cf. Drewes 397). As a consequence, the live personae even show direct physical reactions to what is merely happening to their video doubles. This is suggested in Roadmetal, Sweetbread when the man’s live lover disappears behind the screen while the video shows the mediatised woman hit her with a bottle. As if she had really been struck down by the mediatised woman, the live lover immediately falls to the ground next to the screen (cf. 00:50:14). In a fight among the mediatised couple in the wings, the mediatised woman is moreover seen throwing furniture at her partner on video. Apparently thrown by the mediatised woman, the identical items are seen flying onto the stage. The live man soon reappears holding his head, once the mediatised woman has struck his double on the head (cf. 01:02:42). The reverse relation between stage and screen, in which the live action influences the mediatised action, can be observed when the man’s mediatised lover presumably falls over a plate that the live woman has deliberately placed on the stage floor as a mantrap (cf. 00:42:52). The live woman, in turn, reacts to the mediatised woman’s accident by briefly pausing to look back at where the mediatised woman would be lying if she was live on stage. With the door in the screen that feigns a direct connection between stage and screen, the transitions in Mare’s Nest are not only smoother and more frequent but also permit more direct and seemingly physical interaction between stage and screen. As one of the female personae stretches her arm through the door, for instance, the video shows her hand grab a naked man’s phallus (cf. video stream 2: 00:15:07). Later on, when the other woman opens the door to extend her arm through it while remaining live on the platform with the rest of her body, the other mediatised woman bites her mediatised arm that simultaneously

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appears on screen. Once the live woman withdraws from the door, her real arm also seems to have been injured by the mediatised woman (cf. 00:40:31). Briefly later, one of the live men’s arms is repeatedly caught in the door that appears to be slammed by one of the mediatised women who lurks behind the door in the videoed room (cf. 00:41:41). Looked at from the reverse side of the stage, the live victims turn into mediatised personae in the videoed room, whose arms are now extended out of the screen and injured by live personae (cf. video stream 2: 00:41:02; 00:42:45). As these scenes demonstrate, live and mediatised personae apparently interact physically. What happens on screen seems to have actual effects on the live personae’s bodies and vice versa, as if a distinction between live and mediatised bodies was no longer possible or relevant. During such physical interaction, the personae thus occupy a position that seems to be partly live and partly mediatised. In both productions, the live and mediatised personae themselves obviously take their coexistence for granted. As opposed to this mutual acknowledgement of live and mediatised existence, the personae are sometimes irritated and at a loss what to do when directly being confronted with their partners within the same medium. After having chased each other, both couples in Roadmetal, Sweetbread are insecure and disconcerted when eventually having to face each other so that they soon turn away from their partners (cf. 00:07:21). This is most obvious in the final scene where neither the live nor the mediatised couple dares to exchange glances (cf. 01:07:16). As both productions proceed, the spectators grow more and more accustomed to the interaction between stage and screen. They accept the bizarre logic according to which liveness and mediatisation do not figure as two distinct worlds but mimic and complement each other in perfect synchronicity, are layered onto each other, provide forebodings or show mutual repercussions and physical interaction. The spectators’ initial expectation of a clear demarcation line thus contrasts with their willingness to suspend their disbelief and accept the interaction between liveness and mediatisation. When these opposed conceptions of the relation between liveness and mediatisation collide, the spectators’ delusion is ironically stressed. This is the case, for example, when the mediatised crime scene is recreated on stage in Roadmetal, Sweetbread (cf. 00:57:48). That the female persona rearranges the male persona’s body on stage and screen by repeatedly disappearing behind the screen, reappearing on video and emerging back on stage not only illustrates the matter-of-fact manner of the transitions between stage and screen. It also proves that the female persona considers the positioning of the male bodies on stage and screen as being causally related and interdependent. This scene shows a mutual acknowledgement of live and mediatised personae.

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Yet, there is no direct interaction as observed in earlier scenes where live and mediatised personae seem to manipulate each other without difficulties. Instead, the female persona has to move back and forth inconveniently between stage and screen in order to reposition the live and mediatised man and to keep both worlds under control. She eventually fails, however, because her transitions are too slow for the action on stage and screen so that she always seems to be in the wrong place. In a sense, the scene thus ironically combines the rules of the performance with the conditions of real life by presenting an intermediate state in which liveness and mediatisation still facilitate transitions but no longer render direct interaction possible. A subversion of the interaction between stage and screen also occurs in Mare’s Nest when a female persona apparently walks out of the screen onto the stage, but is irritated still to see her double remaining behind in the videoed room (cf. 01:09:43). In a reversed scene, a female persona apparently enters the videoed room through the door in the screen, but completely disappears from view because the lights have been switched off in the videoed room (cf. 00:46:21). Such scenes are disconcerting for the audience in so far as they undermine the established logic according to which passing through the door is equivalent to a change of status from liveness to mediatisation or vice versa. The modification of the transitions in these scenes thus renders the spectators aware of how much they have already internalised the underlying rules for the transitions between physical and mediatised presence. Though the interaction between liveness and mediatisation in both productions is mostly taken for granted, such examples thus provide a self-reflexive and metamedial contemplation of the limits of such simulated interaction. Despite these occasional subversions of the interaction between liveness and mediatisation, stage and screen are tightly interrelated and closely connected. By contrast, the possibilities of spectator-performer interaction or audience participation are not exploited, even though the performers repeatedly pass through the auditorium. The comparison of the intense relation between stage and screen with the lack of interaction between stage and auditorium thus creates the impression that the live action on stage is closer connected to the screen than to the live presence of the audience. As a consequence, both productions question and playfully invert the conventional idea that liveness contrasts with mediatisation in its potential for interaction with the live audience. In Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes, and even more so in Station House Opera’s Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest, interaction between liveness and mediatisation seems possible and is even taken for granted. This is achieved by making stage and screens appear to be visually, aurally and

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causally connected and by feigning physical transitions between stage and screen. Hence, the live personae’s actions apparently have direct effects on their doubles and vice versa. The seeming reciprocity of the interaction, however, is obviously only simulated because the mediatised personae cannot react to what happens on stage or on other screens. Phaedra Bell explains how feigned agency in what she calls “dialogic media productions” creates the impression that “the images cohere and appear to coincide in the same time and space” (44). This illusion is achieved by simulating an “interchange of dialogue, glance, attribute, equipment or other currency” with other media or the live action (44). Such simulated interaction may also occur between mediatised performers on distinct screens. In fact, though, this interaction is not reciprocal because only the live actors react to the pre-recorded material. It is only as long as the live actors tailor their performances to the prerecorded images that an illusion of mutual interaction may be upheld. The splitsecond timing between live performers and their pre-recorded doubles in Station House Opera’s productions Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest brings this effect to perfection. The productions even take the illusion of agency to such extremes that the audience can often hardly distinguish between live and prerecorded actors any more.

Station House Opera: limited feedback loop versus cognitive activity By contrast with the interaction between stage and screen, the relation between stage and auditorium in Station House Opera’s Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest cannot be considered as being particularly interactive. Audience participation on the level of fictional action is clearly not intended in either of the productions because the spectators are at no point encouraged to take on fictional roles. Admittedly, the personae are brought closer to the spectators by the fact that both productions refrain from developing psychologically elaborated characters and do not present a coherent fictional plot. The personae therefore seem to share aspects of the performers’ real identities and the spectators’ own world. Nevertheless, the personae are not identical with the performers. Furthermore, the implicit rules that guide the interaction and transitions between stage and screen create a self-contained fictional world whose logic is distinct from the performers’ and spectators’ reality and whose existence is thus clearly separate from that of the audience. Hence, the metaphorical ‘fourth wall’ as a dividing line that prevents interaction between spectators and fictional world still exists.

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As opposed to this metaphorical separation, the actual physical separation between auditorium and stage established by the proscenium arch in Roadmetal, Sweetbread or by the delineated edges of the stage in Mare’s Nest is occasionally overcome. The performers repeatedly pass through the auditorium or leave the stage to be seen on video as they inhabit spaces in the wings or in the vicinity of the performance venues. Yet, even in these instances, interaction between performers and spectators is not encouraged, and neither the performers nor the respective personae acknowledge the presence of the audience. In both productions, the live action has to conform and be perfectly attuned to the pre-recorded video sequences, which leaves the performers only very limited possibilities of adapting their acting to the spectators’ reactions. Since minute deviations would already destroy the smooth run of the performances, the performers have to reproduce the rehearsed movements as exactly as possible, irrespective of how the spectators react. The performers are therefore completely predetermined by the videos and adhere to the regular beat of the metronome. By blending live and mediatised action, Station House Opera thus render the live performers dependent on the videos. As Station House Opera’s productions illustrate, the combination of live performance with pre-recorded video may undermine the possibility of audience feedback that is generally considered as a characteristic aspect of live performance by contrast with mediatised performance. Roger Copeland, for instance, describes this characteristic quality of live performance as a “sense of reciprocity, a sense that what transpires onstage – in contrast to the movies – is affected almost as much by what happens in the audience as the other way around” (34). For even conventional theatre that adheres to the fourth wall convention normally permits the audience to influence a performance by providing the actors with immediate feedback. While the audience can react to an ongoing live performance, the actors can theoretically adapt their performance to the received feedback. Erika Fischer-Lichte captures this form of interaction in her notion of the ‘autopoietic feedback loop’ [“autopoietische feedback-Schleife”]. According to Fischer-Lichte, the characteristic simultaneity of production and reception in live performances entails that a performance always develops in a dynamic and collective process based on interaction between actors and spectators rather than being exclusively controlled by either actors or spectators. A performance is thus not predetermined but follows an aesthetic of contingency (cf. FischerLichte 2010: 26 f.; 2004: 59, 80 f.; 2008: 47). In performances that are based on an underlying dramatic text or script, however, the actors’ possibilities of reacting to audience feedback are rather limited because the action is already predetermined. The less a performance is

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scripted, however, and the more it is improvised, the more feedback and interaction may come into play. Dieter Teichert’s notion of one-way communication [“Einweg-Kommunikation”] (204) thus primarily applies to the exchange between audience and performers in more conventional theatrical contexts. As Station House Opera’s productions show, however, the use of pre-recorded video in intermedial performances may also limit the possibilities of interaction in terms of feedback by reducing the live performers’ freedom of action. Despite the general limitations of audience feedback and its relative ineffectiveness for the course of action, the spectators can be seen as the actual initiators of theatrical communication; for without an audience, there would be no performance in the first place. Moreover, audience feedback may influence the commitment and dedication the actors invest in their performances (cf. Elam 86 f.). The proliferation of post-show discussions in contemporary performance practice can be seen as an effective means of facilitating more extensive audience feedback and eliciting reciprocal interaction beyond the limits of the performance. Yet, such communication between spectators, performers, dramatists, directors etc. takes place only on a non-fictional level of communication. Interactivity, feedback and the sense of community among the members of an audience are frequently mentioned in the same breath when liveness is defined in terms of its distinctive features. Martin Esslin, for instance, considers not only the feedback between spectators and performers, but also the interaction among the spectators themselves and their collective responses to the performance as essential aspects of theatre (cf. 24, 27). The possible effects of this spectator-spectator interaction are further explained by Keir Elam. He sees mutual stimulation and the confirmation of individual responses as well as the integration of the individual spectator into the audience collective as its main functions (cf. 87). Yet, this sense of community is not restricted to live performances. Mediatised performances such as film, television and video can also be watched by group audiences while it is possible to give a live performance for a single, isolated spectator as, for instance, in one-to-one performances. Hence, Auslander rightly observes that “communality is not a function of liveness” (1999: 56). Though hardly any interaction occurs between stage and auditorium in Station House Opera’s Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest, increased cognitive activity is demanded from the spectators. With the complex interrelations and causal connections between live and mediatised action and the confusing doubling of performers, both productions require extreme alertness from the audience. If the spectators want to keep track of the action and follow the on-screen action in addition to what is simultaneously happening on stage, they either have to split their attention or constantly decide on where to place their focus of atten-

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tion. This decision, however, is also subconsciously influenced by the mise-enscène on stage and by the camera work on screen, both of which repeatedly direct the spectators’ attention to specific aspects. Close-ups and medium long shots, for instance, repeatedly divert attention from the stage towards the screen. In Mare’s Nest these demands on the audience are even higher than in Roadmetal, Sweetbread. The spectators have to be more active, both mentally in order to understand the more complex relations between stage and screen, and physically if they want to follow the performers from one side of the screen to the reverse side. The higher complexity of Mare’s Nest mostly results from the fact that both playing spaces are interdependent. Any persona who passes through the door in the screen or simply walks around the platform that supports the screen, becomes immediately visible to the audience on the other side. Nevertheless, the action in the two playing spaces is coherent even if followed separately, and the spectators may decide to observe only one of the playing spaces throughout the whole performance. Accordingly, the intricate coordination among both playing spaces is more relevant to the performers than to the audience. For the spectators, however, it is the interaction between stage and screen that attracts most of their attention because, as Lyn Gardner observes, “while what is happening on one side of the structure is connected to what is happening on the other, the more intimate connection is between the live performers and their video doubles” (Gardner 2001, n. pag.). Apart from brief moments of shock at the displayed violence, momentary laughter or occasional incredulity with regard to the uncanny blurring of liveness and mediatisation, the spectators of Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest mostly remain detached observers. They are rather intellectually than emotionally involved because they constantly have to renegotiate the relation between live and mediatised action in order to tell apart live from mediatised personae. At times, this is a rather demanding task. Even moments of heightened proximity between audience and mediatised personae due to the use of close-ups and medium long shots do not increase the immersion of the spectators or their identification with the doubles who remain as mechanical and unemotional as the live personae themselves. The spectators are thus rather inactive in terms of emotional responses to the performances. Spectators are generally required to react to live performances by making active choices as to the focus of their attention. In traditional theatrical performances each spectator is assigned his or her own seat that determines the perspective in relation to the stage. Yet, the spectators do not necessarily keep the whole stage in sight throughout a performance but are free to roam the stage with their eyes and to shift their focus from one actor or detail to another. These decisions are

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mostly made subconsciously or automatically. But they are also influenced by signals and stimuli such as movement, sound or light on stage, elements that are employed deliberately in order to engage the spectators and direct their attention to particulars of the performance. In any case, this specific viewing condition of live performances puts the spectator into a more active and individualised mode of perception than in mediatised performances. In film, television or video, by comparison, the audience always follows the point of view of the camera which predetermines the viewing angle, establishes the focus, chooses the duration of the takes, and creates distance or proximity via specific shots. In a sense, the camera always already provides an interpretation of the action by selecting and highlighting relevant details. Yet, live performances cannot necessarily be said to be more interactive in this respect because the spectators’ choices of perception have no direct repercussions on the performance. Live performances thus merely induce increased (cognitive) activity in terms of perceptive choices on the part of the audience rather than necessitating proper interactivity with the performers, or participation in the action. In intermedial productions such as Station House Opera’s Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest the combination of liveness with mediatisation may further increase the spectators’ cognitive involvement by demanding more alertness and a constantly changing focus of attention that shifts between stage and screen. In Mare’s Nest the spectators are not even assigned fixed seats but need to move around the stage which prevents a physically passive viewing mode. The spectators of mediatised performances are thus more passive and restricted in their choice of focus. Yet, they are as active as live audiences in the sense of having to reconcile their own experiences with what they are watching in order to identify with it or distance themselves from it (cf. Klaver 1995: 311). Mediatised performances thus have the same potential to involve the audience emotionally. The intervention of the camera often even causes a more intense sense of proximity, immersion or identification with the characters by means of close-ups. Elizabeth Klaver further argues that the “rapid, interruptive play” typical of television hinders “passive, filmic voyeurism” by turning the viewer into a “bricoleur, assembling a readable text out of the array of TV images” (1995: 317). This echoes Marshall McLuhan’s distinction of ‘hot’ versus ‘cool’ media. His differentiation depends on how much information or data are provided by a medium or have to be completed by the audience (cf. 1964: 22 f.). According to McLuhan, ‘hot media’ like film are “low in participation,” whereas ‘cool media’ like television are “high in participation or completion by the audience” (1964: 23). As a consequence, television “engages you” (1964: 312; 1967: 126), “demands participation and involvement in depth of the whole being” (1964: 334; 1967: 126) and triggers

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a “creatively participant response” (1964: 336). Contrary to McLuhan’s and Klaver’s emphasis on the televisual demand for participation, however, I would argue that the degree of participation or interaction does not depend on the medium but on its mode of presentation and its use in specific situations. Hence, the distinction is neither a binary opposition nor set in stone so that television and theatre are not necessarily ‘cooler,’ nor do they elicit more interaction than film.

Forced Entertainment and Tim Etchells: shared responsibility versus withheld interaction The concern with the quality of the relationship between performers and spectators can be seen as a central aspect of Tim Etchells’s and Forced Entertainment’s work. Many of their productions meticulously form, investigate and question this relationship. Forced Entertainment’s attempts at subverting conventional understandings of the relationship between audience and performers are already implied by the company’s choice of name. It suggests the compulsiveness inherent in theatrical communication and reveals “the contrived nature of the contractual exchange between performer and spectator upon which all live entertainment is predicated” (Bailes 63). Especially in Forced Entertainment’s later work, this critical attitude towards the relationship between spectators and performers is frequently expressed via the performers’ seeming “bitterness” (Etchells 2004a: 84) or alienation, and via deliberate efforts to belie audience expectations (cf. Etchells 2004b: 213). Instead of courting the spectators like welcome guests or even treating them as co-participants, interaction seems to occur primarily between stage and monitors or among distinct monitors in many of their productions. Similar to Prototype Theater, Forkbeard Fantasy and Station House Opera, Forced Entertainment’s approach to liveness and mediatisation thus questions the assumption that live performances are necessarily interactive and instead underlines the interactive potential of mediatisation. In 200% and Bloody Thirsty (1987), for instance, Forced Entertainment incorporate video for two angels to appear on two monitors positioned above the stage. The mediatised angels, who serve as a chorus for the action on stage, not only communicate with each other across the monitors. They also observe the live action below and thus invert the conventional assumption that mediatised action should be observed from a position of liveness (cf. Giesekam 2007: 120 ff.). The two monitors in Some Confusions in the Law about Love (1989) are placed on stage. They are more closely linked to the live action (cf. Giesekam 2007: 132) when the Elvis Presley impersonator on the

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stage interviews the mediatised sex-show performers Mike and Dolores as if “live by satellite from Hawaii.”¹⁰⁰ The interaction between stage and monitors becomes even more complex when the videoed Mike and Dolores are interviewed by their live alter egos (cf. Giesekam 2007: 131). Marina and Lee (1991) employs video not only to project intertitles for the fragmented action and to provide a backdrop, but also in order to enable a conversation between the live Marina and the videoed Lee, who never appears live on stage (cf. Etchells 1996b: 237 f.). All of these dialogic media productions simulate interaction between stage and monitors or among distinct monitors. As opposed to such mediatised interaction, Forced Entertainment frequently dissociate performers from spectators. In order to raise awareness of the act of watching among the spectators, their productions often reinforce the boundary between stage and auditorium and remind the audience of being spectators rather than co-actors or co-authors (cf. Boenisch 2005: 344 f.). At the same time, the productions insist on the spectators’ responsibility as witnesses (cf. Bailes 87). Rather than focussing on interaction, many productions thus produce an unequal situation with the performers being stared at by the spectators who are forced into the roles of bad witnesses or accused of being voyeurs (cf. Malzacher 2004: 129). By treating the spectators as witnesses or voyeurs, Forced Entertainment emphasise the unique potential of live performance to induce a sense of responsibility among the spectators which cannot be evoked by mediatised performances to the same degree. The pressure on the spectators in live performances to take on responsibility and to position themselves with regard to the action is not equalled by mediatised performances such as television, film or video. Here, the spectators feel less responsible because they have no means of intervening and hence preventing certain events. Moreover, their voyeurism is not necessarily witnessed by others. It is the performers’ liveness that turns the spectators into direct eye-witnesses of the action and renders the action more intimate and possibly unpleasant for both spectators and performers. Whereas liveness and mediatisation can equally well elicit emotional involvement among their audiences, this sense of shared responsibility in live contexts more strongly requires moral responses from the audience. As Hans-Thies Lehmann argues, contemporary theatre often deliberately forces the spectators into a morally problematic situation of involvement, re-

 http://www.forcedentertainment.com/page/144/Some-Confusions-in-the-Law-about-Love/ 99.

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sponsibility or even guiltiness against their own will (cf. Lehmann 2008: 24; cf. Malzacher 2004: 121 f., 134; 2008: 41, 51). Such involvement tries to provoke the spectators to interfere with the action. In a sense, even when spectators thus provoked eventually do not intervene but remain mere observers of the action, this can be seen as an active choice not to get involved and presents an implicit statement. Yet, unless the spectators actually intervene in the performance, such involvement merely implies a more emotional and active mode of reception on the part of the spectators rather than reciprocal interaction between performers and spectators. In line with Forced Entertainment’s approach, Tim Etchells’s solo work Instructions for Forgetting (2001; still ongoing) also undermines interaction between stage and auditorium. It does, however, not rebuff the audience as clearly as Forced Entertainment productions like First Night (2001) with its prediction of the spectators’ deaths. The arrangement of the stage with Etchells and the monitors directly facing the audience and enabling occasional eye contact, at first sight suggests a certain acknowledgement of and openness towards the audience. Yet, the spectators are not treated as equal partners in a conversation and their immediate reactions such as laughter hardly seem to be noticed. Rather than acknowledging such audience feedback, Etchells seems to be reluctant to connect with the spectators and occasionally unwilling to share his stories with them. Along with eager contributors to the production, Etchells also quotes a letter in which Tony Shakar refuses to relate his war stories because they would not be understandable for outsiders. Shaker lays claim to the ownership of these stories with his assertion “besides, they are mine” (126/ 01:07:23). Etchells himself interprets this as a kind of “accusation” that draws a dividing line and helps “[m]ake the audience feel the differences present in the room and those outside of it” (Etchells 2004b: 215). Only once are the spectators explicitly addressed in a self-referential statement in the script that is, however, not included in the performance: “This is the last part. And it does contain some human folly. So if you like that kind of thing, this is definitely the section for you” (126). Apart from this, there is no explicit interaction between Etchells and the audience. This directly contrasts with the suggested interaction between Etchells and his contributors. The conventional salutation “Dear Tim” is not only used at the beginning of each letter and e-mail he reads out, but the phrase or his mere name are interjected at irregular intervals in between (cf. 116/ 00:11:52; 117 f./ 00:19:49; 123 f./ 00:54:23; 125 f./ 01:02:30 etc.). On the one hand, this serves to remind the audience that these are actual letters and e-mails rather than stories made up by Etchells and thus enhances their perceived authenticity. On the other hand, it also

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makes the audience feel excluded from this correspondence that is primarily directed at Etchells. Occasionally, Etchells leans back in his chair in order to watch the videos that are being presented to the audience (e. g. 00:04:40; 01:08:54; 01:32:11). At these moments, it seems as if he was just a member of the audience, especially when he visibly enjoys watching his son’s magic trick (cf. 00:48:52) or seems irritated by the eventual malfunctioning of its tape (cf. 00:51:02). Most of the time, however, he betrays no reactions to the videos and remains in control of the performance. By suggesting his presence as a real person and refraining from performing as a fictional character or narrator-figure, Etchells further illustrates his fascination with “the way that performers can be distant, private, incomprehensible or unknowable” (Etchells 2011: 20). In Etchells’s critical writing, he comments on the illusory community of performers and spectators by raising the provocative question: “Why should we trust audiences at all? I mean, who are these people?” (Etchells 2004b: 214; emphasis in the original). In a way, Instructions for Forgetting similarly questions the equality of performers and audience by implicitly treating the spectators as strangers that maybe cannot fully be trusted although personal stories are shared with them. Yet, the limitation of interaction between Etchells and his spectators to occasional direct eye-contact is not to be understood as a denial of the co-presence of performers and audience in live performance. It criticises the mere pretence of interactivity by attempting to create a simpler “onstage presence that is ‘human-scale,’ everyday” and expresses Etchells’s understanding of live theatrical communication as “doing a job in front of another group of people” (Etchells 2004b: 216). Instead of establishing a separating ‘fourth wall’ as in the earlier Forced Entertainment productions or fictionalising the audience as in the productions of the 1990s, Instructions for Forgetting thus aims at a different form of proximity. This is evoked by means of a “stripping of pretence in relation to the audience” that treats the spectators more simply “as the people who are there, the people who’ve come along to see you, to hear about something” (Etchells 2004a: 83). Yet, by denying conventional forms of theatrical interactivity, Instructions for Forgetting in a way stresses their very importance to the traditional theatrical ‘contract’ between performers and audience and confronts the spectators with their own expectations of theatrical interactivity.

