VR Dramaturgy (#OnBoardXR3)
After an incredible Spring and Summer season, we are beyond proud to report that this Fall #OnBoardXR transitioned from a self-driving sandbox into a stable showcase of some of the most groundbreaking live performance in WebVR. We started with a formalized proposal process and accepted all seven applicants. Michael Morran took over as both chief technologist and stage manager, building robust documentation, new codebase customizations and organizational structure for our two-month development runway, rehearsals and two weeks of performances. We found a sweet spot in our messaging with our partners at Active Replica, presenting us as “the theater company in our basement” allowing their corporate clients in on the fun of this experimental medium and event with a stunning new “lobby” at xrtheater.live.
One of our proposals was from a Production Dramaturg interested in sharing and documenting our process to bring this seasonal anthology to life. Please enjoy a statement from her below:
Making Waves: New Digital Theatre Experiments as a Drop in the Ocean
L. Nicol Cabe (production dramaturg)
Lockdown and social distancing requirements forced many artists to pivot to online performance early last year, and both creators and audiences discovered a wealth of experiences possible thanks to new digital technology. OnBoard XR was among these new live, digital shows, using Mozilla Hubs Desktop User Interface for interactive and immersive 3D virtual performances.
Though online and digital performances are new to many of us, this is a resurgence of a trend that started in the 1990s to mid-2000s, bolstered by recent technology and current social/legal constraints. In the “first wave” of digital theatre, the internet was still young – ah, Web 1.0, when the most exciting and innovative live performances were grainy streams of the Trojan Room coffee pot and Jennicam.
Performing artists during this time innovated with available technology. Helen Varley Jamieson attended a theatre conference where she staged an online performance, causing a major debate about the nature of liveness and interaction on the stage afterward; Katie Mitchell creates multimedia performances livestreaming actors onstage as they made a film; media company Blast Theory combines recorded audio, streamed video, live performers, and videogame interactions in many of their shows; and there are several amateur theatre companies still performing plays in Second Life.
There are two major challenges with first wave digital theatre experiments: lack of tech access, and lack of knowledge. Few people had internet connections good enough for good quality online streaming, fewer understood how to update their bulky desktop computers, and even fewer had interest in learning bespoke software. Now, though, most of us now have access to high speed wifi, quality hardware and software, and basic knowledge of tools from YouTube to WordPress. When pivoting to online performances, more people can become the audience for these shows, and more artists know how to interact with software to make a performance.
OnBoard XR is an ongoing experiment in improving access to these tools for live, online performance. Zoom, Second Life, and even Gather allow fascinating experiences, but WebVR expands artists’ access to virtual reality platforms, with less learning curve to create a show. Discussions between this production team – developers and performers – are like those of in-person theatre, making props, costumes, or soundscapes for traditional shows. Audiences have a unique, immersive experience they can get to easily through a browser or VR headset. OnBoard XR 3.0 continues to build on previous experiments, including those of the first wave of digital theatre.
REFERENCES:
Cox, Gordon. “’All Arts Organizations are Media Companies Now’: How the Pandemic is Transforming Theater.” (24 November 2020). Variety. https://variety.com/2020/legit/news/digital-theater-pandemic-broadway-1234836759/.
Kesby, Rebecca. “How the world’s first webcam made a coffee pot famous.” (22 November 2012). BBC News. https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-20439301.
“Jennicam: The first woman to stream her life on the internet.” (18 October 2016). BBC News. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-37681006.
“Biography: Katie Mitchell – Theatre Director.” The Heroine Collective.
Homepage. Blast Theory.
“Theater: Arts in Second Life.” (13 October 2021). Wikipedia.
All these contributions allowed me to be spread somewhat less thin and support individual artist’s needs, delegate the creative and narrative vision to newcomers and even spin up my own short prototype for live musical theater.
We began with a weekly meeting between our technical and admin team to determine what features to explore and push for this season’s work. Meanwhile, we had a one-on-one intake meeting with each show to get a full picture of their desired process, outcomes and needs. A month before the festival, we opened a Discord server to the entire team to ideate and iterate on and offline. All shows submitted a paper prototype cue sheet for every asset or trigger in their performance. Then our dramaturg, L Nicole Cabe, and Ferryman Collective’s Braden Roy lead conversations around the narrative theme and stitching for the acts into a cohesive run of show to be performed by our Emcees Ari Tarr and Dasha Kittredge. Two weeks before the performances, we began meeting more regularly to check-in, troubleshoot, and stress test the performances and platform. Active Replica and myself absorbed messaging, marketing and ticketing to let the performers focus on their work.
The scope of this structure allowed me to focus on how to grow our community and audience, leading to showcasing our artists’ work as part of larger festivals, like FIVARS. The impact of this megaphone were seen and felt immediately, in fact, we secured more tickets and revenue before our first performance than the entirety of any of our previous productions.
The Festival of International Virtual and Augmented Reality Stories focuses on curating the best immersive story-driven content from around the world with the aim of exploring and nurturing this platform for new narrative forms. FIVARS was the first Canadian festival of its kind featuring many world premieres and in our preview screenings and events, audience responses are consistently full of contemplation, surprise, delight, controversy and wonder. (FIVARS Wikipedia page)
OnBoardXR presented two live shows at FIVARS on October 26 and November 2 to sold-out audiences, delightful feedback and remarkably compelling data about the growing adoption of VR performance.
We had double the attendees despite only half the page views on Eventbrite (compared to OBXR2) and we received almost 20 additional signups from FIVARS. In fact, we had more tickets “sold” prior to our opening show than total attendance of any other OnBoardXR series.
Device Used
Remarkable to see the standalone headset market bringing almost half our audience, while a healthy 5%+ on phone/tablet. We are proudly walking the walk when it comes to accessibility in this emerging modality!
Newcomers
This is my favorite data point as we see an increase each and every season! Adoption is happening, folks! Absolutely blown away to see that we are over 25% of attendees first VR Live Performance...or even first VR Experience! That's so friggin' cool!!!! Taking one step back, over half our audience had seen none or only one Live VR Performance prior to OB3!
Our series is a Pay What You Want event. Across 12 shows, donations averaged $12.15 per ticket. This is up from $11 last season and $12 our first season. 100% of attendees chose to pay something for their ticket, with FIVARS attendees showing the willingness to pay $45 for a festival pass that included a complimentary ticket to OnBoardXR. Overall, I am impressed to see 1/4th of our audience comfortable paying $15+ for our work.