Gob Squad: audience and public participation via live video relays Gob Squad’s Kitchen (2007; still ongoing) projects live remakes of Andy Warhol’s films Sleep, Kitchen and Screen Tests as well as brief allusions to other War-

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hol films onto three partitions of a large screen. They are initially presented as three independent fictional worlds in live relays, until performer Sean (Patten) on the right part of the screen complains to Sharon (Smith) in the centre: “Sharon, don’t pretend you can’t hear me. I’m just through a wall made of fabric next to you” (00:12:19). This remark identifies the permeability of the screen worlds and illustrates that interaction among the distinct projections is in fact possible. Later on, Sarah (Thom) cannot sleep because of the noise coming from the kitchen on the central part of the screen and leaves her position on the left part to enter the kitchen because “it just sounds really good in here” (00:20:10). She thus not only implies that sound travels from screen to screen, but even physically crosses over from one projection to another. The performers – and later on the spectators who substitute them – repeatedly take over each other’s parts and thus switch back and forth between the individual remakes. They also observe what happens on the other parts of the screen and hence acknowledge each other’s existence across the partitions. Behind the large screen, the three settings are actually located next to each other so that the communication of the performers filmed in the live video relays is direct. From the perspective of the audience, however, this interaction is perceived as a mediatised interaction that transcends three different camera frames and connects their fictional worlds. In addition to the interaction between distinct parts of the screen, Gob Squad’s Kitchen also facilitates interaction between stage and screen. When Simon (Will) leaves the screen and appears on stage, he is called back by the other personae and directly communicates with them through the surface of the screen (cf. 00:52:02). Since the production uses live video relays, this interaction between stage and screen occurs in real-time. The mediatised performers on the screen can therefore actually react to the on-stage performer instead of showing only predetermined actions that have already been fixed on pre-recorded video (see fig. 11). As opposed to most of the other productions discussed in the present chapter, the exchanges across the distinct parts of the screen and the interaction between stage and screen in Gob Squad’s Kitchen moreover do not exclude the audience. Instead, the live video relays actually facilitate audience participation. Whereas in Gob Squad’s King Kong Club (2005 – 2007) all spectators were involved in the production of the remake, audience participation in Gob Squad’s Kitchen is restricted only to a few carefully selected members of the audience who, one after the other, replace the Gob Squad performers in the Warhol remakes. While these spectators assume the performers’ parts, the latter emerge from behind the screen. They take the respective spectators’ seats among the rest of the audience to observe their substitutes and give them instructions via headphones. Although the replaced performers in the auditorium are thus

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Figure 11: Stage and screen interact in real-time when the mediatised personae try to convince the live Simon (Will) to return back into their live video relay in Gob Squad’s production Gob Squad’s Kitchen (image used with permission of Gob Squad)

physically close to the spectators, they focus their attention on keeping the onscreen action under control so that they do not really interact with the audience around them. The majority of the spectators can thus only be said vicariously to interact with the performers through their representatives behind the screen. As regards the spectators turned into performers or characters behind and on the screen, they react to the performers’ instructions received via the headphones, and directly interact with the remaining Gob Squad performers behind the screen. Eventually, they also interact with each other once they have gathered on the setting for Warhol’s Kitchen. Most of the time, what they say and do is a reaction to the behaviour of the remaining Gob Squad performers or is controlled by the input they receive via the headsets, a technique referred to as “remote acting” by Gob Squad (Tecklenburg, and Carter 29). Nevertheless, they are granted a certain degree of freedom in their reactions and answers to the performers so that moments of authentic interaction do occur. Eventually, the Gob Squad performers completely withdraw from stage and screen and instruct their substitutes to take off their headphones, thus cutting off the link be-

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tween proper performers and lay actors. In the final moments of the performance, the spectators on screen are thus thrown on their own resources without further guidance and shed their fictional roles in order to interact authentically with each other while exploring the Kitchen setting. In Revolution Now! (2010; still ongoing) Gob Squad’s use of live video relay leads to a new complexity of live and mediatised interaction and participation. It involves not only the performers and the audience as in Gob Squad’s Kitchen but even includes passers-by in the street. Previous Gob Squad productions also elicited interaction between performers and passers-by in real-time. The possibilities for mediatised interaction between passers-by and the spectators themselves in Revolution Now! however add a further dimension of interactivity. In his online review for A Younger Theatre, Jake Orr observes accordingly: Gob Squad take the dreaded words of ‘audience participation’ to a new level in their performance […]. It’s hard to get your head wrapped around watching a performance, where as an audience member you are part of the performance watching someone outside the building, who is watching you inside the building who now also becomes part of the performance. (Orr, n. pag.)

As for the spectators, they are not only encouraged to shake hands and move closer to each other (cf. 00:13:20). Even before they are seated in the auditorium, the performers already engage in interaction with selected members of the audience when filming brief interviews with them in the foyer. This immediately sets the tone for the whole performance that demands extensive participation from the spectators. They are repeatedly directly addressed by the performers and called on to support the revolutionary cause. Individual spectators are requested to pose for the cameras as revolutionary or corpse, play the electric guitars, or read out a poem. But the staging of the revolution for posterity and for the passers-by outside the venue also requires help from the entire audience who applaud, cheer or wave at command in order to attract the attention of passers-by in the street. Their efforts are not only filmed and projected onto the screen on stage, but are also transmitted onto the monitor positioned in the street. In this way, the spectators become part of what happens on stage and outside the performance space. While the performers initially focus their attention on involving the spectators in their staging of a revolution, the performers Johanna (Freiburg) and Sharon (Smith) eventually decide to leave the performance venue. They want to engage in direct interaction with passers-by in the street because the exclusively mediatised communication with the passers-by proves ineffectual in “making an impact” after all (00:34:10). Via the live relay from the street onto the screen on the one hand, and the real-time transmission of the indoor action

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onto the monitor placed on the sidewalk outside the venue on the other hand, the live performers remaining on the stage can now communicate with their fellow performers and the passers-by in the street. Additionally, they still interact with the spectators in the auditorium. The mediatised interaction of performers on stage with performers and passers-by outside the venue is reminiscent of the beginning of Prater-Saga 3 (2004– 2010). The difference is that the spectators in the auditorium are now equally included in the interaction with the ‘real’ world and, just like the performers, hold up signs and banners to transmit messages to the passers-by outside. The importance of the connection between the performers and spectators within the performance venue and the action occurring outside is stressed by the fact that Johanna and Sharon repeatedly interrupt their conversation with ‘The People’ outside the venue in order to report their (often distorted) statements back to the performers and audience within. This makes the passers-by aware of the presence of the audience inside the theatre, while also reminding the spectators that what they are watching on screen is a live relay that happens in real-time and is directly addressed to them and to the performers on stage. During the interaction with the ‘real’ world, the live performers on stage occasionally focus all their attention on what is happening outside. They thus observe the transmission on the screen while turning their backs on the audience. The performers’ physical orientation towards the screen combined with the mediatised reports back from the street create the impression that interaction primarily occurs between stage and screen or auditorium and screen rather than among performers and audience gathered live within the venue. During these moments, interaction thus results from mediatisation based on cameras, screen and monitors rather than from live co-presence. When, in the end, a passer-by agrees to enter the venue and appears on stage, live interaction and co-presence however prevail over mediatised interaction. Performers, spectators and a representative of ‘The People’ are united to form a live community whose co-presence is sealed when they all drink a toast to revolution (cf. 01:17:57). Though the production demonstrates that mediatisation successfully establishes interaction between different locations in realtime and momentarily even attracts more attention than the live interaction, this live interaction between performers, audience and the representative of ‘The People’ remains the first priority and aim of the production. Ultimately, the production thus values live interaction more highly than mediatised interaction. Nonetheless, it also becomes clear that interaction is not limited to the context of liveness.

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As I pointed out earlier, dialogic media productions using pre-recorded video or film only simulate interaction among distinct screens, or between screens and performers or spectators. They convey the illusion that the mediatised images have agency and can react to performers and spectators alike. The case is different for live video relays as used by Gob Squad. Live video relays are not predetermined but show performers and even members of the audience and the public in real-time. As a consequence, they actually facilitate direct though mediatised interaction among distinct screens or between screens, stage, auditorium and the world outside the performance venue. Accordingly, such use of live video relays illustrates that interaction does not require liveness, but that it may even be more effective in mediatised contexts. Mediatised interaction based on live video relays thus dissociates the concept of interaction from liveness by questioning the assumed exclusivity of live interaction. It may even render the mediatised scenes more interactive by comparison. In Gob Squad’s Kitchen and Revolution Now! Gob Squad have recourse to mediatisation in order to facilitate interaction between the three groups of performers, spectators and passers-by on stage, screen and in ‘real’ life. They create possibilities for audience participation and for what I will refer to as public participation. Obviously, the high degree of audience and public participation requires plenty of improvisation on the part of the performers. Many of Gob Squad’s productions thus only adhere to a rough sequence plan with alternating fixed and free passages instead of being entirely scripted so that there is a lot of variation among individual performances of a single production (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 25, 31, 47). Starting with The Great Outdoors in the year 2001, Gob Squad have used video in order to interact with the spectators or to transcend the theatrical space and venture out into the ‘real’ world. They report back to the spectators by capturing people from outside the venue on video and projecting them onto screens and monitors on the stage. The passers-by in the streets are either unwittingly caught on video (e. g. The Great Outdoors (2001– 2002)) or more or less intentionally perform for the cameras (e. g. Super Night Shot (2003; still ongoing); Who Are You Wearing? (2004– 2009); Prater-Saga 3 (2004– 2010); King Kong Club (2005 – 2007); Gob Squad’s Kitchen (2007; still ongoing); Live Long and Prosper (2009); Revolution Now! (2010; still ongoing)). As Gob Squad point out, it is always up to the spectators to decide to what extent they want to be involved in the performances (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 97). Yet, whether they respond to the performers’ attempts to elicit interaction or just turn away from the cameras, all spectators and passers-by captured on video become part of the performances and influence the proceedings in one way or another by advancing the performers’ missions or refusing to cooperate. In this sense,

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mediatisation proves to be inescapable and renders it impossible for them to remain completely detached (cf. Georgi 38, 49). In Gob Squad’s productions mediatisation is not only presented as an alternative to liveness in establishing interaction and audience participation. It is sometimes employed more creatively than live interaction or even proves to be the only way of establishing communication or overcoming anonymity and isolation. As Gob Squad observe moreover, the advantage of mediatised over live interaction lies in the fact that the videoed spectators are not directly exposed on stage and are therefore ready to engage with the performers more openly and in more intimate ways due to their safe mediatised distance (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 83 f.). Moreover, mediatisation allows the performers to interact with passers-by beyond the theatrical context who have not acquired the status of spectators and are thus less hesitant to cross over to the performers’ side (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 107). Live interaction and participation such as the on-stage appearance of a passer-by in Revolution Now! create moments of specific tension that are possibly valued more than mediatised interaction. Yet, these moments are brought about by means of mediatisation or seem to be a product of mediatisation from the spectators’ vantage point. Gob Squad’s productions can thus be seen as an exploration of the interactive and participatory potential of mediatisation. Paradoxically, their investigation “celebrates live performance as a space for the negotiation of encounter via mediation” (Tecklenburg, and Carter 9; emphasis in the original).

Summary Though interactivity is frequently regarded as a distinctive feature of live as opposed to mediatised performance, liveness and interactivity are in fact not contingent upon each other. On the one hand, interaction may also occur in situations of mediatised communication based on telephone, internet, virtual reality, tele-presence etc. Similarly, cognitive and emotional involvement or the sense of community among a group of spectators may be elicited by both live and mediatised performances. On the other hand, the dividing line between stage and auditorium established by the imaginary ‘fourth wall’ separates fictional characters from real spectators. This fact often restricts audience response or feedback in live performances such as theatre to the level of non-fictional communication. Interactivity in this sense applies to communication among the spectators, or between spectators and performers. Such exchanges, however, have only limited effects on the development of the fictional action as such and

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remain within the scope of what Erika Fischer-Lichte refers to as the ‘autopoietic feedback loop’ (cf. 2010: 26 f.; 2004: 59, 80 f.). Where spectators are called on to contribute also to the level of fictional action by assuming the roles of characters, moments of audience participation arise during which spectators-as-characters communicate with the performers-as-characters. Such audience participation does not qualify as a general characteristic of or prerequisite for live performance, but forms an essential aspect of specifically interactive and often improvisational live performances. As my analysis of the intermedial productions in the present chapter illustrates, the media combination of theatre and film or video may serve to increase the actual or perceived degree of interaction between spectators, live and mediatised performers and sometimes even passers-by. Depending on whether live interaction between performers and spectators, or mediatised interaction with and among screens is presented as being more intense, the productions position themselves differently in the debate on the comparative interactive potential of liveness and mediatisation. Since interaction is commonly associated with liveness rather than mediatisation, the interactive and participatory uses of mediatisation may even make the incorporated videos or films seem ‘more live’ than the actual live action. When considering the levels of interaction in all of the selected productions, it becomes obvious that interaction is in no way restricted to or more intensive in their live sequences than in their mediatised sequences. Instead, actual or simulated interaction between mediatised performers on one side, and live performers, spectators or passers-by on the other side often not only equals the degree of live interaction, but exceeds it. In fact, the productions suggest that interaction does not require liveness and that mediatised interaction between stage and screen may not only be on a par with live interaction between stage and auditorium, but may even be more effective. As a consequence, the productions suggest that interaction does not constitute a distinctive feature of liveness. A major difference between the selected productions once more lies in their respective choices between pre-recorded video or film on the one hand, and live video relay on the other hand. Only live video relay allows for actual interaction with mediatised performers or characters, whereas interaction with pre-recorded video or film is always merely simulated. Moreover, pre-recorded video and film also limit the possibilities of adapting a performance to audience feedback and reduce the chances of audience participation. The reason lies in the fact that the pre-recorded videos or films too strictly predetermine the live action and leave little room for improvisation, interruptions or digressions from the prescribed course of action. Instead, interaction with pre-recorded videos or films demands perfect timing and undivided attention from the live performers who can thus no

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longer attend to the spectators’ reactions or spontaneously modify the performance to accommodate the taste of the audience. The use of pre-recorded video and film in the productions by Forkbeard Fantasy and Station House Opera therefore merely feigns interaction among distinct screens, between live and mediatised performers and, to a lesser degree, between the spectators and the mediatised performers. Such “dialogic media productions” as Phaedra Bell calls them (cf. 44) confer simulated agency on the mediatised performers. This makes it seem as if they could react to the live action or instigate exchanges with the live performers, although they were pre-recorded in the absence of live performers and audience. Nonetheless, this simulated agency does not constitute proper interaction because it lacks reciprocity. Apart from visual, aural, physical or causal connections between stage and screen, such feigned interaction may also involve seemingly smooth transitions between stage and screen. They are most successfully employed in Station House Opera’s productions and in Forkbeard Fantasy’s ‘Crossing of the Celluloid Divide.’ The price these productions have to pay for their feigned interaction between stage and screen or among distinct screens is the very limited feedback and interaction between stage and auditorium, because the live performers have to concentrate on their mediatised counterparts. The lack of live interaction with the audience is thus compensated for by the apparent mediatised interaction which is all the more effective and gains in importance by comparison. Mediatisation thus seems superior to liveness in its potential for eliciting interaction. Occasional moments of hypermediacy, however, repeatedly undermine the impression of mediatised interaction and suddenly illustrate how easily the spectators were duped into accepting the simulated interaction. Tim Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting, by contrast, exploits neither the possibilities for mediatised interaction nor for live interaction with the spectators. Etchells occasionally even seems reluctant to get involved with the audience. He thus disappoints the expectation that theatre should be interactive and follows Forced Entertainment’s general interest in questioning and laying bare the conventions of theatrical entertainment. As opposed to the simulated interaction with pre-recorded video or film, the use of live video relay in Gob Squad’s productions facilitates actual interaction in real-time between spectators, live and mediatised performers. It even offers new forms of audience participation or even public participation when spectators or passers-by as on-screen characters interact with the live and mediatised performers. Gob Squad’s Kitchen moreover creates an impression of interaction among distinct screens by means of transitions of mediatised performers from one screen to another or a mutual awareness of performers across screens. In

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Gob Squad’s productions, mediatised interaction and participation not only exceed live interaction. They sometimes even elicit live interaction which is only brought about with the help of mediatisation. While mediatisation thus spurs the spectators into action, it also stresses their shared responsibility for a successful performance. Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) does not exploit such possibilities of audience or public participation and shows a lesser degree of interaction between stage and screen. Instead, its use of live video relay frequently makes it seem as if the mediatised performers were directly addressing the audience or interacting among each other across the three monitors. The personae’s interaction mostly occurs on video rather than live on stage where they often not even face each other. Although the individual form and use of interaction differs from one company or production to the other, they all illustrate that interaction is not contingent upon liveness and thus confirm the argument that interaction is no distinctive feature of liveness. Yet, since interaction is frequently mistaken for a defining characteristic of liveness, the interactive and participatory use of mediatisation may seem to confer liveness on the video or film sequences or even make them appear to be ‘more live’ than the live action itself. Instead of presenting live interaction as superior to mediatised interaction, the productions suggest that interaction and audience participation result primarily from the elements of mediatisation rather than from the live context. As a consequence, the productions playfully conflate or invert the status of liveness and mediatisation by means of interaction. The various conceptions of ‘interaction,’ the distinct agents such as spectators, performers, characters and passers-by, the diversity of involved media and their respective constellations illustrate that interaction is a contended and relative phenomenon that appears in manifold forms as well as different degrees. It follows that theatre is not automatically interactive or more interactive than other media, apart from its inherent but limited potential for audience feedback. Nevertheless, interactivity often figures as an essential aspect of intermedial theatre and performance because it lends itself so perfectly to a blurring of liveness and mediatisation.

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4.5 Representation of Reality Station House Opera: the relativity of realism Station House Opera’s productions Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998; still ongoing) and Mare’s Nest (2001– 2004) do not employ conventional strategies in order to establish a self-contained fictional world. Firstly, neither of the productions introduces psychologically coherent characters with stable mutual relations. Yet, the personae are not simply to be equated with the performers’ real identities either, but are almost undefined in their relation to reality as if the question of being, acting or representing simply did not matter at all. Secondly, both productions present mostly disjointed sequences of action that they repeat, mirror and vary rather than developing a coherent plot. Thirdly, the rudimentary action is not set in a defined fictional time. Other than by repetitions and time lags between stage and screen, the course of action is not temporally structured, and a different order of events would equally make sense. Fourthly, the setting on stage and screen is mostly non-descript, apart from some videoed scenes set in offstage locations. The fictional space therefore remains vague and is hardly differentiated from the actual stage space. It follows from these observations that the fictional worlds of both productions apparently lack definition. Nonetheless, they are rendered coherent by means of the rules that regulate the relation and transitions between stage and screen and that mark the personae’s world as fictional and distinct from the logic that governs the spectators’ reality. Whereas the overall fictionality of both productions can thus be identified, the respective degrees of fictionality of their constituent live and mediatised elements are unstable and relative. The pre-recorded videos appear to be sometimes less, at other times equally, and occasionally even more real than the live action on stage. As a consequence, the relation between stage and screen cannot simply be read as a binary opposition of reality versus fantasy, the conscious versus the subconscious, original versus copy, or present versus past and future. Artistic director Julian Maynard Smith forestalls such binary interpretations when describing his general approach as “try[ing] to balance video and performance so that they’re not loaded with interpretations; the film isn’t just someone’s imagination or fantasy or dream world” (qtd. in Costa, n. pag.). It may sometimes seem as if the stage presented the personae’s reality or present, whereas the videos revealed their dreams or desires, their past or their future. At other moments, stage and screen display an inverted relation because the videos appear to be more real than the live action. The live personae’s occasional imitation of actions that have already been shown on screen moreover suggests that the video doubles sometimes figure as the originals that are

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copied by the live personae. But since such repetition on stage may also involve variation, the videos do not reliably anticipate the action on stage. The relation between live and mediatised sequences is rendered even more intricate by the fact that the live performers have to adapt their actions to the pre-recorded videos. To be precise, the videos are pre-recorded actions which were initially performed by the live performers and are reproduced by them during the performance. This relation between live and mediatised performance thus perfectly illustrates Philip Auslander’s claim that nowadays live performances “have become second-hand recreations of themselves as refracted through mediatization” (1999: 158). Most of the time, however, stage and screen exhibit identical degrees of fictionality or realism. Sometimes, they present a single scene from different perspectives and thus render it more three-dimensional. At other times, they show distinct actions that offer alternative, yet equally valid realities. That neither stage nor screen has priority over the other in terms of realism is illustrated, among other means, by the live and mediatised personae’s direct interaction with and reactions to each other. Their actions on stage thus frequently build on what has just happened on video and vice versa so that liveness and mediatisation affect each other rather than constituting isolated worlds. Since neither stage nor screen can therefore be said to be more real than the other, Giesekam convincingly interprets the interrelation between stage and screen in Station House Opera’s productions as an illustration of “a quantum view of several possible worlds co-existing” (2007: 201). Julian Maynard Smith describes Roadmetal, Sweetbread as “a comedy of fantasies and realities, of what is real and what is not” and further clarifies that the production presents a “constant interplay” between the two personae’s points of view (qtd. in A. Jones, n. pag.). While it is possible to distinguish between the personae’s respective points of view, the question as to which of the sequences of action are meant to be real and which mere fantasies cannot be resolved. This creates the tension between liveness and mediatisation that makes Roadmetal, Sweetbread so compelling. In Mare’s Nest, it is primarily the arrangement of stage and screen that conveys and increases the relativity of alternative realities. The two playing spaces on either side of the screen are linked, because the personae seamlessly pass from one playing space to the other by walking around or directly through the screen. Yet, both spaces can also be observed and made sense of separately. Accordingly, they offer two alternative fictions that the spectators can either combine or choose between. They gain priority over each other only insofar as, depending on the perspective assumed by the individual spectator, the one or the other remains hidden behind the screen. In the same way, the videos on

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the front and reverse side of the screen also offer alternative realities. Although only one of them can be watched at a time so that they mutually exclude each other, neither of them is more real than the other. Repeatedly, the action on one side of the screen figures as an inversion of the action on the reverse side so that the two playing spaces and the two videos complement or contradict each other. During these mirror-inversions, neither half of the stage is subordinate to the other because they simply figure as two sides of the same coin. More important than the interconnected worlds established by the frequent mirror-inversion of the two playing spaces and the two sides of the screen, however, are the alternative realities conveyed by the interaction between each playing space and its respective screen. Here again, neither stage nor screen assumes dominance over the other with regard to its degree of realism. This impression is primarily achieved by means of the door in the screen. It facilitates frequent transitions between stage and screen and makes it even more difficult to tell the personae apart from their doubles than in Roadmetal, Sweetbread, where such transitions are fewer. The resulting connection between the corporeal and the immaterial consequently increases the spectators’ confusion as to what is real. The relation between reality and fiction, stage and screens is further complicated by the fact that the pre-recorded videos in Mare’s Nest often seem to double the stage. By showing a projection of the playing space and the screen, the videos thus create a screen-within-the-screen and stage-within-the-screen effect and produce an additional level of mediatisation. Yet, despite this mise-enabyme, none of the three levels is more real than the others, because the personae still acknowledge each other’s presence or even interact. This can be seen, for example, when one of the female personae on the real stage watches her own double on the mediatised stage-within-the-screen who, in turn, watches her mediatised corpse on the screen-within-the-screen (cf. 01:00:04, see fig. 12). The co-existence and equality of different levels of reality is further highlighted as the scene develops and, for a moment, three doors are seen next to each other: the real door leading through the screen, the mediatised front door of the videoed room and its back door (cf. 01:03:27). Since the three doors look almost identical, it is difficult to assign them to their proper level of liveness or mediatisation. Here, the assimilation of the levels attains perfection. The videos in Mare’s Nest thus form alternative realities that are on a par with the action on stage. The casualness and frequency with which the personae and their doubles seem to pass between stage and screen, their mutual awareness and their interactions make it more obvious than in Roadmetal, Sweetbread that stage and videos are not only meant to be causally related but equally real. On the whole, the blurring of liveness and mediatisation in Mare’s Nest is thus

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Figure 12: Mise-en-abyme of the live woman on stage, her mediatised double on the stagewithin-the-screen and her mediatised corpse on the screen-within-the-screen in Station House Opera’s Mare’s Nest (image provided by Station House Opera and used with their permission)

more complex than in Roadmetal, Sweetbread because of the elaborate arrangement of stage and screen. Nevertheless, the message concerning the respective degrees of realism of liveness and mediatisation is identical in both productions. The doubling, inversions, interactions, causal connections and direct transitions suggest that stage and screen do not provide hierarchically structured and self-contained worlds. They do not form binary oppositions of reality versus fiction, present versus past or future, conscious versus subconscious, or original versus copy. Instead, stage and screen merely supply variations of the same themes and present equally possible or impossible, real or surreal worlds whose internal logic derives from their interactions. Station House Opera present the relation between reality and fiction as a relative matter of perspective rather than as a question of the medium. Roadmetal Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest playfully suggest that realism is no adequate criterion for distinguishing between liveness and mediatisation. The productions

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demonstrate and confirm this interpretation by confusing the audience to a point where the spectators constantly have to renegotiate the respective degrees of realism and are actually fooled. Giesekam summarises the impression of an actual equality or blurring of liveness and mediatisation, stage and screen when describing “the spectator’s sense of disorientation” (2007: 216) in both productions with the following words: […] it was not a case of suspending disbelief and believing that the performers and the videoed figures were really operating in the same realm. It was more that the spectator’s sensory experience was of the worlds fusing, leading to a tension between an awareness of the mechanics of what was occurring and the sensory experience of it. (2007: 215)

Although the spectators actually know better, they forget that a complete fusion of liveness and mediatisation is impossible and succumb to the illusion that the doubles are as real or as fictional as the personae on stage. Contrary to Station House Opera’s successful blurring of liveness and mediatisation with regard to their respective degrees of realism and fictionality, realism is often considered as a criterion for distinguishing between liveness and mediatisation. Just like interaction, however, realism does not constitute a distinctive feature of liveness or mediatisation. Realism is not a question of the medium, but instead depends on whether a medium is used unobtrusively and whether the fictionality is acknowledged or concealed. Yet, no matter how a medium is used, realism is never absolute. What is considered realistic is thus only relative to other representations. As Robert Stam remarks with regard to film, realism is contingent on medial and generic conventions and viewing habits that are culturally conditioned as well as historically determined (cf. 10 f.). No medium can create perfect, complete and objective representations of reality because this would require the possibility of an unmediated access to reality as a point of departure (see chapter 3.2). Moreover, all art can only ever focus on a segment of reality whose very choice already implies a subjective perspective and interpretation. Though perfect realism may occasionally be striven for, it therefore remains an impossible ideal not only in theatre but in any medium whatsoever. However convincing theatre, film, video or any other medium may be, in other words, their representation of reality is always an imperfect construction. Realism is nevertheless often misconceived as a question of the medium. The relation between theatre and technological media has therefore often been analysed in terms of their allegedly inherent degrees of realism or considered as a competition for superior realism. Especially in its early stage, film was perceived

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as a threat to theatre due to its presumed superior pictorial realism. In his study Film and Theatre (1936), for example, Allardyce Nicoll observed: The film has such a hold over the world of reality, can achieve expression so vitally in terms of ordinary life, that the realistic play must surely come to seem trivial, false and inconsequential. The truth is, of course, that naturalism on the stage must always be limited and insincere. (183)

Similar views of a deficient realism of theatre have been voiced repeatedly. Though Martin Esslin’s judgement that other media “have both gained and lost as against stage drama” is balanced, he also claims that “[t]he photographic nature of the film and television medium […] allows a much greater degree of realism in the backgrounds” (78 f.). Ralf Remshardt expresses a more recent questioning of theatrical realism when observing that “film made theatre’s theatricality visible, […] foregrounded theatre’s constructedness and contingency” and “relegated the theatre to a position defined now by its antecedent function and its defective authenticity” (41; emphasis in the original). In 1949, Nicholas Vardac argued moreover that the dissatisfaction with the imperfect realism in theatre was the incentive for the invention of film (cf. xviii, xxiii), as if film had simply arisen out of the shortcomings of theatre. In opposition to the pessimistic prognoses of the fate of theatre due to filmic realism, Robert Edmond Jones considered the alleged superior realism of film as a chance for theatre to regain its “old lost magic” (147 f.) by bethinking itself of its very theatricality. In his opinion, “[m]otion pictures are about to become a great liberating agent of drama. By draining the theatre of its literalness they are giving it back to imagination again” (134). As these commentaries on the relation between theatre and film illustrate, their comparison is based on the assumption that film has a higher potential for realism than theatre and live performance due to its technical superiority. As a consequence, they associate the liveness of theatre with deficient realism and shallow or unsatisfactory illusion. When turning one’s attention from technical perfection and photographic realism to the physical presence of real actors, however, the converse could be argued. In comparison not only to film but to technological, and specifically digital media in general, the spatio-temporal co-presence of performers and spectators in theatre and live performance may increase the effect of realism because it serves as a guarantee for the performers’ actual existence. Admittedly, the sight of mediatised performers also suggests that they must have existed in order to have left their traces on the respective medium at some point in the past. With regard to photography, this notion of mediatised traces, imprints or records of

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a past reality is already expressed in Roland Barthes’s extensive essay Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography [La chambre claire: Note sur la photographie] which was first published in 1980. According to Barthes, photographs confirm the prior existence of what is depicted because they simply capture actual imprints of light waves reflected by its surface (cf. 92, 95). They are thus not a mere imitation or copy of the real but an ‘emanation’ of a past reality (cf. 90, 99). As an extension of photography into moving pictures, film can likewise be understood as giving proof of a former existence that may, however, reappear in a fictional context. This view is held, for instance, by Gilberto Perez who argues: What a photograph depicts has been: what a painting depicts comes into being in the picture. What a movie depicts can, in each of its details, be said to have been: each thing we see must have been there before the camera, which has no imagination and ‘infinite appetite for the material.’ (34)

Susan Sontag agrees that a photograph is “a trace, something directly stencilled off the real” (1978: 154) that gives “incontrovertible proof that a given thing happened” (1978: 5). Nevertheless, she adds for consideration that photographs are never completely objective or neutral. They are “not just a record but an evaluation of the world” (1978: 88) and have to be considered as interpretations and artefacts (cf. 1978: 6 f., 69). This subjectivity obviously applies also to other media such as film or video, even more so if they are used to convey a fictional story rather than documentary information. What casts even more doubts on the consideration of photography, film or other technological media as imprints of reality, however, are the possibilities of manipulation of photographic and other images. In an age of digital image processing, computer-generated imagery, computer animation etc., the depicted object or person is no longer necessarily a trace of the real, and it can no longer be taken for granted that it actually existed at all or in the depicted state. Whereas spectators of theatre and live performance witness the actors’ real existence with their very eyes, the authenticity of mediatised images is thus called into question. Obviously, this argumentation only concerns the status of the actors which does not necessarily determine how convincing a character may be. Since realism does not figure as an inherent quality of theatre or any other medium, it should instead be regarded as a strategy or a mode and style of presentation that can be exploited irrespective of the medium and yields different ‘effects’ of realism. This conception is confirmed when looking at the diverse subgenres of theatre, film and other media which exhibit varying degrees of realism within a single medium. Although theatre reacted to the invention of film

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with a new interest in non-realist representation (cf. Maintz 23 f.), filmic realism has not altogether superseded realism in theatre so that realist plays still abound as much as non-realist films. Documentary theatre and verbatim plays raise a claim to realism and authenticity that is to be distinguished, in turn, from the social realism of, for instance, British ‘Kitchen Sink’ drama. Epic theatre, by contrast, deliberately undermines the creation of dramatic illusion and alienates the audience from what is presented on stage. In other media such as television and film, a contrast between apparently representational as opposed to overtly fictional subgenres can likewise be observed. Here, the scale ranges from documentaries and reality television shows to more obvious cases of fictional creation such as science fiction and fantasy films, to name but a few examples. Since realism is not contingent on a specific medium and its liveness or mediatisation, it perfectly lends itself to a blurring or contrasting of liveness and mediatisation in intermedial performances. The distinct degrees of realism chosen for the constituent media in cases of media combination thus shape the relationship among the involved media and may draw attention to the conventions underlying their effects of realism. Although realism is neither a question of a specific medium nor absolute, the choice of the respective degree of realism offers ample opportunity for shaping the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation whenever theatre is combined with technological media like film or video. It is in this sense that realistic representation is relevant to the discussion of liveness and mediatisation despite the fact that it is no distinctive feature of liveness or mediatisation per se. As my following analysis will illustrate, Station House Opera’s decision to present equally valid alternative realities is not the only option for shaping the perceived relation between liveness and mediatisation. Instead of an equally high or low degree of realism in both the live and the mediatised elements, a juxtaposition of different degrees of realism may either celebrate mediatised realism to the detriment of a less realistic liveness, or may present realism on the level of liveness as superior to a less realistic mediatisation.

Station House Opera and Gob Squad: the incorporation of off-stage reality via mediatisation The playful exploration of realism may also extend beyond the stage. Station House Opera’s presentation of alternative realities, for instance, is not limited to the relation between stage and screens but even includes extra-theatrical reality. This adds an additional level of confusion to the play with the relativity of reality.

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To be more exact, the presentation of actual off-stage spaces as part of Station House Opera’s video footage brings the videos more into line with the spectators’ reality. It can therefore be seen as a successful strategy for increasing the perceived degree of realism of the videos by comparison with the live action on the stage. As opposed to the non-descript settings on stage, such excursions take the spectators to recognisable real spaces of the host cities and to backstage areas that can be assumed to have a real existence beyond the realm of the performance – whether they are actually familiar to the spectators or not. The first scene of Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998; still ongoing) already connects live and mediatised action as well as stage, screen, auditorium and the reality outside the performance space in an apparently direct transition. The pre-recorded video shows the male performer as he walks the streets of the host city, enters the performance venue and eventually crosses the auditorium towards the stage. At the same moment, the corresponding live performer enters the auditorium through a back door and similarly approaches the stage. As a consequence, it appears as if the live performer had directly stepped out of the video and the extra-theatrical reality represented in it. Similar effects occur in Mare’s Nest (2001– 2004) where the pre-recorded videos not only show a mediatised room but repeatedly take the spectators through backstage areas, into the technician’s studio and out into the host city. In this way, the screens serve to extend the fictional world or add details to it. How To Behave (2003), a Station House Opera production commissioned specifically for the reopening of the Hampstead Theatre in London,¹⁰¹ complements the live action on the stage with life-size video relay. The live video transmissions are projected onto a large screen and show action that simultaneously occurs behind the screen. Again, the mediatised action is linked with the live action by the performers’ seemingly unhindered transitions from stage to screen and back onto the stage. Yet, the live relay alternates with pre-recorded videos revealing action that only pretends to be happening simultaneously behind the screen or at other sites. Some of this pre-recorded footage is filmed in the backstage area that the spectators themselves were led through prior to the performance (cf. Costa, n. pag.)¹⁰² so that they recognise these settings as actual offstage locations. The intricate use of video in How To Behave thus once more blurs live and mediatised performers, on-stage and off-stage action as well as real and fictional spaces.

 Cf. http://www.stationhouseopera.com/project/6046/.  Cf. http://www.stationhouseopera.com/project/6046/.

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From the perspective of the spectators, the performers are physically absent during these mediatised excursions into reality. Nevertheless, they remain spatially connected to the audience because they inhabit spaces that are at least partly familiar to them so that they can be identified as real spaces. Although these real spaces acquire an additional fictional quality by the simple presence of the personae, they also form part of the spectators’ real world of experience. Paradoxically, while the live personae are actually off-stage and invisible to the audience, they thus seem somehow more real because they are no longer limited to the fictional space on stage, and their doubles take on an existence in the spectators’ real world. This use of mediatisation ties in with Station House Opera’s presentation of the relativity of reality. The “anchoring” of the performance in real space (Malcolm 52) makes videos and reality converge. It brings the video sequences closer to the spectators’ reality and simultaneously renders reality itself more fictional by including it within the personae’s world. The relativity thus also extends to the spectators’ and performers’ reality because the videos make off-stage spaces become part of the mediatised world. In contemporary theatre and performance, space has been turned into a contested concept. In agreement with Hans-Thies Lehmann, Christopher Balme observes a challenging of the “clear phenomenological distinction made between physical and fictional stage space” which leads to a “destabilization of the borders between work and frame” (Balme 123; emphasis in the original). As a result, “the fictionally or aesthetically organized space remains connected or contiguous with the real space of the spectator, instead of being clearly metaphorized and thus distanced” (123). The transitions between the personae’s fictional worlds and the spectators’ reality are a further means of raising a metafictional awareness of the stage as a fictional as well as a real physical space. Station House Opera’s use of video to reveal extra-theatrical reality further illustrates that, although there are no media-specific degrees of realism, media nevertheless have their medium-specific qualities and strategies for evoking effects of realism. Marvin Carlson, for instance, argues that theatre and film have “different relationships” to realism and achieve realism due to distinct properties. Theatre surpasses film in the “physical and emotional reality of the objects and human beings actually present for the observation of spectators” or, in other words, the physical co-presence in the spectators’ ‘here’ and ‘now.’ Film, by contrast, excels theatre in its “spatial mobility and flexibility” (617). When theatre and live performance incorporate film or video, they may therefore take advantage of their spatial mobility in order to open up to spaces beyond the stage or the performance venue. This may create contiguity of fiction-

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al and actual space and increase the overall effect of realism. Films or videos may thus not only approximate stage and auditorium, but also connect them to backstage areas or spaces outside the theatre. As Carlson argues, videos may be used to create “a remarkable collage of spaces […], live and mediatized space, actor and audience space, onstage and offstage space, real and mimetic space, all simultaneously present” (625). Yet, this use of mediatisation also automatically superimposes a fictional layer onto reality that suddenly becomes part of the fiction on stage. While this strategy may serve to increase the perceived realism of a production, it may also draw attention to the disparity of the respective spaces and thus lead to “a new awareness of the constructedness of stage space and of the great potential role of contemporary technology to that construction” (Carlson 626). The gain in realism may hence be cancelled out by increased metafictional and metamedial awareness. In his investigation of various European theatre productions, Carlson specifically focuses on the advantages of live video relays. He illustrates how they may extend the fictional stage space into fictional or actual off-stage spaces, and may also connect on-stage and off-stage spaces in real-time by actually following the performers with a camera. Since Station House Opera’s use of pre-recorded videos successfully creates the illusion of live video relays, their productions achieve an effect of realism similar to the actual use of live video relays described by Carlson. Gob Squad also use pre-recorded videos in Super Night Shot (2003; still ongoing) in order to incorporate real spaces outside the venue. The production evokes a sense of immediacy that makes live and mediatised time seem at least very close, if not identical. In productions like Prater-Saga 3 (2004 – 2010) and Revolution Now! (2010; still ongoing), however, Gob Squad employ actual live video relays to suggest spatial and temporal congruence of liveness and mediatisation, stage fiction and off-stage reality. Gob Squad use mediatisation in order to extend the action into the auditorium or into spaces outside the performance venue. In many of their productions, the action is momentarily or completely transferred off-stage. This strategy serves to include off-stage spaces within their productions and also aims at pulling ‘real’ spectators or passers-by into the performances. The fictional worlds on stage thus no longer appear to be selfcontained. Yet, the recordings of what lies beyond the stage offer no pure glimpses of reality. Their integration into the productions instead confers a fictional quality to these spaces or people beyond the stage. As a consequence, no clear distinction can be drawn any longer between stage fiction and the reality beyond it. This effect deconstructs the notions of ‘reality’ and ‘realism,’ whether resulting

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from liveness or mediatisation, and replaces them with an awareness of the relativity of reality. In Super Night Shot (2003; still ongoing) the cameras fuse fiction and reality by relocating the action from the stage into the streets and making interaction with real passers-by possible. During this process, the city is transformed into a film set inhabited by real people. In her role as promoter for the mission envisaged by the production, Laura (Tonke) explains to the spectators: “The streets will be our film set, cigarette butts and litter our props and passers-by the extras” (00:03:19). Just like the performers themselves, the passers-by and the streets occupy an intermediate position between fiction and reality because they acquire a fictional quality by being caught on camera and projected onto the stage. Accordingly, actual and mediatised spaces are placed side by side (cf. Matzke 2005: 85) or even merge completely. This becomes most obvious when location-scout Sarah (Thom) reinvents everyday locations as ideal film sets. She considers a deserted parking structure as a set for “gangster thrillers” (00:11:52), evokes a film including drugs, sex and gang wars behind some dustbins (cf. 00:14:59), and points out the suitability of the back-seat of a car for a passionate first kiss or “illicit affair” (00:22:17). Eventually, she chooses the clock-tower (cf. 00:39:29) as an ideal setting for the Hollywood kiss. As Mieke Matzke points out, most of the spectators are probably familiar with the area outside the performance venue and recognise the streets they have passed through on their way to the performance. Some of the spectators may even have encountered the performers and may themselves have been captured on their cameras (cf. Matzke 2005: 84). All of them, in any case, appear on the videos while cheering the performers during their eventual return to the venue. The videos thus insert details of the spectators’ own realm of experience into the performance. Furthermore, the participation of real individuals also adds a sense of authenticity because of their genuine emotions. Again and again, the conversations between performers and passers-by centre on the question of emotional realism in film as compared to real life. While Gob Squad criticise the artificiality and idealisation of love in Hollywood films, the hesitant relations between performers and passers-by suddenly seem all the more sincere. When Sean (Patten) asks a young couple whether they “think love in real life is anything like love in the movies” (00:23:15), the man asserts to have no desire for “those big Hollywood emotions” (00:23:39). Another passer-by does not agree with Simon (Will) that “this is romance” (00:24:07) when she is carried by him across the street. Her judgement illustrates that heroic gestures may be inappropriate in reality and that love at first sight cannot easily be found in the reality of the streets. In short, love and other emotions in Super Night Shot are more hesitant and subdued but possibly more sincere than

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in glamorous Hollywood films. Simon’s apology “for being a little bit two-dimensional” (00:44:13) accordingly not only refers to the actual lack of a third dimension on screen but also criticises the stock character of the Hollywood ‘hero’ and the simplistic representation of reality in film – for “that’s how it can be in the movies sometimes” (00:44:18). Gob Squad’s interaction with real people thus creates an impression of authenticity and realism that is more convincing than what is often presented in film and on television. This effect is further enhanced by Gob Squad’s use of everyday language in mostly unscripted conversations, their simple camera work and restrained editing. Super Night Shot uses videos recorded immediately prior to the performance in order to document the performers’ interaction with the ‘real’ world outside the performance venue. Productions like Prater-Saga 3 and Revolution Now!, however, work with actual live video relays in order to augment their effects of realism by connecting the stage space with the world outside the performance venue in real-time. As in Super Night Shot, the spectators in the auditorium again recognise the real spaces outside the venue because they are part of their own realm of experience. As these productions show, mediatisation serves to blur fiction and reality in Gob Squad’s productions. It projects the fictional world into reality and vice versa and blurs the spaces occupied by characters, actors, spectators and the public. As opposed to Station House Opera’s approach, the general public outside the performance spaces therefore frequently forms a part of the equation in Gob Squad’s productions. On the one hand, the cameras thus permit an inclusion of ‘reality’ within the productions. They allow the performers to leave the stage in order to engage in improvised interaction with the spectators in the auditorium or passers-by in the streets. Moreover, they include these ‘real’ people in the fiction by projecting them onto the screens and monitors on stage. As a consequence, the fictional world is no longer perceived as being self-contained. In the case of live video relay, this interaction not only occupies real spaces but also occurs in real-time. On the other hand, the performers’ intrusion into the ‘real’ world automatically makes reality appear as framed. It superimposes a layer of fictionality not only on the ‘real’ spaces and situations, but also on the ‘real’ people (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 70, 83) who suddenly become co-stars in Gob Squad’s fictions. The spectators and passers-by are not only drawn into the theatrical fiction on stage. They repeatedly appear on videos or, as in King Kong Club, even act parts in a film remake that is produced exclusively with lay actors. Simon Will’s description of Gob Squad’s work as an “intervention into reality” (qtd. in Diez, n. pag.) seems adequate when considering not only their inclusion of off-stage reality via the use of video footage but also their choice of per-

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formance venues. Most of their productions leave conventional venues behind in order to make use of a wide scope of locations. Among the productions that are taken out into the streets of the host cities are The Great Outdoors (2001– 2002), Super Night Shot (2003; still ongoing), Who Are You Wearing? (2004– 2009), Prater-Saga 3 (2004 – 2010), Saving the World (2008 – 2011), Live Long and Prosper (2009) and Revolution Now! (2010; still ongoing). Other unconventional performance venues include a disused house in House (1994– 1995), an office in Work (1995), a furniture shop in An Effortless Transaction (1996), an underground station in 15 Minutes to Comply (1997), a car park in Calling Laika (1998), a minibus in Where Do You Want To Go To Die? (2000 – 2011) and a hotel in Room Service (2003 – 2010).¹⁰³ What unites all of these productions is the effort to connect fictional and real spaces and superimpose them onto each other. This questions simple binary oppositions of fiction and reality and encourages reflection on the conception of realism in theatrical performances. In several of these productions, this strategy is supported by using mediatisation as an effective means of blurring fictional and real spaces.

Station House Opera and Forkbeard Fantasy: immediacy versus hypermediacy The perceived realism of live and mediatised action is not only influenced by their mutual relation and their connection to off-stage reality. It is also affected by their degrees of immediacy or hypermediacy (see chapter 3.2) that hide or highlight their mediality and materiality. The impression of the equal factuality of stage and screen in Station House Opera’s productions Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998; still ongoing) and Mare’s Nest (2001– 2004), for instance, is achieved by diverting attention from the materiality of the screens. The video doubles are mostly life-size and thus indiscernible from the live personae with regard to their stature. Hence, whenever the live performers are synchronous with their video doubles or seem to interact directly with them, the mediality and materiality of the screens are almost forgotten and the mediatised action seems as immediate as what is happening on stage. In Mare’s Nest, moreover, it is the presentation of the videoed room and the deceptive transparency it bestows on the screen that primarily adds to the realism of the mediatised world. The impression that this is an actual three-dimen-

 Since all of these productions are transferable to similar sites rather than being exclusively dependent on specific sites, they can be classified as “site-generic” rather than “site-specific” or “site-exclusive” theatre (Wilkie 149 f.).

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sional room that the personae can occupy and pass through is enhanced by the fact that the front door for the videoed room is layered onto the real door in the screen. A mediatised back door apparently leads directly out of the room to the other playing space that is hidden on the reverse side of the screen. As a consequence, the personae seem to traverse the videoed room when actually passing only through the door to the other playing space. Moreover, the screen apparently forms a large front window for the videoed room, through which another window at the back of the room seems to be visible. The spectators therefore have the impression of not only looking into the room through its front window, but also looking out of its back window where they believe to see glimpses of the action occurring behind the screen. At one point, for instance, the back window apparently reveals the two female doubles as they dance for the audience behind the screen (cf. 00:54:03). Later on, the two male doubles seem to carry the female corpse, which is covered under a cloth, out of the videoed room through the back door where they can again be observed through the back window as they disappear (cf. 01:00:45). Obviously, what the spectators see through the mediatised back window of the videoed room is not really the live action in the playing space on the reverse side of the screen. It is pre-recorded action that is as mediatised and two-dimensional as the videoed room itself. The transparency of the windows works both ways so that the doubles themselves can presumably also observe the live action through these mediatised windows (cf. 00:01:35; 01:03:50). This configuration renders the screen transparent by presenting it as a window into the room, and out of the room onto the playing space hidden behind the screen. Occasionally, however, the spectators are deliberately reminded of the illusionary quality of the videoed room in Mare’s Nest. The most striking example of this occurs when, in a fight, a female double is apparently pushed against the front window of the mediatised room. Her face is seen pressed against the screen as she slides to the floor in slow motion (cf. 00:41:15; video stream 2: 00:41:51). Even though the window remains transparent in this scene, it provides a physical and impenetrable barrier for the mediatised double and painfully obstructs her way out into the world on stage and beyond (see fig. 13). In another scene, the mediatised back door and the actual door that is inserted into the screen are apparently locked (cf. 00:19:41). Consequently, a smooth transition between stage and screen is no longer possible, and the screen is once more perceived as a barrier between these two worlds. Both Roadmetal, Sweetbread and Mare’s Nest also use other ways of momentarily accentuating the distinct mediality of the video sequences before again fusing liveness and mediatisation. Actually, whenever the actions on

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Figure 13: When the mediatised woman is suddenly pushed against the window, the screen is rendered hypermediate in Station House Opera’s Mare’s Nest (image used with permission of Station House Opera)

stage and screens no longer correspond to each other but reveal discrepancies, their contrast is stressed and the immediacy of the videos is undermined. Other means of creating hypermediacy are of a more technical nature. Closeups (e. g. Mare’s Nest 00:22:24; 00:23:25; Roadmetal, Sweetbread 00:51:57) and medium long shots (e. g. Mare’s Nest 00:19:47), for instance, repeatedly indicate the selective focus and interference of the camera. Though these are no actual close-ups of simultaneous live action on the stage but are in fact pre-recorded sequences, they highlight the fact that a camera can zoom in on important aspects and can thus influence the spectators’ attention. This contrasts with the constant distance between spectators and stage provided by the live action. Dissolves are further strategies of exposing the mediatisation of the videos by highlighting the technical features of the medium. They are used when one of the female doubles in Mare’s Nest slowly disappears from view (cf. 01:09:59), or when the medium long shot of the other female double gets increasingly blurred to illustrate her impaired vision after having drunk cleaning agent (cf. video stream 2: 00:48:28). Moreover, the time passing by while one of the female personae sits

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waiting at a table is indicated by a cross-fade of her waiting double on the screen (cf. video stream 2: 00:31:56). That a lot of technology is involved in the smooth running of the performance is further illustrated by a scene in Mare’s Nest in which one of the male doubles is followed off-stage as he apparently takes over the technician’s studio and tampers with the monitoring desk. This seems directly to result in flickering lights and loud music on the stage (cf. 00:27:08). The alternation between transparency of the screens and a deliberate focus on their materiality becomes most obvious when the live personae and their doubles in Roadmetal, Sweetbread repeatedly disappear and reappear from behind an actual, as well as a mediatised wooden board. These boards are of exactly identical size and are sometimes layered onto each other, sometimes placed next to each other, so that it becomes increasingly intricate to tell apart real and mediatised wooden boards, as well as real and mediatised personae. The sequence begins as the female persona carries the wooden board, which completely covers her body, onto the platform and places it right in front of the screen. The close-up of a broken neon tube, which is visible on the screen at that moment, is thus also projected onto the wooden board that now covers part of the screen. This underlines the nature of the close-up as a mere projection (cf. 00:10:48). As the sequence continues, the female persona repeatedly repositions the wooden board so that she alternately emerges from behind the board and is covered by it again. Whenever she is hidden, however, her mediatised double becomes visible instead, only to slide behind a mediatised wooden board, which is projected exactly onto the real one, the moment the live persona reappears again from behind it. During this fast play with appearance and disappearance, it becomes increasingly difficult to keep track of which is the live persona and which her double. Their interaction blurs stage and screen and makes the spectators forget the mediatisation of the video. This effect is increased by the ensuing struggle, during which the woman and her double apparently try to drag the board into different directions (cf. 00:12:03). When the live and the mediatised woman eventually carry the wooden board away, liveness and mediatisation are dissociated again. At this moment, the unrestricted movement of the live persona who carries the board all across the stage contrasts with her double’s range of motion that is confined to the screen and limited by its frame (cf. 00:12:18). Although the mediality of the videos and the materiality of the screens are emphasised for brief moments, this does not automatically render the videos less real than the action on stage. In Mare’s Nest, for instance, the reminders of the materiality of the screen and its door even serve to enhance the feigned materiality of the mediatised window and doors. The videoed room thus paradoxically seems even more real. The distinct mediality of the videos merely sug-

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gests a parallel existence or an equally valid alternative to the action represented on stage. Shifts from an overall transparency that fuses the screens with the stage, to moments where their materiality and distinct mediality are deliberately highlighted, illustrate and confirm Bolter and Grusin’s notions of immediacy and hypermediacy. As I pointed out in chapter 3.2, Bolter and Grusin argue that immediacy and hypermediacy are not a question of the medium. They depend on the use of a medium in specific contexts and on how it compares to other media. Immediacy and hypermediacy, in other words, are relative terms rather than inherent features of media. It follows that any medium can be rendered more transparent or more opaque depending on whether its specific mediality is unobtrusively employed or openly acknowledged. The alternation between immediacy and hypermediacy as observed in Station House Opera’s productions illustrates the versatility of the involved media. It also encourages metamedial reflection on the relationship between liveness and mediatisation and fosters a metafictional awareness of the relativity of realism. A deceptive illusion of realism may instead be promoted by the constant use of medium-specific sign systems or technology in a way that is as unobtrusive and transparent as possible, rather than drawing attention to the medium itself or exposing the conventions of its medium-specific construction of reality. When an impression of realism is achieved in film and video, it is based on an illusion of immediacy that makes the viewers forget about the involved technology by means of technology itself. Paradoxically, the alleged realism is thus nothing but an effect of an unobtrusive use of technology and mediatisation. As Walter Benjamin already observed in “The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproduction,” film creates an “equipment-free aspect of reality […] precisely on the basis of the most intensive interpenetration of reality with equipment” (70; emphasis in the original). Station House Opera’s productions only exhibit brief moments of hypermediacy to remind the spectators that the predominant illusion of immediacy is only artificially upheld as an effect of technology. Forkbeard Fantasy’s production The Fall of the House of Usherettes (1996; 2005; still ongoing), however, heavily relies on hypermediacy on its live as well as its mediatised level. On the level of live action, the production draws attention to the materiality and mechanics of the stage. All scene changes are executed by the performers themselves, and the mise-en-scène is deliberately surreal, cleverly combining clumsiness and ingenuity. Due to Roderick’s intake of pills and opium, for in-

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stance, he feels so “rubbery” (00:36:30) that his entire bedroom is made of wobbling rubber. His bed is placed vertically against the wall to illustrate that the pills are literally “driving [him] completely up the wall” (00:58:17). Briefly later, von Earlobe sleeps in the “most gigantic four-poster bed” (00:50:10) when spending the night in the ‘developing tank.’ The bed is only hinted at by a square contraption around von Earlobe’s head that looks like a miniature bed and makes his giant head combined with tiny puppet arms look truly nightmarish. With the rest of his body and the stage disappearing in darkness, the tiny bed strangely appears as if being rocked on a dark “sea of liquid film” (00:50:20). Nonetheless, the scene clearly shows how the illusion is constructed, which renders it hypermediate. The mediatised action, on the other hand, is also presented in a deliberately hypermediate way. This is achieved, first of all, by means of the sheer number of projectors and projection surfaces. These projectors are manually operated by the performers themselves and are not only visibly placed in front of the stage and on the revolving stage, but also provide an audible background noise (cf. Stickland, n. pag.). Although the projectors are so clearly noticeable, the projection surfaces attract far more attention due to their mostly unconventional materiality. The main projection screen raised on the revolving stage is the least conspicuous of all projection surfaces used in the production. Nevertheless, its materiality is brought into focus when von Earlobe is seen running on the spot while crudely drawn cartoon images of doors and corridors drift past on the screen behind him to make it seem as if he was running along animated corridors (cf. 00:28:57). Eventually, he falls to the floor after having allegedly crashed into a filmed wall that suddenly appears at the end of the cartoon corridor (cf. 00:29:47). The materiality of the screen is also stressed when the mediatised von Earlobe repeatedly hits his head against the “protective screen” when being caught in the crypt (01:05:22) or when trying to escape from Deirdre’s loop (cf. 01:08:17). In these instances, the perception of the screen as a transparent window that gives way to another reality is replaced by its presentation as a physical barrier. Occasionally, its use as a prop that forms part of the setting is also underlined. This happens when the screen is repeatedly veiled and unveiled by a curtain (e. g. 00:23:14; 00:31:41; 01:01:54), or when von Earlobe and Roderick rotate the revolving stage and with it the main projection screen in order to catch the filmed Deirdre in a “tracking shot” (01:01:55). Yet, in comparison to the main screen, the materiality of the other projection surfaces is much more evident. Before the introductory film sequence shows von Earlobe’s arrival at the Empire Picture Palace, the cloth on which this sequence is projected is raised inch by inch by the three sisters who pump up the inflat-

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able frame that holds up the cloth (cf. 00:03:06; Giesekam 2007: 181). Since its surface is not altogether smooth, wrinkles in the cloth remain visible so that the projection is not completely transparent. The materiality of the cloth is highlighted even more clearly when von Earlobe gets caught in it and thus tears down the entire projection surface while trying to enter the mediatised Empire Picture Palace (cf. 00:07:05). In a later scene, von Earlobe allegedly escapes from the loop he is caught in by actually breaking through a paper screen and tearing it apart (cf. 01:22:14). Once more, the destruction of the projection surface terminates the projection. On the tripartite screen right next to the paper screen, an animated film shows Nancy who accidentally dried up in the drying room and is now soaking in “wetting agent” to regain her former stature (01:15:30). Her animated body grows in size along a scale drawn onto the paper screen and goes through different shapes in a rapid succession of cartoon images. Meanwhile, she is divided into non-matching body parts by means of three incompatible projections shown on the three parts of the screen. This division of the screen into smaller segments and the scale drawn onto its surface again underline its materiality. The projection of the animated history of ‘liquid film’ onto an opened umbrella held by Nancy, however, is even more unusual than the preceding examples. Yet, it is ironically suitable as a protection against the supposed fluidity of ‘liquid film’ (cf. 00:12:10). The originality of this projection surface is only equalled by the weather balloon that is pumped up by Lucy and used for a projection of Roderick’s face in increasingly large close-ups (cf. 01:18:15; Giesekam 2007: 182; see fig. 14). As if this unusual projection surface was not enough in itself, further attention is drawn to its materiality. Lucy punches it with her fists and makes it bounce slightly (cf. 01:18:49), the monster finally makes it burst (cf. 01:24:43), and von Earlobe tries in vain to blow its remnants up again (cf. 01:25:24). Several film sequences are not even projected onto anything resembling a proper projection surface at all. This significantly reduces their image quality due to the interfering background. During the projection of the film loop of a bank manager onto Roderick’s bedroom door, for instance, the background still shines through the film (cf. 00:43:22). Here, the materiality of the door, that remains visible beyond the film projection, creates the impression that the liquid film loop really is a mere vapour and thus seems to illustrate its immateriality by contrast. In a similar way, the cartoon of personified Time on a galloping horse is projected onto the rotating revolving stage that still remains faintly visible. This effect makes it seem as if Time was too fast or abstract to leave an actual trace that could fade out the revolving stage in the background (cf. 01:11:55).

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Figure 14: Roderick’s face is projected onto an inflated weather balloon in a close-up in Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes (image used with permission of Forkbeard Fantasy)

Such experiments with unconventional projection surfaces bring into focus the (im‐)materiality of film. Its mediality, however, is illustrated by the obtrusive play with film techniques and film genres. The animated film that tells the history of ‘liquid film,’ for instance, uses written text that highlights the importance of specific statements and is reminiscent of the use of subtitles in silent film (e. g. 00:12:20; 00:15:45). The ensuing impression of clumsiness is further enhanced by the overly dramatic music and the suspenseful live running commentary. In a more professional way, the opening film that shows von Earlobe’s discovery of the Empire Picture Palace combines model shots with actual location shooting (cf. 00:04:45; Giesekam 2007: 184). Moreover, many of the projections are shown in black-and-white film (e. g. 00:04:45) or alternate between monochrome and colour film (e. g. 00:23:14). This creates a more historical, dismal or terrifying atmosphere or simply illustrates the colour range provided by the filmic medium. In keeping with the conventions of horror films, the intensity of certain moments is enhanced by close-ups (e. g. 00:24:17; 00:26:01), and suspense is in-

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creased by means of an unsteady camera (e. g. 00:04:46), flickering and colourdrained images (e. g. 00:24:28) or tilted shots (e. g. 00:26:01). Hypermediacy is also achieved by an indirect evocation and imitation of film techniques via ‘implicit’ intermedial references to film. The live action on stage evokes film when von Earlobe moves backwards across the stage as if rewound, fights against the monster in ever repeating moves and eventually pursues Deirdre and the master bottle as if in slow motion (cf. 01:24:16). Just like the film sequences themselves, the live action is moreover frequently accompanied by film scores. Despite the impressive interaction between stage and screen in The Fall of the House of Usherettes, neither of them aims at an illusion of realism. Their respective hypermediacy further questions the possibility of a perfect conflation of liveness and mediatisation. The reminders of the materiality and mediality of the screens can also be seen as ironic and metamedial commentaries on the characters’ fascination with ‘liquid film’ as a medium that is supposed to facilitate a perfect fusion of liveness and mediatisation due to its immateriality. The predominant hypermediacy therefore identifies the promise of ‘liquid film’ as an impossible illusion and parodies the wish of creating perfectly realistic films. Just like The Fall of the House of Usherettes, many other Forkbeard Fantasy productions draw attention to the materiality of their screens in order to achieve effects of hypermediacy. A similarly complex and multifaceted combination of live and mediatised action occurs in Frankenstein (2001– 2002). The production complements its use of film and digital projection with intermedial references. They result from a thematic exploration of the filmic medium in a plot that centres on Frankenstein expert Scrivener who is suddenly caught in the past of Mary Shelley’s novel where he is mistaken for Frankenstein. His endeavours to create a Frankenstein film adaptation are paralleled by his experiments in creating a mate for the monster. The dissection and recombination of body parts thus serve as meta-commentaries on the processes of cutting and editing film (cf. Giesekam 2003, n. pag.; 2007: 196). This idea is further explored by the “cyborgian merging” of live action and film (Giesekam 2003, n. pag.). Scrivener’s body is temporarily fragmented into a live and a mediatised half, or into two mediatised halves projected onto two separate blinds (cf. Giesekam 2003, n. pag.; 2007: 194). Yet, the suggestion becomes most obvious when filmed, animated, painted etc. body parts are combined on the two blinds (cf. Giesekam 2003, n. pag.; 2007: 196). Once more, the production not only explores diverse film genres. It again also makes use of a variety of unusual projection surfaces such as a front cloth, the two blinds, a mirror and a plate (cf. Giesekam 2003, n.pag.; 2007: 193, 196). As a consequence, the materiality of film is deliberately exposed, and the

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technology involved in the production is openly acknowledged (cf. Giesekam 2003, n. pag; 2007: 193). Forkbeard Fantasy’s Shooting Shakespeare (2004) presents the competition of theatre and film during “the pioneering days of Early Cinema” in a thriller about turning William Shakespeare’s The Tempest into a silent film (Forkbeard, “Shooting,” n. pag.). Once more, it features film as an intermedial reference on the thematic level. Yet, it also provides media combination by using analogue and digital film and facilitates transitions between stage and screen. While a digital projection covers the back wall of the stage, three mountain-shaped islands are moved around the stage. These islands are used for diverse projections, including animated film and film of the islands that is superimposed on the material islands themselves¹⁰⁴ which still remain visible through the projections. The involved technology is again highlighted by elements such as the use of a “pedal-powered cine projector” (Forkbeard, “Shooting,” n. pag.). Prospero moreover appears as a violinist whose face is projected onto a small screen that exactly covers his actual face (cf. Forkbeard 2005: 00:09:30). Additionally, “animated splashes of coloured paint” gradually transform into Prospero’s island on the back screen (Wolfson, n. pag.). Hypermediacy also plays an important role in Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Colour of Nonsense (2010 – 2011).¹⁰⁵ The production not only uses digital as well as 16mm film, but also employs overhead projectors on which a bacterium and a fly are shown as if under a microscope (cf. 00:29:28; 01:02:17). The entire plot, a satire on the art world,¹⁰⁶ is retold and occasionally anticipated by the projection of an animated ‘graphic novel’ that appears to be drawn by a character called Line in real-time and is accompanied by his live running commentary. More conspicuous are the projection of the lower half of Splash’s body as an animated cartoon on a screen he holds in front of his legs (cf. 00:17:58; see fig. 15) or Line’s sudden transformations into a filmed character who is seen climbing and falling down cartoon steps (cf. 00:45:57; 01:14:04). The use of a screen that is manually pulled up and down in order to simulate a lift (cf. 00:13:09; 00:29:50; 00:32:45), or Line’s and Scuro’s huge glasses onto which their eyes are projected (cf. 00:26:05) are equally striking uses of mediatisation. Such effects once more emphasise the materiality of the projection surfaces and create hypermediacy.

 Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/useoffilm6.php.  References to The Colour of Nonsense are based on the DVD recording of the performance at Northcott Theatre, Exeter, in March 2010 (Forkbeard 2010). Time codes are measured with Windows Media Player.  Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/colourofnonsense.php.

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Figure 15: The lower half of Splash’s body is turned into an animated cartoon in Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Colour of Nonsense (photograph © Maisie Hill, used with permission of the photographer and Forkbeard Fantasy)

As these examples illustrate, Forkbeard Fantasy’s productions highlight the materiality and mediality of stage and screens and expose the mechanics of projections and film techniques. The resulting hypermediacy figures as an alienating effect that prevents perfect illusion on stage and screens and thus deconstructs both theatrical and filmic realism.

Forkbeard Fantasy, Tim Etchells and Gob Squad: metamediality and metafictionality The spectators of Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes (1996; 2005; still ongoing) are constantly kept aware of being confronted with a fictional plot. This is not only achieved via the primarily hypermediate use of stage and screens that clearly identifies the events as being mediated by means of live and mediatised performance. What is more, the overtly theatrical and self-conscious acting style further undermines the spectators’ suspension of disbelief. The eccentric costumes do not hide the fact that the five male and female characters are all impersonated by the three male performers, and the characters frequently draw attention to the artificiality of the dialogues by conversing in rhymes (e. g. 00:20:39; 00:21:00). The theatricality is further stressed by the

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performers’ use of static poses and exaggerated or dance-like movements (e. g. 00:31:52; 00:52:18; 01:24:22), the eerie flashing of torch-lights across their faces (cf. 00:01:40; 01:10:57) and the sudden amplification of their voices (cf. 00:45:02). In addition to these effects, von Earlobe’s intermittent past tense commentaries on the ongoing action (e. g. 00:04:50; 00:08:54; 00:18:22; 00:42:18) imply that he already experienced the action at some point in the past. They self-reflexively underline the fact that this action is now represented again for the sake of an audience whom he supplies with explanations and background information. Since von Earlobe himself provides the retrospective commentary, it is to be expected that he will survive the collapse of the Empire Picture Palace to be able to deliver its story to posterity. The narrative instance thus frames the fiction and pushes it at a further remove from the audience, while also decreasing the suspense by looking back from a detached position located in the present. This distancing effect becomes most apparent when von Earlobe comments on Roderick who is letting him in on his plans of how to escape from the endless film loops. Though Roderick is clearly agitated and wildly gesticulating, his voice is drowned in von Earlobe’s remarks that seem like a voice-over to Roderick’s continued acting as if in silent mode. As von Earlobe comments on Roderick: He seemed a man possessed, his eyes were wild and staring, his hair stood on end. And as I stood there rudely recording these observations into the thin air, ignoring every single word he spoke, it seemed to me that by his urgent gesticulations and by the entreaty in his eyes, that he was trying to tell me something of the utmost importance. I decided to listen to him for a little while. (00:40:26; cf. Britton, n. pag.)

Yet, von Earlobe’s later remark “in a sense I really, really pitied him, he was so terribly, terribly naïve” (00:47:57; cf. Britton, n. pag.) is directly overheard by Roderick whose “I beg your pardon?!” (00:48:07) cuts him short. This ironically questions von Earlobe’s arrogance with which he looks down on the other characters and believes himself to be superior to them as a survivor of the action. Nevertheless, his past tense monologues momentarily destroy any illusion of him actually being ‘in the moment.’ The theatrical acting style and von Earlobe’s past tense commentaries are complemented by references to literary works. As suggested already by the title and the gothic setting, the production parodies Edgar Allan Poe’s short story “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839). It does not follow Poe’s plot closely enough to qualify as an adaptation and hence intermedial transposition from the literary source text into a performance. Instead, it figures as an example of intermedial reference both to Poe’s story and to gothic tales and the literary and film-

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ic horror genre in general. Within the category of intermedial references, it can thus further be classified as both ‘individual reference’ and ‘system reference.’¹⁰⁷ In addition to the allusions to Poe’s story, William Shakespeare’s Macbeth is evoked by the three witch-like sisters who repeatedly parody the opening scene of Shakespeare’s tragedy with their chorus: When shall we three meet again? In thunder, lightning or in rain? When the Hurlyburly’s done, when the bottle’s [sic] lost and won. Fair is foul and foul is fair, let’s hoover [sic] through the fogged and filmy air. (00:04:10; 00:22:44; 00:55:00; cf. Britton, n. pag.)

More importantly, since the plot centres on the invention of ‘liquid film,’ the medium of film is explicitly discussed by the characters who also use film terminology in their dialogues. These ‘explicit references’ are most obvious in the animated history of ‘liquid film’ that elaborates on the differences between ‘liquid’ and ‘ordinary’ film (cf. 00:15:45). In addition to this, photographic processing is alluded to in references to the “developing tank” where von Earlobe has to spend a night (e. g. 00:42:42), or the “drying room” in which Nancy is supposedly locked (e. g. 01:11:00). It is also implied by von Earlobe’s puns on being “well enough developed” (00:48:33) or getting more “exposure” (00:48:37). Whereas these explicit intermedial references constitute ‘system references’ that evoke film and photopraphy in general, other explicit references provide ‘individual references.’ They more specifically allude to actual films or use famous film scores (cf. Stickland, n. pag.). When having entered the Empire Picture Palace, for instance, von Earlobe discovers “an original mirror by Tarkovsky” (00:09:16) which hints at the Russian director’s 1975 film The Mirror. Among references to non-existent films, Nancy’s film quiz (cf. 00:10:29) moreover includes questions concerning actual films such as Jean Epstein and Luis Buñuel’s 1928 film adaptation of The Fall of the House of Usher (cf. 00:11:13). Additionally, when recounting his nightmares, von Earlobe mentions films and short films such as The Bounty, 20000 Leagues Under the Sea or Ole Man River, to name but a few examples (cf. 00:50:26). Another list of film titles and characters is provided when the three sisters enumerate Roderick’s doctors Doctor Who, Dr. No, Dr. Caligary, Dr. Mabuse, Dr. Strangelove and Dr. Dolittle (cf. 01:08:53). Some of the ‘individual references’ only implicitly evoke early and contemporary experiments with film. The animated film that shows personified Time galloping on his horse, for example, takes up Edweard Muybridge’s experiments with animal locomotion such as “Animals in Motion” (1887) (cf. Britton, n. pag.).  See chapter 1.2 for terminology relating to intermediality.

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The projection of Roderick’s head onto a weather balloon is reminiscent of George Méliès’s silent film The Man with the Rubber Head (1902).¹⁰⁸ A further example is the brief appearance of a child with a tricycle in the filmed corridors of the Empire Picture Palace. It refers to Stanley Kubrick’s Stephen King adaptation Shining (1980), a classic horror film that repeatedly shows the boy Danny cruising the hotel corridors on his tricycle. As I mentioned before, the intermedial references to film often acquire a selfreflexive quality and go so far as to suggest that the characters’ reality, i. e. the entire performance, is a film in which its characters are trapped. By extension, they pose the question of whether even the spectators’ reality may only be part of a film. This idea is already alluded to in the opening film when von Earlobe compares his arrival at the Empire Picture Palace to a succession of film frames and unwittingly comments on the making of the film sequence he finds himself in: I lurched from frame to frame as on a half-developed emulsion of some film. I felt as though I was superimposed upon a model landscape as each cut increased my sense of mounting tension and heightened the effect of mystery until I came against its bleak and glassy frontage. (00:06:15; cf. Britton, n. pag.)

At this point, von Earlobe merely uses film as a comparison to his experience, without being aware of the fact that his entire existence is contained within a film. The other characters, however, are aware of their filmed nature from the beginning. They are initially seen as they pour the bottle of ‘liquid film’ for the performance (cf. 00:01:55) and pump up the screen on which von Earlobe makes his first appearance (cf. 00:03:05). This makes the entire performance seem like a ‘liquid film’ provided by the usherettes. Roderick more explicitly explains to von Earlobe that “the film that we’re in at the moment [is] The Fall of the House of Usherettes” (01:00:47). He plans to “edit out all the bits with you and me in them” (01:00:57) in order to escape into a “really positive and truly uplifting movie with lots of romantic interest and a truly heroic finale” (01:01:07). This suggests that for the characters there is no chance of completely leaving their filmed existence behind and that their only option is therefore to choose a better film to exist in. When von Earlobe eventually gains insight into his filmed existence, he criticises his lack of liveness by expressing his resentment against an existence that offers not “much of a life” (01:23:05). His announcement that he no longer wants to be in a “second-rate horror B-movie like this” (01:23:12) by extension also iron Cf. http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/new_ffs_use_of_film9.html.

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ically criticises the quality of the performance. The negative evaluation of his existence in ‘liquid film’ contradicts the promises made by the earlier animated history of ‘liquid film,’ which claimed it to be closer to life. Whereas ‘ordinary’ film could only give “the illusion of life,” it argued that ‘liquid’ film “is alive” and constitutes “a living liquid immortality” (00:16:02). As the production illustrates, however, any film or performance must end and can only be considered eternal in the sense that each ending precedes the possible beginning of a renewed projection or staging. Though the three sisters are content with this kind of immortality based on repetition, it proves to be distressing and far from desirable for Roderick and von Earlobe. The characters’ existence wears on inexorably until it draws to a close, only to be repeated again for another audience. Meta-references to the remaining duration of the performance abound in the production. Lucy announces in panic that “the end draws near” when Nancy has gone missing (01:11:44) and adds that “the credits are amassing in huge storm clouds upon the horizon” (01:12:32). The giant statues upholding the Empire Picture Palace, in turn, sigh in relief that “the fall is near […] it’s nearly over” (01:12:46). Eventually, “The End” is projected onto the main screen (01:28:47). As von Earlobe gradually gains insight into his filmed existence, his simple maxim that “what’s real is real” (00:44:46) is upset bit by bit. What remains in the end is only the question of whether there is any ‘real’ existence outside of film at all. For the audience, the experience is less unsettling since liveness and mediatisation can still be told apart. Yet, the production illustrates the ease of transitions from the one to the other. While the live action itself is highly theatrical and exposes the nature of the performance as a performance, the film sequences are no mere insertions into this live action but interact with it. Film therefore seems to be completely on a par with the live performance in a way that makes neither of the media dominant. This impression is enhanced by the implicit and explicit, individual and system references that make the medium of film pervade the entire production and render it impossible to disentangle it from the live action. The plot even suggests that the film sequences are not contained within a live action. To the contrary, the live action and characters are meant to be contained within an all-encompassing film and thus are not live at all. Though the overall playful tone of the production is too light to raise serious existential questions in the spectators, the idea that their reality may be less real than assumed is at least ironically addressed. The transitions between stage and screens suggest that liveness and mediatisation complement each other and are not to be thought of as distinct realities that form a binary opposition.

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As in Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes, the illusion of realism in Tim Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting (2001; still ongoing) is undermined by the deliberate hypermediacy of the videos. Most of them do not directly relate to the live narration of stories and expose their own mediality by conveying an impression of amateurism and poor quality. Moreover, they repeatedly employ jump cuts (e. g. 121/ 00:41:56; 01:12:41), freeze frames (e. g. 00:24:13), repetitions and loops (e. g. 00:11:40; 120/ 00:34:24; 01:13:16; 01:18:49), slow motion (e. g. 00:11:40; 00:17:17; 01:13:16; 01:19:20), rewinding and fast-forwarding (e. g. 00:23:09; 121/ 00:43:22) and occasionally include animated cartoons (e. g. 120/ 00:34:24; 123/ 00:53:16; 128/ 01:18:49). Explicit metafictional commentaries on reality, fiction and story-telling additionally subvert the illusion of realism in Instructions for Forgetting. That Etchells classifies the production as an “at times semifictional documentary performance work” (Etchells 2006: 109) already suggests that it plays with the boundary between fact and fiction. Etchells as performer repeatedly insists on the factuality of the mostly mundane and unspectacular stories about “things that are true” or “things that have happened in the world” (e. g. 114/ 00:00:22; 116/ 00:11:20; 118/ 00:23:15; 130/ 01:31:18). He makes them appear like a collage of arbitrarily collected letters, e-mails, videos and assorted memories strung together without any underlying principle of organisation. Nevertheless, the production also owns up to its theatricality, fictionality and organisational structure when he reads out the titles of each section (cf. 116/ 00:10:59; 119/ 00:30:30; 123/ 00:53:14; 126/ 01:07:39) or announces pauses (cf. 123/ 00:52:43; 124/ 01:01:59). He thus concedes that the material is not just spontaneously presented but thoroughly structured. His meta-commentaries on the underlying rules of the production (cf. 114/ 00:04:07), and his references to the “rehearsals in Sheffield” and the process of selecting and arranging the material (129/ 01:23:14) further confirm this impression. In his introduction to Instructions for Forgetting, Etchells also elaborates on the preparatory processes of requesting, rewriting, editing and expanding the collected material (cf. Etchells 2006: 112). Throughout the performance, Etchells as presenter of the gathered stories repeatedly reflects on the nature of storytelling in general. This is most explicit in the interlude that is only included in the script and that reflects on the “ownership” of stories, the “permanence of print” and the relevance of omissions (129). To complement these meta-commentaries voiced by Etchells as the overarching storyteller, the respective storytellers of the presented material exhibit a similar self-consciousness with regard to the processes and conventions of storytelling. They thus similarly point out the fictional construction of the allegedly factual material. Many of the stories moreover revolve around themes re-

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lated to the blurring of the boundary between reality and its fictionalisation. Etchells’s own stories and videos centre on his son’s attempts to separate facts from fiction (cf. 119 ff./ 00:32:45; 122/ 00:45:48) or to cover up reality with an unsuccessful magic trick (cf. 122/ 00:48:58). Helen’s childhood story about her attempts at reviving Tinkerbell in a stage version (cf. 120 f./ 00:38:41) and about her idea of trying the same strategy with her deceased aunt (cf. 122/ 00:46:29) also addresses the difficulty of distinguishing between fiction and reality. The same applies to Tony’s musing about how his adult neighbour Suzanne loses her grip on reality and argues with her teddy bear (cf. 125 f./ 01:03:23). Graham implicitly addresses the distortion and misinterpretation of the past by offering several more or less realistic or abstruse versions of a single incident involving the Irish footballer George Best (cf. 126 ff./ 01:12:54). In one way or another, all of these contributions deal with questions of realism, representation, magic, illusion or delusion. Additionally, many of the contributors explicitly comment on their own stories and thus acknowledge their constructedness or cast doubt on their reliability. Gary’s e-mail, for instance, ends with his question “Is that story too much, Tim? Or too sad? I’m happy to try writing again” (116/ 00:15:52). Vlatka questions the reliability of her own fragmented memories of Croatia (cf. 123 f./ 00:53:19), whereas Tony asserts the ownership of his stories (cf. 126/ 01:07:11). The anonymous author of the letter that is not reproduced in the script finally assumes that Etchells might not like her story (cf. 01:30:17). All in all, these storytellers express scepticism with regard to the reliability of their stories and memories and question the possibility of adequately representing reality. By drawing attention to its use of live narration alongside the hypermediate videos, the production contrasts the modes of telling and showing (cf. Hutcheon 38 ff.) and their respective aesthetic and generic conventions. Furthermore, it encourages reflection on the role of media in the blurring of fiction and reality. The production features several explicit discussions of the effects of mediatisation on the representation of reality as when mentioning the traumatic experiences of Etchells’s son when watching Titanic (cf. 122/ 00:46:09) and James and the Giant Peach (cf. 119 ff./ 00:32:45). Their ensuing conversations revolve around the questions of “What is true? What is an illusion? Is magic real?” (122/ 00:48:41). Moreover, the fragmentation and incoherence of the stories and videos indirectly allude to the often fragmented information provided by media such as television (cf. Etchells 1996a: 111). This suggests that the televisual mode of presentation has affected the way we perceive and approach reality even in media such as theatre and live performance. The salient presence of the monitors and the technician on stage further question the role of theatre and live performance in a culture dominated by mediatisation. All in all, the production thus combines

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hypermediacy with meta-commentaries on reality, storytelling and the role of media in order to illustrate that the line between reality and fiction cannot clearly be drawn in either liveness or mediatisation. The tendency to combine a hypermediate use of screens, monitors and cameras with other metamedial or metafictional strategies can also be observed in Gob Squad’s productions. They stretch the boundaries of theatrical subgenres by combining them with diverse media formats and explore the role of mediatisation in contemporary life and entertainment. Gob Squad’s repertory accordingly not only covers well-established subgenres such as happenings as in Say It Like You Mean It (2000 – 2001), or durational performances and installations as in House (1994– 1995), Work (1995), An Effortless Transaction (1996), Welcome to Our World (built with you in mind) (2002; 2005), Are You With Us? (2010 – 2012) etc. What is more, it also includes mixtures of theatre and new media that result in unusual formats such as the “internet radio docu-soap” Are We Nearly There Yet? (1999) (Gob Squad, and Quiñones 182), the “live TV performance” or gala event Who Are You Wearing? (2004– 2009),¹⁰⁹ the theatrical casting-show Prater-Saga 3 (2004– 2010) (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 151), or the “Reality Robot Opera” My Square Lady (currently being developed).¹¹⁰ Moreover, the influence media have on everyday life and the way they shape contemporary culture often figure as more or less explicit themes of the productions. The durational performance What Are You Looking At? (1998 – 2003) and the reenactment of “the least watched video on YouTube” in Western Society (2013; still ongoing)¹¹¹ question the display of privacy in reality shows and on the internet. Star cult and glamour are parodied in the mock TV talent show Neukölln sucht den Superstar (2003) and in Who Are You Wearing? (2004– 2009), where ordinary passers-by are invited onto the red carpet for a brief celebrity gossip and tittle-tattle. Prater-Saga 3 (2004– 2010) even goes so far as to show the casting process complete with negotiations of contracts for the passers-by featuring as “found actors” (Gob Squad, and Quiñones 188). In all of these instances, Gob Squad deliberately contrast or fuse live and mediatised performance in a hypermediate style that openly acknowledges and draws attention to the level of mediatisation of their performances. Hence, their productions investigate what it means to perform ‘live’ nowadays

 Cf. http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/who-are-you-wearing.  http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/my-square-lady.  http://www.gobsquad.com/news.

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and invite reflection on the current status of liveness and mediatisation in everyday life. As Forkbeard Fantasy’s, Tim Etchells’s and Gob Squad’s productions show, hypermediacy often goes along with metamedial reflections on the employed media and metafictional commentaries on the degree of realism or the constructedness of the presented plot. The involved media are thus not only rendered visible, but their impact is also explicitly discussed. This strategy ensures that the spectators constantly remain aware of the mediality and fictionality of a performance or at least of certain aspects of it. Accordingly, they do not completely immerse and lose themselves in the illusion of the fiction. To a certain extent, the hypermediate focus on the employed media, the metamedial reflection on their effects, and the metafictional commentaries thus reduce the perceived degree of realism. This counterbalances the gain in realism that may result from a mediatised extension of the fictional world into the reality of off-stage spaces and the approximation of performers, characters and audience as observed above.

Forced Entertainment, Tim Etchells, Gob Squad and Proto-type Theater: degrees of acting In an interview with Peter Billingham, Tim Etchells voices Forced Entertainment’s interest “in playing this boundary between real and not real, between pretended and just happening, between the deliberately staged and the accidental,” which he also refers to as “edge playing” (Etchells 2007b: 167, 169). Sara Jane Bailes similarly addresses this tendency in Forced Entertainment’s work when observing that “[t]heir theatre applies relentless pressure to a number of untested dualisms, such as the perceived distinction between fictional and factual material, real and pretend behaviors (acting and non-acting), and intentional or unrehearsed performance” (Bailes 57). Specifically in the durational performances that last for up to 24 hours, the performers’ eventual exhaustion and lapses of concentration make their acting seem “less filtered” and “closer to the real person” (Malzacher, and Helmer 20). Moreover, many of their productions shift between exaggerated theatricality and moments of contemplation during which the performers observe each other act while apparently waiting for their next cue (cf. Benecke 35). Yet, this blurring of fiction and reality does not mean that Forced Entertainment’s productions deny their own fictional status. Instead, Etchells introduces “the idea of levels – a base-line of performers-as-performers and above that levels of pretences, assumptions of character or whatever” and promotes the “slip-

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ping between these layers or levels” (qtd. in Svich 34). Forced Entertainment accordingly combine realism and fictional elements in a way that does not always draw a clear distinction between the two but suggests a state somewhere in between or creates distinct layers of fictionality. Their productions play with theatrical conventions and question the very possibility of representing reality on stage. In this sense, the fictional quality is always retained and acknowledged (cf. Etchells 2007b: 169), and the performances seem to oscillate between real experience and mere acting. But rather than actually ceasing from acting momentarily, the performers merely pretend not to act or not to know how to act (cf. Etchells 2004b: 216). And instead of choosing between being themselves or enacting fictional parts, the performers “are presenting themselves as performers” (Matzke 2004: 176; emphasis in the original). In other words, they always retain a certain “transparency” of their status as performers: “Real people in real time really pretending. The pretence acknowledged at all points. Or the pretence flickering in and out of acknowledgement,” as Etchells puts it (Etchells 2004b: 212). In the way the productions engage with conventional means of producing stage realism such as costumes, props, dialogue etc., they are “theatrical in extremis” rather than rejecting theatre (Bailes 71; emphasis in the original). That the productions confound fiction and reality, acting and not-acting is thus indicative of Etchells’s “struggle with […] theatre [that] pretends not to be theatre, pretends not to have these kinds of rules or frames, but in fact still does” (Etchells 2011: 23). By constructing “stages-on-stages” (Benecke 44), contrasting acting with not-acting, and using metatheatrical commentaries, Forced Entertainment’s productions thus often stage or discuss their own struggles and failures and reflect more generally on the limitations of theatrical representation. Productions like Club of No Regrets (1993), Showtime (1996), First Night (2001), Bloody Mess (2004), Spectacular (2008), The World in Pictures (2006) and The Thrill of It All (2010) explicitly deal with the staging of a show or performance and its inevitable breakdown. Here, it becomes apparent how the notion of failure and the degree of realism interrelate. On the one hand, failure renders the strategies and conventions of stage realism visible and thus exposes the fictionality of the productions. By extension, the feigned failure also suggests a failure of theatre per se to represent reality (cf. Bailes 12, 106). On the other hand, instances of failure may create an illusion of authenticity and immediacy because they seem to offer the audience a means of looking beyond the act of performing (cf. Bailes 58), even if these failures are merely staged and therefore fictional. Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting (2001; still ongoing) also constitutes an example of ‘edge playing’ where the line between acting, self-representation or simply being oneself can no longer clearly be drawn. Etchells assumes an un-

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pretentious, low-key delivery style that makes him appear as a mere organiser and presenter of the collected material, as if there was no role for him to play at all. Etchells describes the performers’ complex position at the border of acting and not-acting in Instructions for Forgetting, but also in A Decade of Forced Entertainment (1994) and The Travels (2002), as being “more or less present as themselves, sharing time and space with those watching – telling, recounting, reading, and constructing the performance from evidence gathered elsewhere” (Etchells 2006: 109). Repeatedly, Etchells simply watches the videos together with the audience and thus qualifies more as fellow spectator than as actor. In these moments, he seems to be taking a break from the performance. He thus acquires an “undefined” status, as Etchells explains it in his analysis of productions that play with presumed gaps in acting in order to create a “real presence” (Etchells 1996a: 108). The impression of authenticity is supported by Etchells’s present tense storytelling that makes it seem as if his mind was spontaneously drifting from one story or association to another, like a stream of consciousness that is neither predetermined nor rehearsed. Together with Etchells’s revelation of his and other people’s personal stories and the mostly intimate or even confessional tone assumed by the contributions, the performance thus seems more like an exposure of facts than a fictional creation. That Etchells simply reads out the letters and e-mails from his script moreover supports his claim that these are factual contributions rather than inventions springing from his own mind. It suggests that they are not clouded by an interfering impersonation although, of course, they are. The replacement of acting with reading from notes as an attempt to suggest authenticity is a strategy that recurs in many Forced Entertainment productions, especially in the confessional production Speak Bitterness (1994). As Etchells’s production shows, whether a fictional world on stage is specifically marked as being fictional or denies its fictionality depends first and foremost on the perceivable amount of acting. Michael Kirby, theatre and performance scholar and former editor of The Drama Review, developed a scale for measuring the amount of acting. It extends from ‘non-matrixed performing’ to ‘complex acting’ with intermediate degrees and gradually increasing levels of representation, pretence, impersonation or feigning (cf. 10 f.). Whereas ‘complex acting’ refers to “a hypothetical ‘maximum’ amount of acting” (8), ‘non-matrixed performing’ designates a state where the performer does “not do anything to reinforce the information or identification […], is merely himself and is not imbedded, as it were, in matrices of pretended or represented character, situation, place and time” (4; emphasis in the original).

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As an objection to the notion of ‘non-matrixed performing,’ it has been pointed out repeatedly that a certain amount of pretence and fictionality remains even in performances that try to go beyond acting and claim to present the performers’ real identities rather than developing fictional characters. As Herbert Blau observes, it is impossible to stop acting not only in theatre but also in reality (cf. 1982– 83: 155; 1982: 242). As a consequence, even though [t]here has been a serious effort over the last generation to eliminate the as if, to return performance to unmediated experience, […] it is at best only appearance. There is nothing more illusory in performance than the illusion of the unmediated. It can be a very powerful illusion in the theater, but it is theater, and it is theater, the truth of illusion, which haunts all performance whether or not it occurs in the theater, where it is more than doubled over. (1982– 83: 143; emphases in the original)

Even where the performers pretend just to be themselves, they are wittingly or unwittingly enacting their own personalities because “theater cannot so easily give up its being theater” (Blau 1982: 291). The pretence of not acting therefore creates an additional level of acting. As a consequence, “[b]eing oneself onstage may be more artificial than being a character” (Blau 1982: 275), and one can be “no longer sure that keeping [the remnant of a mask] on is any the less true than taking it off, even if that were possible” (Blau 1982: 150). The illusion of not-acting is thus always a result of conscious or subconscious acting and hence a mere staging of authenticity. But even though it may be impossible to stop acting altogether, Kirby’s observation that there are different degrees of acting is very useful for determining degrees of realism¹¹² and understanding specific performance practices and developments. Just as Kirby detects a “shift toward the not-acting end of the scale” (11), Hans-Thies Lehmann observes that contemporary theatre relies much less on impersonation or representation of fictional characters and instead concentrates on the performers themselves, on their reality and on their relation to the spectators (cf. 2008: 22 f.). As Lehmann further argues with regard to contemporary ‘postdramatic theatre,’ the perfect illusion of authenticity and reality in terms of mimetic theatre is often no longer aimed at because it is perceived as an attempt at audience deception. Instead, a kind of truth is created by an ex-

 Although Kirby himself argues that the amount of acting is not “concerned […] with the degree of ‘reality’” (3) or the believability (cf. 11), he at one point refers to the “non-matrixed or ‘reality’ end of our acting, non-acting continuum” (12). I believe that although both extremes of the scale can be equally convincing, the proximity to the performers’ real identities in ‘nonmatrixed performing’ adds an element of reality to a performance and thus may create an additional effect of realism.

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plicit identification of theatre as theatre and an open acknowledgement of its fictionality (cf. Lehmann 2001: 186). Exposing the theatricality of theatre may thus paradoxically increase its credibility. In many of their productions, Gob Squad also try to increase the degree of realism and authenticity by playing with their real-life identities. This often goes along with a use of allegedly spontaneous and often actually unscripted language. Yet, the authenticity of the performers’ identities is simultaneously undermined by their ostentatious self-dramatisations, by their explicit discussion and constant reworking of their own acting and by the very basic mise-en-scène in terms of costumes and props. In a manner typical of Gob Squad’s productions, the performers in PraterSaga 3 (2004– 2010) address each other with their real names and thus blur their fictional parts and actual identities. At the same time, however, they explicitly identify their own status as inferior in its realism to that of the passers-by when explaining: “Tonight we’re working with real people, not people like us but real people.”¹¹³ For as part of the performance, three passers-by or “found actors”¹¹⁴ are cast as characters for René Pollesch’s play Prater-Saga. While reality is thus brought onto the stage, fiction in turn spills out into reality when unsuspecting passers-by are suddenly considered as potential actors and directly interact with the performers-as-casting-agents. The lay actors’ eventual performance takes place in an area of the stage that is sealed off from the spectators so that the lay actors are only ever present to the audience in their mediatised transmission onto the screen. Nonetheless, their lack of professionalism as actors makes them appear to be more real and authentic. When they finally enact their parts in makeshift costumes, their real identities still show through. This, of course, is also due to the fact that they have no prior knowledge of the script or its context. Instead, they are only given their lines via headphones while they are already in the respective scenes so that they have no time for slipping into their roles. Practically, they are not acting but actually experiencing the action in real-time without prior rehearsals (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 77). When lay actor Toma as Pollesch’s ‘Bigman’ appears on screen and identifies it as “[a]t last a screen which has something to do with everyday life” (00:09:03),¹¹⁵ he aptly sums up the impression that, despite its mediatisation, the screen communicates something real. And although the random    Gob

http://www.gobsquad.com/archivesubpage.php?id_project=9. http://www.gobsquad.com/archivesubpage.php?id_project=9. The quotation is transcribed from the “Gob Squad Essentials” section available on any of Squad’s DVDs.

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cast and Pollesch’s drastic lines arouse much laughter from the audience, the obvious amateurism creates its own suspense and may be more authentic than a professional performance. Yet, Prater-Saga 3 also induces hypermediacy and metamedial reflection. The inclusion of the casting of actors and their contract negotiations in the performance, for example, comments on the production processes of television and film. Moreover, though the screen serves as a window to the world outside during the live video relay from the streets, its transparency is intentionally reduced. In imitation of familiar television show formats, the screen shows a “Saga 3 TV” logo in the top left corner, while the names of the casting agents and passersby are alternately displayed across the bottom. As a consequence, the screen functions as an opaque barrier rather than a transparent window. When the eventual enactment of Pollesch’s script is transmitted onto the screen, it is accompanied by melodramatic film music and instantly edited with opening credits announcing the leading roles. Televisual conventions are further parodied when the performance is interrupted for commercial breaks promoting local shops whose assistants quote passages from Pollesch’s script (Behrendt 70) and thus additionally blend fiction and reality. All in all, realism in Prater-Saga 3 is not a question of the choice of medium, its immediacy or hypermediacy, but it depends primarily on the inclusion of ‘found actors’ into the performance. That this inclusion is permitted by the use of live video relay rather than by live co-presence on the stage is only of secondary importance to the perceived degree of realism. Gob Squad’s Kitchen (2007; still ongoing) is a remake of Andy Warhol’s Kitchen and other Warhol films. Its title, however, already asserts that it does not claim to provide a perfect imitation of the originals because Gob Squad deliberately put their mark on Warhol’s work. Realism in the sense of an authentic reenactment of the original is clearly not the aim of Gob Squad’s production. Instead, it seeks approximately to evoke the style of Warhol’s Kitchen and the general atmosphere of its era by conveying “the essence of its time” (00:02:24; cf. 01:31:24). Warhol’s Kitchen, which is no longer publicly available, was thus only consulted once the rehearsals were almost completed (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 45). Authenticity or fidelity, in the context of Gob Squad’s Kitchen, do not mean emulating the original by faithfully recreating minute details. Instead, they are to be understood as a recreation of associated stereotypes that satisfies the clichéd expectations of the audience. The spectators probably have not seen the film either and only have a general idea or cultural memory of it as the quintessence of Warhol’s Factory films. The challenge for Gob Squad is thus to re-enact a film they do not know on the mere basis of clichés (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 44).

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The recurring explicit debates on the question of authenticity only serve to draw attention to the artificiality of the reconstruction and ironically point out the deviations from the original and the inevitable gap between the historical facts, Warhol’s filmed representation and Gob Squad’s eventual re-imagination. The production thus discusses the problematic notions of reality, authenticity and truth in the context of art (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 21). As the performers-as-characters claim from the very beginning, the setting for their remake is ‘real.’ “So, here’s the kitchen. It’s a […] real kitchen” (00:03:54), Simon (Will) says before taking inventory of its furniture, and he demonstratively eats some potato chips in order to prove that “they’re real potato chips” (00:06:45). The spectators can moreover verify that the kitchen and its props not only have a mediatised but also a physical existence when they are invited behind the screens to explore the set before the performance begins. When the members of the audience who replace the performers in the remake eventually find themselves in this ‘real’ kitchen, the previously monochrome film suddenly turns into colour film, as if a veil had been lifted and a more direct view on reality was available now (cf. 01:32:17). Yet, the props in the kitchen are no authentic objects from Warhol’s period but are only more or less adequate substitutes. Sharon (Smith) and Simon (Will), for instance, explain at great length why they believe their table-cloth to be a suitable prop for a 1965 film: it is “quite sixties,” although it is “sort of looking actually quite fifties,” but “the thing about the sixties” is that “they had fifties things in them” (00:04:10). However convincing this argumentation may be, the setting is neither ‘real’ in the sense of being authentic nor ‘real’ in the sense of having a live presence for the majority of the spectators who remain at a further remove from it, distanced by the screen. In keeping with the apparent lack of acting in Warhol’s Kitchen, where the camera just seems to observe the performers being themselves, Gob Squad’s performers also create the impression of not acting or adhering to any underlying script. Warhol’s films are deliberately plot-less, only roughly scripted and without clear direction. They assign no proper parts to the performers but instead show them in construed situations or being involved in mundane activities or even inactivity such as eating and sleeping. As Warhol explained, he aimed at “catch[ing] people being themselves instead of setting up a scene and shooting it and letting people act out parts that were written” (Smith 156). In imitation of this, Gob Squad’s performers try to bring across an authentic impression of their counterparts in the original films by not assuming clearly defined parts either. In a sense, they enact their own personalities by pretending just to be themselves and again use their real names. Therefore, Simon’s explanation “[m]y name is Simon Will and tonight I’m gonna be playing the part of Simon Will in a film

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called Kitchen” is paradigmatic of the way most of the performers introduce their parts in the performance. The notion of ‘characters’ or ‘parts’ becomes more complicated once the performers begin to trade parts and replace each other. When Simon consents to take over the part of Sarah (Thom) in Sleep, she announces “this is Simon playing me, Sarah, in Sleep” (00:23:20) and later inquires “how was it, being me being Sarah?” (00:40:00). One by one, all performers are substituted by members of the audience who take over their parts. Though dispensing with proper parts, the performers repeatedly discuss whether their acting or not-acting does justice to the original films. Their meta-commentaries on how best to re-enact Warhol’s films, the reworking of scenes and the rehearsing of affectedly negligent accents (e. g. 00:17:05) all create an uncanny mixture of slipping into character, breaking character and pretending not even to act a part at all. The self-reflexive commentaries with which the performers evaluate their own performances (e. g. 00:09:24; 00:10:53; 00:11:34) repeatedly remind the spectators of the characters’ fictional status and prevent them from being drawn into the fiction. Hence, the performers’ “acting exposes itself, by its failure to re-enact non-acting” (cf. Primavesi 97). In a scene involving Simon (Will) and Sean (Patten), both performers repeatedly interrupt and criticise each other so that they have to begin the scene over and over again (cf. 00:15:41). Simon even criticises Sean’s performance for being too real and unrestrained and reacts appalled when Sean actually touches him during his pretended sexual advances (cf. 00:17:05). Too much stage realism, in other words, makes him feel ill at ease. In keeping with the original films, the performers often also directly address the audience beyond the screen and give background information (e. g. 00:00:37). Although the presumed lack of acting can be seen as a faithful imitation of Warhol’s films, it also reminds the spectators that they are observing Gob Squad’s performers rather than actual representatives of Warhol’s Factory. When the performers exchange their parts and are eventually replaced by members of the audience, they instruct their substitutes how their parts should be played (e. g. 00:12:36; 00:21:22; 00:44:53; 01:01:50). Their instructions stress the fact that these are performers or spectators who pretend to be other performers whose respective fictional parts they enact. This creates different levels of acting and fictionality instead of making the audience forget altogether about the fact that this is acting. Though this prevents the fictional characters from coming across as real, it makes the performers themselves appear to be all the more real in their inept endeavours to stage a successful performance. Realism is thus not created on the level of fictional parts but on the level of the performers’ supposedly real identities that are, of course, mere self-dramatisations. This effect is carried to extremes whenever the performers mix autobiographical details

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into the lines they give to their replacements (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 78). The spectators thus metamorphose into fictional beings who substitute the performers who tried just to be themselves while imitating the original cast who, in turn, were mostly just being themselves. In a review for The Guardian, Lyn Gardner describes this complex situation by observing that the spectators often “act better than the actors. Even more curiously, they are often better at acting the actors than the actors are at acting themselves” (Gardner 2008, n. pag.). All in all, an impression of realism is evoked in Gob Squad’s Kitchen despite its playful meta-theatricality and hypermediacy. But realism, in this context, does not mean an authentic or perfect copy of an original. Instead, it relies on the confirmation of clichés and once more on the interaction between spectators and performers. The latter seem even more real in their imperfection and insecurity about how to act. Realism in Gob Squad’s Kitchen is thus an effect of the performers’ alleged status as real people and of their replacement with spectators – irrespective of their liveness or mediatisation. Gob Squad’s description of their current production Revolution Now! (2010; still ongoing) as a “real uprising staged for the cameras”¹¹⁶ immediately raises the question of how anything can be ‘real’ and ‘staged’ at the same time. It thus already points to the complex relation between fiction and reality in this (re)enactment of a revolution. Similar to the earlier Gob Squad productions, an effect of realism is conferred on the production by the performers’ use of their real names and their pretence of just being themselves, with the exception of Bastian (Trost) who is introduced as the only “fully trained actor” (00:04:43). Moreover, the cameras again integrate ‘real’ people into the action and extend it into locations beyond the stage. One group of ‘real’ participants are the spectators. Their interaction with the live performers begins already when some of them are interviewed and filmed by the performers in the foyer before entering the auditorium. All spectators are moreover projected onto the screen on the stage and onto the monitor outside the venue, where they indirectly interact also with the passers-by and later with the performers Johanna (Freiburg) and Sharon (Smith) who have left the performance space. The passers-by constitute the other group of ‘real’ participants. They are only mediatised on the screen until a representative of ‘The People’ eventually appears on the stage. Yet, they are ‘real’ in the sense of having an existence outside the fictional world of Revolution Now! Despite the inclusion of ‘real’ people and ‘real’ locations into the performance, its potential for realism is not fully exploited but deliberately diminished.

 http://www.gobsquad.com/projects/revolution-now.

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At least initially, the performance is explicitly presented as a “rehearsal” for a revolution (00:05:23). Accordingly, its theatricality is highlighted by the evident staging and restaging of individual scenes in order to produce convincing live coverage with maximal audience appeal. The spectators’ spontaneous applause when the performers first appear on stage is thus restaged more emphatically and enthusiastically for the camera (cf. 00:03:53). Performers and spectators alike are repeatedly arranged in stereotypical poses in order to “add gravitas” (00:25:21) by representing belligerent revolutionaries, corpses etc. Such instances convey the impression that the revolution is minutely orchestrated rather than spontaneous and authentic. Moreover, the use of overtly theatrical props such as toy guns and the inappropriate costumes actually run counter to an authentic representation of reality, although they are ironically employed with a view to making the staging appear to be more real. Furthermore, the complexity of revolutionary forces is broken down into neat categories such as the establishment, the revolutionary masses and ‘The People.’ It is reduced to a simple understanding where those who do not actively support the revolution are seen as illiberal and narrow-minded (cf. Georgi 44 f.). The few passers-by, moreover, can hardly be considered as truly representative of ‘The People,’ especially once substituted only by a single spokesman on stage. As in Gob Squad’s Kitchen, the quest for authenticity is based on a secondary imitation of other representations of reality rather than going directly back to an original experience. Its representation of revolutions and revolutionaries is inspired by Sergei Eisenstein’s film Oktjabr (1927) that recreates the events of the October Revolution of 1917. The film in turn is based on photographic reenactments of the revolution that were created in order to document the historical event for posterity. In this sense, the production serves as a farcical reenactment of a reenactment of a reenactment (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 45). With the help of individual spectators, the production also brings Eugène Delacroix’s famous painting Liberty Leading the People (1830) back to life in a tableau vivant (cf. 00:22:30; see fig. 16). In addition to this, it shows revolutionary poses and gestures that allude to Che Guevara or more generally evoke and parody conventional representations of revolutionary figures propagated by sensational media coverage (cf. Rakow 2010, n. pag.). The production thus freely mixes historical facts, fictional representations, stereotypes and clichés in order to conjure up a seditious spirit among the spectators and indirectly approaches reality via its existing representations. In this sense, it offers a faithful representation not of reality itself but of its representation in the media. Since the production has recourse to diverse media representations of revolutions and playfully emphasises the discrepancies between historical events and their documentation or mediatisation, the production parodies the staging

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Figure 16: Performers and spectators re-enact Eugène Delacroix’s painting Liberty Leading the People in Gob Squad’s Revolution Now! (image used with permission of Gob Squad)

of reality for the media. It turns mediatisation itself into a topic and thus establishes a metamedial focus. The performers constantly and humorously remind the audience that the actual live experience of the event is only secondary to its medial documentation. Performers and spectators even collaborate in creating and manipulating images for the video cameras which will best bring across the artificially heated-up revolutionary spirit on the stage. Since the live videos are projected onto the bipartite screen at the back of the stage as well as onto two monitors placed on the stage, the audience can constantly check the mediatised version against the live action on the stage. All this time, the cameras, screen and monitors form the centre of attention or vie with the live action for the spectators’ attention. The performers often suggest the primacy of the mediatised version over the live experience when they themselves merely observe the screen and monitors, comment on the live video relays and discuss their impact while turning their backs on the audience. In these moments, the performers’ live presence on the stage is almost marginal because the spectators, too, no longer focus on what is happening on the stage. They concentrate instead on

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the live transmission from the street as well as on the live feed showing the performers and spectators themselves. A repeated emphasis on the materiality and mediality of the screen and monitors moreover creates an effect of hypermediacy. This results, for instance, from the juxtaposition of monochrome with colour transmission, and from onscreen captions such as an “on air” display that indicates the live transmission of events from or to the street (e. g. 00:15:20). The monitor on the pavement outside the venue is occasionally also seen on the screen on stage, which creates a frame within a frame and renders the mediatisation even more hypermediate. Similar to Station House Opera’s approach, the production all in all presents liveness and reality as mere matters of perspective. What is live for the spectators and performers indoors is merely mediatised for the passers-by and performers outdoors and vice versa. The relativity of liveness is further underlined by the division of the screen into two projection surfaces that can show the live transmission from the stage or auditorium next to the live transmission from the street. The distinct locations are thus transmitted alongside each other and share the same level of mediatisation on the screen. Moreover, the moment the passersby become involved in the performance or merely watch the transmission on the monitor placed on the pavement, they wittingly or unwittingly become participants in the performance and are in turn observed by other passers-by. Similarly, when posing to impress the passers-by, the spectators in the auditorium are themselves transformed into performers who can no longer be distinguished from the actual performers by the passers-by. The participants’ status thus shifts between that of witness, spectator and performer – depending on whose perspective is applied to them – and thus illustrates their ambiguous relation to fiction and reality. Even by venturing out into the street and interacting with real passers-by, the performance cannot transcend its own fictionality and mediatisation or free itself from established ideas of other media representations. The performers can only leave the artificial space of the stage with the help of their cameras. Moreover, they are disappointed to discover that it is “less real out [t]here than […] expected” (00:53:05). A layer of fictionality is again imposed on reality, and real communication with the intimidated or indifferent passers-by turns out to be difficult. Neither the live interaction with real spectators within the performance venue, nor the mediatised encounter with real passers-by transcends the blatant theatricality of the revolution. Only when a representative of ‘The People’ appears on stage so that passers-by, spectators and performers are finally united, reality momentarily seems to infiltrate into the performance. Compared to earlier Gob Squad productions, Revolution Now! is more critical of the potential of live performance and the media to facilitate meaningful interaction

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and to represent reality. The production focuses more on the distorting impact of mediatisation and is even sceptical of the very existence of reality itself. Gob Squad frequently blur the distinction between fictional characters and real performers because they pretend just to be themselves while being involved in contrived, fictional situations. They play with the notion of not-acting by relating to their real identities, using their real names and setting themselves real tasks (Tecklenburg, and Carter 16). At the same time, they acknowledge their selfdramatisations, try out different versions of themselves and reject or deconstruct their previous impersonations (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 51 f.). Their authenticity is further undermined by the use of inappropriate props, makeshift costumes and exaggerated poses that are often accompanied by metafictional or metamedial comments. The confusing effect created by the actors’ pretence of not-acting is perfectly captured by Herbert Blau’s description of the blurring of character and actor, role and being: Whatever we have our actors do nowadays, there is always the memory of the actor’s playing a character. Then we remember that there is somebody playing the actor playing the character, and we are caught up in that cycle of performance, or the awareness of it, where the character is really the actor playing that character […]. (Blau 1982: 285)

Moreover, Gob Squad’s language is mostly unscripted and includes repetitions, stammering and other imperfections or ungrammaticalities (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 47 f.). This further supports the impression of not-acting. Janine Hauthal illustrates how an illusion of authenticity can be evoked in theatre (and, it should be added, in other media) by using language that, though often scripted, seems to be spontaneous. Such language is often reminiscent of oral rather than written communication and is apparently directly addressed to the real audience in the ‘here’ and ‘now’ beyond the theatrical frame (cf. 108, 297).¹¹⁷ Ungrammaticalities, broken off sentences, ellipses and elisions, hesitations etc. may thus create an illusion of spontaneity and authenticity of speech that resembles real-life communication. In Gob Squad’s productions, the use of seemingly or actually spontaneous language applies to live as well as mediatised elements. The fictional action on stage and screen thus repeatedly seems to dissolve into non-fictional communication. A similar strategy can be observed in many Forced Entertainment productions where the apparently unscripted language is actually thoroughly rehearsed.

 Hauthal calls this the fiction of orality [“Mündlichkeitsfiktion”] (e. g. 264), which she illustrates primarily with reference to Martin Crimp’s drama Attempts on Her Life (1997).

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Overall, the use of lay actors has a higher potential for creating effects of realism than the performers’ pretence of not-acting. The members of the audience and of the public who assume parts in a production contribute their own personalities to the parts they take over too spontaneously to suppress their actual personalities and to cast off their own identities. Especially where the process of selecting or casting ‘real’ people for fictional roles forms part of the actual performance itself, the remaining audience can directly observe the lay actors’ oscillation between real and fictional existence. As a consequence, it may become difficult to tell participation on the level of fictional action apart from interaction among ‘real-life’ performers, spectators and passers-by on the level of non-fictional communication. The pretence of not-acting, the alternation between fictional and actual spaces, and the inclusion of ‘real’ people constantly renegotiate the status of theatre and reality. For Gob Squad, therefore, the question arises whether an unmediated, authentic reality beyond fiction actually exists (cf. Gob Squad, and Freiburg 109, 114). As Simon Will explains in an interview, the confrontation of fiction and reality in Gob Squad’s work often results in a way of looking at the world “as if it’s a piece of theatre, as if everything that you’re watching is a construct, as if everything that you see has been rehearsed somehow before” (Will, and Smith, n. pag.). In Gob Squad’s productions, it is primarily the use of mediatisation that facilitates the incorporation of real spaces and persons from beyond the stage. The overall subversion of reality in their productions, however, equally results from the moments of liveness and mediatisation. The difference between liveness and mediatisation does therefore not necessarily imply distinct degrees of realism. The extent of realism instead merely depends on whether the fictionality is openly acknowledged or glossed over, and whether the audience is unnoticeably drawn into the fiction or deliberately distanced from it. In the end, reality itself is questioned. Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) (2009 – 2010) is even more clearly at odds with the conventions of realism in theatre and performance. On the one hand, it exposes the stage for what it is and openly acknowledges the theatricality of the live action. On the other hand, it also renders the mediatised action hypermediate because the monitors and cameras are directly operated by the performers themselves. This draws attention to how the mediatised images are produced and highlights the incongruities between stage and monitors. The moveable frame with blinds and the recurring motif of windows moreover suggest that the monitors are windows to reality. Finally, the themes of role playing, lying and dreaming also investigate the relation between fiction and reality.

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As I mentioned before, the boundaries of the stage are only indicated by a square taped onto the floor, and the simple props only vaguely allude to the fictional space they represent. Hence, the stage self-reflexively points to its own nature as a stage. Moreover, the performers use a “heightened performance style” (Petralia 2010a: 161). When the ‘Woman’ makes up her story of the death of her “wicked” sister who did not exist (12/ 00:30:29) or complains about the “rags” she has to wear while being clad in a becoming bathing costume (13/ 00:33:44), her performance is exaggerated, deliberately theatrical and overly emotional. The same applies to the scene where the ‘Man’ describes having fallen in love (cf. 14/ 00:34:13). Furthermore, the performers change their costumes right on stage (e. g. 00:25:10; 00:36:21; 00:42:30; 00:55:55) and eventually take off their wigs at the end of the performance, as if finally casting off all the fictional identities they kept taking on during the performance (cf. 01:15:21). Throughout the production, the performers rearrange the props on the stage and the miniature furniture in the dolls’ house in order to create a more complete fictional world on the three monitors. Refurnishing the dolls’ house thus indicates a change of time and setting, while also contrasting the live video relay of the perfectly naturalistic miniature setting with the comparably bare stage. In order to complement the stage design in the spectators’ imagination, the production additionally uses verbal and acoustic décor in the form of an elaborate “soundscape made up of household noises” (Petralia 2010b: 108). Only the three gunshots fired at Kennedy in the end are simply rendered by ‘Man 2’ shouting “Bang” (36/ 01:15:06; cf. Petralia 2010a: 161) so that this climactic moment deliberately refrains from realistic staging. This scene also constitutes an emancipation from mediatisation because with each shot, one of the monitors is switched off (cf. 01:15:06). The realism of the miniature world on the monitors is however undermined by the visibility of the actual dolls’ house that reminds the audience that the mediatised setting merely originates from a toy world. Instead of exploiting the potential of video to expand the fictional space and include real spaces and people as in Station House Opera’s and Gob Squad’s productions, Virtuoso (working title) moreover uses video only to present a more detailed version of the fictional space represented on stage and offers no glimpses of the world beyond the characters’ home. Combined with the circularity of the plot, this enhances the claustrophobic atmosphere of the production and illustrates the characters’ sense of confinement. The outside world remains an unknown space that is full of promises but also potentially threatening. The house, by contrast, “this home, this prison, this cage that protects us” (27/ 01:00:10) simultaneously provides shelter and deprives the characters of their freedom.

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To complement the theatricality of the live action, the production also renders its mediatisation hypermediate by placing the three flat-screen monitors directly in front of the stage and letting the four cameras be operated by the performers themselves (e. g. 00:01:17; 00:19:11; 00:24:40). This draws attention to the fact that the fiction is mediated by technology. Moreover, the personae are primarily concerned with how they come across on the monitors so that they mostly play for the cameras rather than directly interacting with each other or with the audience. In their boredom, they pass their time pretending to be on television (cf. 32/ 01:11:24; Petralia 2010a: 161) and lose themselves in this game to an extent where they actually feel trapped in a television set and long for an escape (cf. 12/ 00:27:44) or for the game to end (cf. 33/ 01:12:16). Since the spectators witness how the images on the monitors are constructed out of the live components, they can observe the distorting effect of mediatisation by identifying the discrepancies in perspective or scale between the stage and the monitors. Although the mediatised images combine with the live action in order to create a more complete fiction, the distinct mediality of liveness and mediatisation is thus constantly stressed. The more obvious the contrast between the fragmented and multiplied close-ups on the monitors and the live performers and props on the stage, the more this effect becomes evident. The awareness of the technical possibilities and distortions of the cameras is most intense when the cameras draw attention to details. They sometimes zoom in so closely that they no longer render a recognisable image at all (e. g. 00:02:27; 00:40:47) or that the fragments on the monitors can only be made sense of by comparison with the live action (e. g. 00:20:29). The characters’ obsession with windows further renders the monitors hypermediate. The moveable frame with half-closed blinds merges with the actual screens of the monitors as well as with the imaginary television screen of the characters’ games. It symbolises the characters’ temptation and fear of transcending their own fiction. While the characters look through the frame representing the window, a camera films their faces and transmits them onto the monitors. As a consequence, the commentary “I can see all the way through it” (4/ 00:11:45) creates the illusion of the monitor being a transparent window through which the performers or characters watch the spectators. This impression is inverted when ‘Man 2’ approaches the camera and observes “I suppose the larger a window is, the better. I mean, it lets light in. Lets the outside in” (6/ 00:13:51). Interpreted as yet another metamedial statement, this suggests that the monitors literally provide a window for the audience to look at the characters’ world. The disturbing idea that the characters can watch the spectators through the monitors and simultaneously sense the spectators’ gaze is also implied when the ‘Man’ complains: “The windows frighten me with their glass always looking at

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me; always watching me. I’m inside the television […]. I see through the television to you” (12/ 00:27:47). In addition to the hypermediacy of the live and mediatised mise-en-scène and the recurring motif of the window, the production also explores the elusive nature of reality by exposing the characters’ metafictional awareness of role playing and introducing the notions of lying and dreaming. Throughout the production, the characters choose varying identities for themselves and assign roles to each other. Repeatedly this game with identity resorts to historical figures that are associated with John F. Kennedy’s assassination in one way or another: Kennedy and his wife Jacqueline (e. g. 28 f./ 01:02:22), the assassin Lee Harvey Oswald (e. g. 35 ff./ 01:14:21) or John Connally, the Governor of Texas, and his wife Nellie (e. g. 18/ 00:42:15). The characters’ actual identities, however, not only remain hidden from the audience but are also unknown to the characters themselves. As the performance proceeds, the ‘Woman’ and ‘Man 2’ become increasingly worried about their lack of identity and long for an escape from their games. ‘Man 2’ most explicitly articulates his loss of identity and his metatheatrical awareness of having to act when complaining: “I have to play these endless games. I want to escape […]. Who am I? I don’t know. […] How I’m forced to act. How I must! Must! Don’t want to, but must” (29/ 01:03:18). The ‘Woman’ also confesses to be “bored with the fiction of it all” (30/ 01:06:45), yet admits that just being herself “sounds dangerous” (26/ 00:59:45). In the end, the ‘Man’ is the only one who remains willing to take on whatever identity is assigned to him. He answers the question of who he wants to be with the simple question “Who do you want me to be?” (34/ 01:13:52). The other characters eventually assign Kennedy’s role to him and sacrifice him in order to escape in a “final play to end all plays” (Petralia 2010a: 161). In the epilogue that is not included in the stage version, ‘Man 2’ self-reflexively comments on the intricate relation between performers, characters and performed identities when observing: “I’m standing in the remains of a fiction. I’m standing in the remains of several layers of fiction. Some I don’t understand. Some are out of scale. I’m looking around at the wreckage and how it is contained to this little plot of land, this area marked off by a false boundary” (37). Yet, there is a glimpse of hope that he might have found his true identity when he remarks: “And now I’m someone else in an entirely different way” (38). The characters’ play with identity is closely linked to the notion of lying. Although the shifting identities are part of the game, the characters repeatedly accuse each other of lying (cf. 15/ 00:35:07). However, since reality is such an elusive concept and hidden under so many layers of fiction and role playing, it is impossible for the characters to decide what is true. The distinction between truth and lying as such actually becomes obsolete.

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The smooth transition between dreaming and being awake brings about a similar confusion. The woman’s nightmare of a spot turns out to be more than a dream that forebodes the collapse of their house and their fiction. The spot actually seems to materialise so that she keeps wondering how “a spot from a dream suddenly appear[s] on your wall” (6/ 00:14:13). Her dreams are moreover not restricted to night-time (cf. 20/ 00:47:37), and even though the other characters are equally worried about the spot, its appearance may just be a day-dream. In the end, it is impossible to tell because even if you open your eyes within a dream (cf. 1/ 00:08:00), you may still not be awake. All in all, no clear distinction can be made as to what is performance or role play within the performance, truth or lie, dreaming or waking. While it is impossible to tell apart the distinct layers of fiction, what remains clear is only that everything is merely a fiction and nothing is real. This impression is supported not only by the allusions to role playing, lying or dreaming and by the motif of windows on the level of content, but is also formally generated by the overt theatricality and hypermediacy of the production. With its thin line between performers, characters and imaginary personae, its non-naturalistic mise-en-scène and its deliberate exposure of cameras and monitors, the production constantly draws attention to its own fictionality and mediality. Since the spectators observe the construction of the mediatised images, they remain alert to the distortions of mediatisation and the general fictionality of the production. In Virtuoso (working title) the elusive relation between reality and fiction applies both to the live and the mediatised elements of the performance that are equally unreal and entangled in multilayered webs of fiction. Once more, realism therefore offers no means of distinguishing between liveness and mediatisation in this production.

Summary My analysis of the selected productions shows that none of them actually aims at perfect realism. Instead, they deliberately contrast effects of realism with an acknowledgement of the fictionality of both their live and their mediatised elements. In other words, the productions use the combination of liveness and mediatisation in order to decrease the overall impression of realism. They expose their fictionality by highlighting the materiality and mediality of the live and the mediatised action. The constant changes in the degrees of realism in all of the productions moreover draw attention to the fact that realism is a question of the style and mode of presentation rather than the medium. This means that there is no fixed hierarchical relation between live and mediatised representations of reality.

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Hence, it becomes clear that realism is no adequate criterion for distinguishing liveness from mediatisation because live performances and technological media may choose to produce an equally convincing or unconvincing illusion. Station House Opera’s productions, for instance, suggest that there are alternative and interchangeable realities whose status is a mere question of perspective and is not tied to liveness or mediatisation. This idea is also explored in Gob Squad’s Revolution Now! Some of the selected productions even go so far as to question the very existence of reality. Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) presents inescapable layers of role playing, lying and dreaming that cannot be disentangled. That reality is heavily influenced or even distorted by the media is generally illustrated by Gob Squad’s productions. Forkbeard Fantasy’s The Fall of the House of Usherettes even implies that reality itself may only be a film. As the productions prove, many of the strategies for creating effects of realism are shared by distinct media such as theatre, film and video. This applies, for instance, to the blurring of the performers’ real identities with their fictional parts and their pretence of not-acting as in Station House Opera’s, Gob Squad’s, Tim Etchells’s and Proto-type Theater’s productions. The same holds true for an unobtrusive mise-en-scène that uses no elaborate costumes, props, scenery, special effects etc. and, specifically in Gob Squad’s productions, is supported by presumably spontaneous everyday language. Equally independent of the choice of medium is the reverse strategy of subverting effects of realism. It may be achieved via metafictional and metamedial commentaries, explicit or implicit ‘individual’ or ‘system’ references to other media, a surreal mise-en-scène, the hypermediacy of cameras, projectors and screens, their presentation as physical barriers or windows etc. In most of the selected productions, the effects of live and mediatised realism alternate with a deconstruction of realism due to moments of explicit theatricality and hypermediacy. This draws attention to the question of realism and illustrates that realism is relative, elusive and never perfect. Admittedly, there are also medium-specific means of suggesting realism. Whereas live media have the advantage of the actors’ and spectators’ physical co-presence in real space and time, technological media may achieve an impression of realism due to their “spatial and temporal mobility” (Carlson 617). When incorporated into a live performance, mediatisation is thus capable of extending the fictional world into real or fictional off-stage spaces and projecting ‘real’ people onto the stage. This, in turn, may also superimpose a layer of fictionality onto reality. Once more, there are major differences in the use of pre-recorded film or video compared to live video relays in this context. Only pre-recorded material

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can be edited before its transmission in order to improve or delete aspects that might negatively affect the impression of realism. Yet, only live video relay may extend the productions into ‘reality’ in real-time via the use of live feeds so that spectators in the auditorium or passers-by outside the venue may actually become part of the productions and interact with the performers. Occasionally, however, even pre-recorded videos or films may successfully create the illusion of being live relays that include extra-theatrical reality in real-time. This effect is achieved in Station House Opera’s productions and, to a certain extent, in Gob Squad’s Super Night Shot. Nonetheless, neither pre-recorded film and video, nor live video relay can be said to be generally more realistic than the other, or more or less realistic than liveness. In the end, realism is always imperfect in any medium, whether live or mediatised, because the presentation of the ‘real’ is nothing but a more or less effective (re‐)construction.

Conclusion Matthew Causey identifies the liveness of theatre as a still unresolved issue when admitting: “The thingness or thisness of the theatre, the riddle of the ontology of theatre, has not been solved. Hopefully, it never will be resolved, for it is this impossible thought, this site of theatre’s aporia, that seduces us to return continually to the event […]” (Causey 111; emphases in the original). Without any intention of spoiling the fascination of theatre or depriving it of its mystique, I have attempted to shed light on the enigmatic notion of theatrical liveness. My study has tried to explain what distinguishes theatre and its liveness from other media. I have analysed how individual artists position theatre in relation to technological media that do not possess this quality of liveness. More precisely, I have investigated how media combinations of theatre with film or video affect the relation between liveness and mediatisation in contemporary British theatre and performance. My selection of case studies has covered productions by Forkbeard Fantasy, Station House Opera, Gob Squad, Proto-type Theater, Tim Etchells and Mary Oliver. First of all, I have more generally addressed the exceptional mediality of theatre and have asked whether theatre differs from other media with regard to its intermedial potential. With recourse to theories of intermediality, I have identified theatre as an inherently multi- or plurimedial medium because it may comprise other media such as language, music, the pictorial arts, dance, etc. When experienced in a performance, these media form a unified whole and are fused to an extent where they are no longer conceived of as distinct media but as forming a single hyper-medium. I have further distinguished this phenomenon from media combination as an intentional and less conventional mix of media. This rendered it possible to highlight that, in addition to its multi- or plurimediality, theatre may incorporate other media by means of media combination. In fact, theatre has an exceptional ability to incorporate other media in their entirety without affecting their materiality and sign systems or blurring medial boundaries. I have referred to this quality as its ‘semiotic’ and, more importantly, ‘medial mobility.’ This quality of theatre also becomes apparent in the selected productions. Although they include films or videos as equitable elements that can hardly be disentangled from the live action, they leave their mediality and materiality intact and recognisable. Since the medial boundaries of theatre, film and video remain perceptible to a certain extent, these productions encourage metamedial reflection on the differences as well as similarities of the involved media. As my brief historical account has illustrated, however, the com-

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bination of theatre and technological media is no new phenomenon because theatre has always been receptive to other media. Having identified the exceptional intermedial potential of theatre, I have inquired into the reasons theatre may have for complementing its inherent multior plurimediality with media combination by incorporating film or video as additional media. I have thus identified several, often interdependent functions of media combination. Most importantly, it raises a hypermediate awareness of the materiality of the involved media and encourages metamedial and metafictional reflection on the relation between liveness and mediatisation, reality and fiction. As my analysis has illustrated, the selected productions occasionally render their screens or monitors deliberately visible or hypermediate in order to accentuate their respective materiality and mediality. Yet, such mise-en-relief of the involved media also applies to the theatrical medium itself whose specific mediality is thus underscored. In this sense, the insertion of film and video into theatre performances not only serves as a means of framing and staging film and video respectively. It also facilitates a self-reflection of theatre with regard to its own mediality and provides a stage for its own liveness in comparison to mediatisation. Furthermore, film and video frequently draw attention to the relation between fiction and reality in the selected productions. They may increase the overall theatricality and fictionality of the action or extend the fiction into reality via transmissions from off-stage locations. Either way, they implicitly address the role of media in everyday life and explore whether an im-mediate experience of reality without intervention of media is possible at all. In this manner, the productions take up central theoretical debates from the field of media philosophy that are concerned with mediation, mediatisation and representations of reality, aspects I have introduced in chapter 3. The staging of liveness via media combination moreover raised the question of how theatrical liveness could be defined in the first place. By comparing theatre and live performance to technological media such as film or video, I have argued that liveness differs from mediatisation due to the combination of three defining characteristics. Firstly, liveness implies the spatio-temporal copresence of spectators and performers. Secondly, it inevitably renders a performance unique, ephemeral and not identically reproducible. Thirdly, it entails unpredictability and the risk of imperfection. My study has further identified two more aspects that are often considered as distinctive features of liveness although they may, in fact, play an equal role in contexts of mediatisation. These aspects are interaction and the representation of reality. Interaction is not contingent upon liveness and is often restricted to the feedback loop between performers and spectators in live performances. In mediatised contexts, interaction via tele-communication and real-time transmission is thus often more effect-

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ive. Similarly, realistic representation is not a question of a specific medium or its liveness but instead depends on the chosen mode and style in which reality is represented, a process that is moreover always imperfect. Although interaction and realistic representation are no distinctive features of liveness, the selected productions explore and exploit them alongside the defining characteristics of liveness. Due to their disputed relevance to the notion of liveness, in fact, interaction and the play with degrees of realistic representation perfectly lend themselves to a simulation of liveness and are thus even more productive than the actual constituents of liveness when it comes to blurring liveness and mediatisation. As I have pointed out, theatre practitioners address the relation between liveness and mediatisation in a playful manner by exploring, challenging and manipulating the actual and presumed aspects of liveness. On the whole, they judge the influence of mediatisation onto theatre more favourably than it is evaluated in the corresponding theoretical debates. The theoretical discourse tends to conceive of liveness and mediatisation as antagonistic or ontologically opposed phenomena and regards the ever-increasing mediatisation as a threat to an allegedly marginalised liveness. The theatre practitioners, however, are less critical of the influence mediatisation has on theatre. They integrate technological media in their productions in order to demonstrate that liveness and mediatisation exhibit many parallels, may complement each other and may be used to throw each other into relief or to question conventional assumptions of what constitutes liveness and mediatisation. Though the productions do not actually eliminate the differences between liveness and mediatisation, they successfully create an illusion of their assimilation. As a result, theatre and film or video occasionally appear to be equally live or equally mediatised. Paradoxically, mediatisation may even seem to be ‘more live’ than liveness itself, but its liveness is merely simulated. The defining characteristics of liveness and particularly the disputed notions of interaction and realistic representation play an important role for the attempts of mediatisation to appear in the guise of liveness. My discussion of how the selected productions stage liveness started off with the aspect of spatio-temporal co-presence. I have illustrated that the productions attempt to assimilate liveness and mediatisation by simulating mediatised copresence and corporeality. The mediatised doubles vie with the live performers for attention and actually seem to be corporeal and three-dimensional when the screens present them from several perspectives at once. The occasional use of extreme close-ups as in Proto-type Theater’s Virtuoso (working title) even creates a sense of hyper-presence that exceeds the proximity between live performers and spectators. Moreover, the productions address the factors of space and time by creating the illusion that the mediatised performers are present in

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the spectators’ ‘here’ and ‘now.’ The use of live video relays in Proto-type Theater’s and Gob Squad’s productions actually facilitates temporal co-presence in real-time, whereas Station House Opera’s synchronicity of live and pre-recorded action successfully simulates real-time transmission. Yet, neither live video relays nor pre-recorded videos or films can establish spatial co-presence but are restricted to tele-presence. In the end, the productions thus emphasise the relevance of combined temporal and spatial co-presence to the notion of liveness. Mary Oliver’s productions moreover propose an understanding of presence as a performer’s charisma but illustrate that this is a quality that can equally be achieved by mediatised performers. Ephemerality, uniqueness and disappearance form the second aspect of liveness whose validity is examined in the selected productions. This defining characteristic of liveness results from the irreproducibility and linearity of live performances and is confirmed by Mary Oliver. Her productions praise this ephemerality and contrast it with mediatised action that can be repeated or fast-forwarded. All of the other productions, however, challenge this binary opposition. Forkbeard Fantasy even playfully invert the status of liveness and mediatisation by presenting liveness (and life) as repetitive and circular, whereas the ‘liquid films’ disappear into thin air and several screens are destroyed. The other productions make more moderate statements and merely assimilate liveness and mediatisation. Whereas Gob Squad make their live and mediatised elements appear to be equally unique experiences, Station House Opera and Proto-type Theater present them as being equally repetitive and circular. Tim Etchells’s Instructions for Forgetting also plays with repetition on both levels and eventually suggests that liveness and mediatisation are equally ineffective against a disappearance caused by death and oblivion. The productions achieve further assimilation of liveness and mediatisation by probing the notions of unpredictability and risk of imperfection that form a further defining characteristic of liveness. Station House Opera’s productions exhibit near-perfection in their live and mediatised elements so that liveness resembles mediatisation in this respect. All the other productions, by contrast, assimilate liveness and mediatisation by intentionally increasing their overall unpredictability and deliberately staging live and mediatised imperfection. They display apparently inept performers, inadequate sets, costumes and props, old-fashioned equipment or seemingly amateurish filming that does not exploit the possibilities of eliminating flaws during post-production. Gob Squad additionally increase the unpredictability via improvisation and audience or public participation. On the whole, the selected productions illustrate that mediatisation, even when perfect in itself, becomes risky once it is included in a live performance. This is due to the complicated timing between live and me-

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diatised action and to the risk of technological breakdowns during playback. It becomes clear, moreover, that the productions value unpredictability and imperfection because they increase suspense and suggest authenticity. This is most obvious in Mary Oliver’s and Proto-type Theater’s presentation of perfection as being stifling and boring. Accordingly, most of the productions deliberately enhance their actual imperfections by means of staged imperfection or failure. Since interaction is not contingent upon liveness, but is nevertheless often falsely assumed to be one of its distinctive features, mediatised interaction lends itself perfectly to a simulation of liveness. Hence, it is an ideal means of blurring liveness and mediatisation or inverting their status. Only Etchells’s production does not take advantage of this effect and challenges theatrical conventions and audience expectations by deliberately limiting the possibilities for live and mediatised interaction. In the other productions, interaction not only occurs between stage and auditorium but also involves screens or monitors. In Gob Squad’s productions mediatisation even draws passers-by into the action. Occasionally, mediatised interaction is so effective that it exceeds the live interaction. In these instances, mediatisation even appears to be ‘more live’ than liveness itself. Where pre-recorded video or film are employed, however, such interaction is only simulated and not reciprocal because the recorded footage does not actually react to the live action. This applies to Station House Opera’s, Forkbeard Fantasy’s and Mary Oliver’s productions. Gob Squad’s and Proto-type Theater’s use of live video relays, by contrast, facilitates actual interaction so that even distinct screens suddenly seem to interact with each other. In Gob Squad, moreover, live interaction sometimes depends on mediatised interaction because it is the use of mediatisation that spurs the spectators and passers-by into action. Like interaction, realistic representation is not a question of liveness or of a specific medium but of the mode of presentation. The notion of realism thus equally lends itself to bringing liveness in line with mediatisation. Instead of striving for realistic representation, the selected productions accept that reality cannot be represented perfectly by any medium. What is more, they deliberately draw attention to their own fictionality and constructedness. This is achieved via explicit theatricality and hypermediacy, via self-reflexive, metamedial and metafictional commentaries, or via a mise-en-scène that is intentionally imperfect and disrupts the illusion. These strategies may not only render live and mediatised representation equally unrealistic. In Forkbeard Fantasy’s, Station House Opera’s and Proto-type Theater’s productions, they even serve to deconstruct reality itself or to present it as a matter of perspective. Gob Squad’s productions moreover suggest the distorting influence the media may have on our perception of reality.

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All in all, the productions playfully question the binary opposition and ontological difference of liveness and mediatisation by challenging the actual as well as the presumed characteristics of liveness. Their media combinations opt for a harmonious coexistence and fusion of theatre, film and video. Yet, their conflation of liveness and mediatisation also draws attention to the influence of mediatisation on everyday life. With this in mind, the productions illustrate how subtle and imperceptible the encroachment of mediatisation on liveness may be due to the potential of mediatisation to appear in the guise of liveness. To what extent our reality is mediatised can therefore not clearly be answered. In their open-minded explorations of mediatisation, the productions nevertheless do not present mediatisation as a threat to liveness. As Giesekam observes, “rather than being a sign of defeat when theatre works with film, video or computer imagery, it may be that it is a sign of a theatre that is willing to engage actively with some of the key forces which shape our experiences of the world today” (2007: 251). In this sense, the selected productions accept mediatisation as a central contemporary phenomenon. They consider it as a fruitful complement to liveness that also provides an opportunity for theatre to define its own liveness and medium-specificity by contrast with mediatisation. Repeated moments of hypermediacy furthermore remind the audience that the convergence or inversion of liveness and mediatisation are only simulated and that liveness and mediatisation are not actually identical or interchangeable. In the end, this confirms the exceptional nature of theatrical liveness despite its presumed conflation with mediatisation and throws the theatrical medium into relief. This applies specifically to Mary Oliver’s and Tim Etchells’s productions that fuse liveness and mediatisation to a lesser extent than the other productions and thus more clearly highlight the distinct mediality and materiality of theatre, film and video. That their approaches differ from the use of mediatisation in the other productions in this respect can be explained by considering their broader context. Oliver’s productions serve as ‘performed papers’ that explicitly discuss and stage the distinction between liveness and mediatisation by having recourse to current theoretical debates. Etchells and his company Forced Entertainment, on the other hand, are renowned for drawing attention to the theatrical medium by deliberately subverting theatrical conventions and denying the fulfilment of audience expectations such as demands for interaction or professional acting. In this context, Etchells’s production raises the question of what we understand by a ‘live’ performance by contrasting it with mediatisation. The differences in how the convergence or inversion of liveness and mediatisation are brought about in the selected productions can further be explained by their respective choice of technological media. This brings us to the

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last question I have addressed in the present study, namely whether films, prerecorded and live videos have an identical potential for creating effects of liveness. As the case studies have demonstrated, the use of live video relays by Gob Squad and Proto-type Theater offers more extensive means of conflating liveness and mediatisation than film and pre-recorded videos. This is due to the fact that live video relays more closely resemble live performance with regard to its actual and falsely attributed defining characteristics. As opposed to pre-recorded material, live video relays provide temporal co-presence with performers and spectators due to their transmission in real-time. Yet, they offer no spatial co-presence and thus still remain distinct from live presence. When used in theatre and live performance, live video relays are moreover only shown once and are produced anew during each individual performance. Accordingly, their use is unique and differs from pre-recorded footage that may be used again in subsequent performances. Whereas pre-recorded videos and films can only simulate interaction that is not reciprocal, live video relays furthermore facilitate real interaction between live and mediatised performers or spectators and may even offer additional opportunities for involving passers-by in the action. Since live video relays do not permit editing during post-production, they also resemble live performances in their unpredictability and risk of imperfection. Finally, they may also increase the perceived degree of realism by extending the performances into real off-stage spaces in real-time, though this may superimpose a layer of fictionality onto reality. Although live video relays cannot create actual liveness, they therefore exceed pre-recorded videos and films in their potential for simulating liveness and imitating the theatrical medium in intermedial performances. As I hope to have demonstrated, the use of film and video within theatre not only provides a stage for these media, but it primarily serves to stage the theatrical medium itself and to renegotiate its liveness. Despite this medial introspection, the productions are also generally concerned with the impact mediatisation has on reality. Accordingly, they draw attention to the proliferation of technological media in everyday life that tends to be accepted or even to be taken for granted. In this sense, the productions and the present study have wider implications beyond the scope of theatre and its relation to other media. They address the complex relation between liveness and mediatisation in general and inquire into the possibility of accessing ‘reality’ beyond mediation and mediatisation. In the end, it remains to be asked more pragmatically how the media combination of theatre with film or video influences the creation of theatrical performances or impacts on the audience. In this context, it would be worthwhile exploring to what extent the use of film or video within theatre demands different approaches to devising processes and rehearsals, and inquiring whether it

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necessitates specific acting techniques or additional performer skills. Possibly, it even requires new types of spectators who are media adepts and feel at ease in a media-saturated context. In this respect, research into how audiences of different ages intuitively define liveness might provide a valuable insight into possible generational differences in the perception of liveness. A comparison with phenomena of media combination in other inherently multi- or plurimedial media could further help to elucidate the specifics of theatrical media combination. Investigating the use of technological media in opera, for instance, would render it possible to compare the functions of mediatisation and their effects on theatre and opera as framing media and would illustrate how Richard Wagner’s call for an operatic Gesamtkunstwerk might be implemented in the age of ‘new media.’ Finally, it would also be of interest to analyse how the relation between liveness and mediatisation is addressed by phenomena such as cyber theatre and performances in virtual or augmented reality. Ultimately, time will tell how future inventions of media will impact on the liveness of theatre and how they may be incorporated within theatrical performances. It remains to be seen whether theatre will be more hostile to these media or will react with the same openness that is apparent in the productions selected for the present study. These productions, as I have tried to demonstrate, establish an intellectual game and extend an invitation to the audience to join in the thought experiment of a conflation of liveness and mediatisation.

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Station House Opera, prod. 2005: Roadmetal, Sweetbread. Perf. Susannah Hart, and Julian Maynard Smith. Rec. Maison de la Culture de Nevers et de la Nièvre, Nevers. Jan. 2005. Artsadmin. DVD.

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White, Tim 1994: “The Screen: Looking through It, Walking through It.” Contemporary Theatre Review 2.2: 107 – 114. Whybrow, Nicolas 2000: “Animating Morecambe: Forkbeard Fantasy Goes to the Ball.” New Theatre Quarterly 16.1: 3 – 16. Wilkie, Fiona 2002: “Mapping the Terrain: A Survey of Site-Specific Performance in Britain.” New Theatre Quarterly 18.2: 140 – 160. Will, Simon, and Sharon Smith 2009: “Revolution Now: Gob Squad im Interview.” Interview by Rita Böhmer. Artmetropol.tv. Artmetropol.tv, Berlin. Web. 27 Mar. 2012 ‹https://artmetropol.tv/videos/beitraege/2010/revolution-now.html›. Willett, John 1978: The Theatre of Erwin Piscator: Half a Century of Politics in the Theatre. London: Eyre Methuen. Winkelmann, Sabine 2004: Intermedialität in Eugene O’Neills Dramen ‘The Emperor Jones,’ ‘The Hairy Ape’ und ‘The Great God Brown.’ Diss. U Augsburg, 2002. Würzburg: Königshausen & Neumann. Wolf, Werner 1996: “Intermedialität als neues Paradigma der Literaturwissenschaft? Plädoyer für eine literaturzentrierte Erforschung von Grenzüberschreitungen zwischen Wortkunst und anderen Medien am Beispiel von Virginia Woolfs ‘The String Quartet.’” AAA – Arbeiten aus Anglistik und Amerikanistik 21.1: 85 – 116. Wolf, Werner 1999: The Musicalization of Fiction: A Study in the Theory and History of Intermediality. Amsterdam: Rodopi. Wolf, Werner 2002: “Intermedialität: Ein weites Feld und eine Herausforderung für die Literaturwissenschaft.” Literaturwissenschaft: Intermedial – Interdisziplinär. Eds. Herbert Foltinek, and Christoph Leitgeb. Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. 163 – 192. Wolf, Werner 2004: “Intermedialität.” Metzler Lexikon Literatur- und Kulturtheorie: Ansätze, Personen, Grundbegriffe. Ed. Ansgar Nünning. 3rd rev. ed. Stuttgart: Metzler. 296 – 297. Wolf, Werner 2005: “Intermediality.” Routledge Encyclopedia of Narrative Theory. Eds. David Herman, Manfred Jahn, and Marie-Laure Ryan. London: Routledge. 252 – 256. Wolf, Werner 2008: “The Relevance of Mediality and Intermediality to Academic Studies of English Literature.” Mediality/Intermediality. Eds. Martin Heusser, Andreas Fischer, and Andreas H. Jucker. Tübingen: Gunter Narr. 15 – 43. Wolfson, Richard 2005: “The Silver Screen Revitalised.” Rev. of Shooting Shakespeare by Forkbeard Fantasy. FT.com. Financial Times, 10 Jan. 2005. Web. 26 Mar. 2012 ‹http://www.forkbeardfantasy.co.uk/new_articles.html›. Woll, Stefan 1984: Das Totaltheater: Ein Projekt von Walter Gropius und Erwin Piscator. Berlin: Gesellschaft für Theatergeschichte. Zajac, Camilla 2006: “Now: Roadmetal Sweetbread.” Rev. of Roadmetal, Sweetbread by Station House Opera. BBC Nottingham. BBC Nottingham, 24 Oct. 2006. Web. 11 Apr. 2014 ‹http://www.bbc.co.uk/nottingham/content/articles/2006/10/24/now_station_house_opera_event_feature.shtml›. Zatlin, Phyllis 2005: Theatrical Translation and Film Adaptation: A Practitioner’s View. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.

Index of Performances Brenneis, Lisa, and Adriene Jenik waitingforgodot.com (1997), 61 Eisenstein, Sergei Enough Simplicity in Every Sage (1923), 58 Oktjabr (1927, film), 236 Etchells, Tim Down Time (2001), 118 Everything (2002), 118 Instructions for Forgetting (2001– ), 115 – 118, 125 – 126, 132, 143 – 144, 160, 185 – 186, 194, 224 – 226, 228 – 229, 250 et passim Words & Pictures (2005– ), 118 see also Forced Entertainment Forced Entertainment Bloody Mess (2004), 141, 228 Club of No Regrets (1993), 141, 143 – 144, 228 Decade of Forced Entertainment, A (1994), 229 Disco Relax (1999), 115, 117 First Night (2001), 126, 141, 185, 228 (Let the Water Run its Course) to the Sea that Made the Promise (1986), 126 Marina and Lee (1991), 184 Pleasure (1997), 141 Showtime (1996), 126, 141, 228 Some Confusions in the Law about Love (1989), 126, 183 – 184 Speak Bitterness (1994), 229 Spectacular (2008), 126, 141, 228 Thrill of It All, The (2010), 141, 228 Travels, The (2002), 229 200% and Bloody Thirsty (1987), 126, 183 Who Can Sing a Song to Unfrighten Me? (1999), 126 World in Pictures, The (2006), 126 – 127, 141, 228 see also Etchells, Tim Forkbeard Fantasy Barbers of Surreal, The (1998 – 1999), 168 – 169 Clone Show, The (1979 – 1980), 168 Colour of Nonsense, The (2010 – 2011), 145, 218 – 219 Experiment in Contraprojection, An (1987– ), 168 Fall of the House of Usherettes, The (1996; 2005– ) 40, 42, 110 – 113, 119, 131 – 132, 160, 169 – 170, 177 – 178, 213 – 217, 219 – 223, 245 et passim Frankenstein (2001 – 2002), 144, 217 – 218 Ghost (1985), 168 Invasion of the Bloopies (1991), 168 Invisible Bonfires (2007 – 2008), 144 – 145 Rough Magyck (2006), 169

270

Index of Performances

Shooting Shakespeare (2004), 218 Who Shot the Cameraman? (1986), 168 Gob Squad Are We Nearly There Yet? (1999), 226 Are You With Us? (2010 – 2012), 226 Calling Laika (1998), 209 Effortless Transaction, An (1996), 209, 226 15 Minutes to Comply (1997), 209 Gob Squad’s Kitchen (You’ve Never Had It So Good) (2007– ), 128 – 130, 133, 150 – 151, 159, 186 – 189, 191, 194, 232 – 235 et passim Great Outdoors, The (2001), 93 – 94, 191, 209 House (1994 – 1995), 209, 226 King Kong Club (2005 – 2007), 128, 147 – 149, 157, 159, 159 – 160 et passim Live Long and Prosper (2009), 151, 191, 209 My Square Lady (currently being developed), 226 Neukölln sucht den Superstar (2003), 226 Prater-Saga 3: In This Neighbourhood, The Devil Is A Goldmine (2004 – 2010), 95 – 96, 190, 206, 208, 226, 231 – 232 et passim Revolution Now! (2010– ), 1 – 2, 96 – 97, 156 – 157, 159, 189 – 192, 206, 208, 235 – 239, 245 et passim Room Service (Help Me Make It Through the Night) (2003 – 2010), 41, 94 – 95, 209 Saving the World (2008 – 2011), 128, 209 Say It Like You Mean It (2000 – 2001), 226 Super Night Shot (2003– ), 89 – 93, 145 – 147, 149, 157, 159, 206, 207 – 208, 246 et passim Welcome to Our World (built with you in mind) (2002; 2005), 226 Western Society (2013– ), 226 What Are You Looking At? (1998 – 2003), 226 Where Do You Want To Go To Die? (2000 – 2011), 209 Who Are Your Wearing? (2004 – 2009), 191, 209, 226 Work (1995), 209, 226 Jenik, Adriene see Brenneis, Lisa Méliès, Georges Man With the Rubber Head, The (1902, silent film), 222 Pills of the Devil, The (1905), 57 Oliver, Mary Almost (2007), 104 Blue (2008), 104 Fly Me to the Moon (2006 – 2007), 104, 137 Mother Tongue (2001 – 2002), 104 Never Work With Animals, Children or Digital Characters (2006), 104 – 108, 119 – 120, 134, 136 – 138, 160 et passim Swimmers (2009), 104 – 105 Wednesday, Wednesday (2005 – 2006; 2009), 104 – 109, 119 – 120, 133 – 134, 136 – 138, 160 et passim

Index of Performances

271

Pervasive Media Studio Extended Theatre Experience (2009), 60 Piscator, Erwin Kaisers Kulis, Des [The Kaiser’s Coolies] (1930), 59 Kaufmann von Berlin, Der [The Merchant of Berlin] (1929), 59 Konjunktur [Boom] (1928), 59 Proto-type Theater Fortnight (2011– ), 61, 163 – 164 Virtuoso (working title) (2009 – 2010), 42, 79, 100 – 103, 130 – 131, 132, 138 – 140, 159, 160 – 163, 164, 166, 167, 195, 240 – 244, 245, 249 et passim Whisper (2007 – 2009), 163, 164 Rimini Protokoll Call Cutta (2005), 61 Sermon, Paul Telematic Dreaming (1992), 167 Station House Opera Dissolved (scheduled for 2014), 99 How To Behave (2003), 204 Live from Paradise (2004 – 2005), 60 – 61, 99 Mare’s Nest (2001 – 2004), 40, 83 – 88, 121 – 124, 125, 132, 153 – 155, 158 – 159, 170 – 171, 173 – 178, 178 – 179, 180 – 182, 196 – 200, 204, 209 – 213 et passim Mind Out (2008 – ), 123 Other Is You, The (2006), 60 – 61, 99 – 100 Play On Earth (2006), 60 – 61, 99 Roadmetal, Sweetbread (1998– ), 40, 86 – 88, 121 – 123, 124 – 125, 132, 153 – 155, 158 – 159, 170 – 178, 178 – 179, 180 – 181, 182, 196 – 200, 204, 209 – 213 et passim Snakes and Ladders (1998), 84, 170 What’s Wrong with the World? (2008), 60 – 61, 99 Stelarc Fractal Flesh (1995), 167 ParaSite (1997), 167 Ping Body (1996), 167 Svoboda, Josef Intolerance (1965), 59 Wooster Group, The To You, the Birdie! (2002), 60

General Index acting, degrees of, 90, 95 – 96, 141 – 142, 148, 150 – 151, 165, 196, 227 – 231, 233 – 235, 239 – 240, 245 asides ad spectatores, 160 – 161, 164 – 165 audience participation, 160 – 195, 240 et passim Auslander, Philip, 8, 12 – 14, 55, 66 – 67, 77 – 79, 80, 81, 82, 115, 180, 197 authenticity, 78, 81, 124, 142 – 143, 144, 152, 159 – 160, 185, 201, 202, 203, 207 – 208, 228, 229, 230, 231 – 236, 239 – 240, 251 et passim (autopoietic) feedback loop, 14, 179, 193, 248 Avatar Repertory Theatre, 99 Barthes, Roland, 202 Baudrillard, Jean, 66, 68, 70 – 72, 76, 77 – 78, 79, 81 Benjamin, Walter, 71, 124, 213 Blast Theory, 2, 61 Blau, Herbert, 13, 127, 230, 239 Bolter, Jay David, 9, 14, 23, 27, 42, 62, 75 – 76, 80, 213 Brenneis, Lisa, and Adriene Jenik, 61, 99 Builders Association, The, 2, 11, 59 Cassiers, Guy, 3 charisma, 103 – 108, 250 close-ups, 42, 79, 87, 89 – 91, 101 – 103, 107 – 108, 109, 118, 125, 160 – 161, 168, 181, 182, 211, 212, 215 – 216, 242, 249 communication, fictional vs. non-fictional, 164 – 166, 179 – 180, 192 – 193, 239 – 240 Complicite (Théâtre de Complicité), 2 co-presence, 5 – 6, 14, 83 – 110, 249 – 250, 253 et passim corporeality, 85 – 89, 91 – 92, 99, 102 – 103, 105 – 108, 108 – 110, 112, 167, 198, 249 Corsetti, Giorgio Barberio, 59 counterfeit, 70 – 71 see also Baudrillard, Jean death, 124 – 127, 130, 132, 151, 185, 250

desktop theatre, 61, 99 dialogic media productions, 178, 184, 191, 194 documentation of performance, 8, 50, 123 – 125, 130, 236 – 237 drama vs. theatre, 7, 21, 29, 45 – 53, 82, 98, 114, 165, 179 – 180 Dumb Type, 3 Eisenstein, Sergei, 58, 236 Elevator Repair Service, 134 ephemerality, 5 – 6, 82, 110 – 133, 250 et passim Etchells, Tim, 8 – 9, 115 – 116, 118, 124, 125 – 126, 142, 143, 183, 186, 227 – 229, 245, 251, 252 et passim see also individual performances Ex Machina, 2 see also Lepage, Robert failure, 133 – 160, 251 et passim feedback, 166, 179 – 180, 185, 192 – 195, 248 Fischer-Lichte, Erika, 14, 45, 67, 98, 114, 179, 193 Fiske, John, 17 Flusser, Vilém, 18 – 19 Forced Entertainment, 3, 5, 9, 115 – 116, 118, 124, 126 – 127, 141 – 142, 143, 183 – 184, 185, 186, 194, 227 – 228, 239, 252 et passim see also individual performances Forkbeard Fantasy, 3, 9, 111, 113, 115, 119, 144 – 145, 152, 168 – 169, 183, 194, 217, 219, 227, 250, 251 et passim see also individual performances fourth wall, 164, 178, 179, 186, 192 Fura dels Baus, La, 2 – 3 George Coates Performance Works, 59 Gertrude Stein Repertory Theatre, 60 Giesekam, Greg, 5, 9, 10 – 11, 57, 100, 197, 200, 252 Goat Island, 134, 142

General Index

Gob Squad, 3, 8 – 9, 41, 51, 79, 89 – 90, 92, 93, 97 – 98, 128, 131, 132 – 133, 149 – 150, 151 – 152, 166, 191 – 192, 194 – 195, 206, 208 – 209, 226 – 227, 231, 239 – 240, 245, 250, 251 et passim see also individual performances Goulish, Matthew, 142 Gropius, Walter, 58 – 59 Grotowski, Jerzy, 54 Grusin, Richard, 9, 14, 23, 27, 42, 62, 75 – 76, 80, 213 Hall, Stuart, 17 – 18 Höfele, Andreas, 50 – 51 Hutcheon, Linda, 166 hypermediacy, 14, 40, 42 – 43, 62 – 64, 75 – 76, 80 – 81, 145, 170, 194, 209 – 219, 224 – 227, 232, 235, 238, 240 – 244, 245, 248, 251, 252 hyper-presence, 79, 103, 109, 249 hyperreal, 70 – 72, 77, 78, 81 immediacy, 14, 42, 62 – 63, 75 – 76, 79, 80 – 81, 152, 159, 164, 206, 209 – 213, 228, 232 compare hypermediacy immersion, 62, 82, 166, 181, 182 imperfection, 5, 65, 133 – 160, 248, 250 – 251 et passim implied performance, 51 – 53 Institute for the Exploration of Virtual Realities (i. e. VR), 60 Institute of Failure, 142 interaction, 5-6, 14 – 15, 65, 82, 160 – 195, 248 – 249, 251 et passim intermediality, see intermedial references, (inter)medial transposition, media combination, multior plurimediality compare intertextuality, intramediality, transmediality intermedial references, 10, 11, 25, 30 – 35, 37, 38, 39, 43, 45, 48, 52, 53, 56, 217 – 218, 220 – 222 (inter)medial transposition, 10, 11, 30, 31 – 32, 36, 37, 38, 45, 48, 52 – 53, 56, 220 intertextuality, 24 – 25, 29, 50 – 53

273

intramediality, 25, 29 – 30, 33 Jenik, Adriene, see Brenneis, Lisa Jesurun, John, 2, 59 Kirby, Michael, 229 – 230 Kittler, Friedrich A., 18, 22 – 23, 68, 72, 79 Krämer, Sybille, 68 – 69, 73 – 75, 81 Laterna Magika, 2, 59 Lehmann, Hans-Thies, 98, 184 – 185, 205, 230 – 231 Lepage, Robert, 2, 11, 59 linearity of live performances, 119 – 121, 131, 134, 156, 250 liveness, 2, 5 – 6, 12-13, 55, 65, 77 – 78, 80, 82, 248 – 249, 252 et passim live video streaming via internet, 99 – 100 Luhmann, Niklas, 19 Marinetti, Filippo Tommaso, 58 Maynard Smith, Julian, 83, 85, 153, 196, 197 see also Station House Opera McLuhan, Marshall, 19 – 20, 26, 27, 42, 69 – 70, 72, 73, 182 – 183 media combination, 2, 3 – 4, 5, 6 – 7, 10, 13, 14, 15, 30 – 33, 35, 37 – 44, 45, 47 – 48, 53, 56 – 57, 61, 62, 63, 64, 110, 158, 193, 203, 247 – 248, 252, 254 et passim media generativism, 26, 68, 69 – 73 medial mobility, 4, 47, 48 – 49, 53, 247 see also semiotic mobility medial transposition, see (inter)medial transposition media(l) turn, 69, 72 media marginalism, 68 – 69, 73 compare media generativism media philosophy, 73, 248 mediation, 7, 26, 28, 66 – 67, 68 – 82 et passim mediatisation, 7, 12 – 14, 66 – 67, 68 – 82, 249, 252 et passim medium, 7, 16 – 24 et passim Méliès, Georges, 57, 222 Mersch, Dieter, 74 – 75, 81 metafictionality, 44, 205, 206, 213, 219 – 227, 243, 245, 248, 251

274

General Index

metamediality, 43 – 44, 206, 213, 219 – 227, 232, 237, 239, 242, 245, 247, 248, 251 (meta‐)theatricality, 11, 62 – 63, 110, 112 – 113, 141 – 142, 201, 219 – 220, 223, 224, 227, 228, 231, 235, 236, 240 – 241, 243, 244, 245, 248, 251 Metaverse Shakespeare Company, 99 Meyerhold, Vsevolod, 58 Meyer, Petra Maria, 12, 46 – 47 mise-en-abyme, 174, 199 Mitchell, W. J. T., 9, 26 – 27 multi- or plurimediality, 4, 7, 10, 33 – 35, 38 – 41, 247, 254 Oliver, Mary 3, 9, 43, 104 – 105, 131, 134, 137, 138, 140, 160, 250, 251, 252 et passim see also individual performances Paik, Nam June, 59 Pervasive Media Studio, 60 Petralia, Peter, 100, 103, 131, 138, 161, 163 see also Proto-type Theater Phelan, Peggy, 12 – 14, 114 Piscator, Erwin, 58 – 59 Poor Theatre, 54 Postman, Neil, 18, 72 premediation, 76 Proto-type Theater, 3, 9, 100, 127, 131, 133, 160, 245, 250, 251, 253 et passim see also individual performances Rajewsky, Irina, 10, 23, 25, 29 – 36, 38, 39, 43, 46 refashioning of media, 9, 27, 76 see also remediation remediation, 9, 23, 25, 27 – 29, 76, 103 reality, representation of, 5 – 6, 196 – 246, 248, 249, 251 et passim Rimini Protokoll, 61 risk, 5, 133 – 160, 248, 250 – 251 et passim Second Front, 61 Seel, Martin, 68, 73, 79 – 80 semiotic mobility, 12, 46 – 48, 53 see also medial mobility Sermon, Paul, 60, 167 Shannon, Claude E., 18

sign (systems), 4, 7, 18, 20 – 22, 24, 25, 29 – 34, 43, 46 – 49, 51 – 52, 70 – 72, 213, 247 simulacra, 70 – 71 see also Baudrillard, Jean simulation, 71 – 73, 76, 77 see also Baudrillard, Jean site-specific theatre, 83 – 84, 110, 111, 209 Sontag, Susan, 55 – 56, 114, 135, 202 Squat, 59 Stanislavsky, Konstantin, 165 Station House Opera, 3, 9, 11, 60 – 61, 83 – 85, 88 – 89, 91, 92, 99 – 100, 122, 127, 132, 155, 160, 170, 179, 180, 194, 203 – 204, 205, 206, 213, 241, 245, 246, 250, 251 et passim see also individual performances Stelarc, 60, 167 Svoboda, Josef, 59 see also Laterna Magika synthetic theatre, 58 tele-presence, 93 – 94, 95, 96, 97 – 98, 109, 167, 192, 250 theatre vs. drama, see drama vs. theatre three-dimensionality, 88, 91 – 92, 102, 108, 109, 197, 249 Toneelgroep Amsterdam, 3 Total Theatre, 58 – 59 transmediality, 10, 29 – 30, 33, 36, 37, 38, 56 uniqueness, 110 – 133, 250 et passim unpredictability, 5 – 6, 82, 133 – 160, 248, 250 – 251 et passim Virilio, Paul, 19 – 20 Vostell, Wolf, 59 Warhol, Andy, 128 – 130, 150 – 151, 186 – 188, 232 – 234 Weaver, Warren, 18 Wolf, Werner, 10, 22, 25, 29, 32 – 36, 38, 52 – 53 Wooster Group, The, 2, 11, 59, 60