Saturday, March 16, 2013
Productions breathe new life into robotic-play genre
TribLIVE: They blink and breathe and speak like their fellow castmates.
But not all of the actors in “Sayonara” and “I, Robot” are humans; they are androids and robots.
Having a robot character is nothing new.
In 1920, Karel Capek's “R.U.R.,” which popularized the word “robot,” had seven robot characters. More recently, British playwright Alan Ayckbourn's plays “Comic Potential” and “Henceforward” feature robots in pivotal roles.
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7 comments:
It sounds like an interesting production and also a step towards seeing autonomous robots on stage. This must be interesting to watch, especially hearing the actors voice coming from the robot, and how odd their interaction must seem. But offstage we are still at the point where the robot is being controlled by someone. It gets a lot more interesting when there is enough AI software for a robot to function as an actor. An actor that would be able to respond well to messed up lines or cues like any professional actor should be able to. Technology like this is being used more and more in theater so it can't be too long before we start moving in that direction.
I dont know how I would feel about watching a robot onstage. I feel like it would be boring after you get over the fact that there is a robot onstage. If it can move and talk then I guess it can act. But with that a director may as well just put a bad actor who can do one cool thing onstage. If that makes any sense. I like robots as much as the next person, but there are probably better uses for the technology besides just watching it move and perform.
This sounds like something that was proposed during one of our presentations in Foundations II. And we all know, that although those were fun, half of the plans just didn't seem feasible or even all that good. If the robot were as fluid, as exciting to watch, as a human, that might be different. But even the most advance robots move more slowly and speak more choppily than human actors. The technology is great, and maybe experimentation in some settings isn't too bad of a step forward. But as far as large scale productions go, I just don't see integration being seamless enough yet to really work well for an audience.
I understand where Simone and Kassondra are saying about what a robot's performance would be lacking compared to a human's, but I think we're thinking about the wrong thing here. There is no point in comparing human actors to those robots and androids, because they are not meant to appear on stage as humans. They are meant to appear on stage as robots, and I'm sure they are real good at that.
I am a big fan of shows that are about/use computers, social media, technology, and now robots! All these elements have become or are becoming a major part of our society, and it makes sense to include them in the art that is being produced now. After all, what is art but a commentary on what we know?
I can't wait to see where shows involving robots go in the future, I think there is a lot of potential to do some interesting things with the technology. And I wish I'd known about this show earlier than a week after it was performed in Pittsburgh, because I would've really liked to go and check it out myself.
I agree with Camille that there is no point in comparing robot actors to human actors when they're meant to play robots. I don't think that there is any chance of robots taking over for human actors, not for a long while, between control issues, and the problem of overcoming the uncanny value. I do love watching as theatre changes to follow the changes in technology.
It doesn't sound like we're talking about "robots" here. These sound like mechanized puppets. There is a lot of argument over the definition of "robot," and really it's the term that is used loosely. In my mind, a robot carries out its function without human intervention. Anything else is just fancy RC. Robots are programmed and then run on their own, not controlled remotely as in the case of these short plays. This may be just a argument of semantics, but if the possibility of "robots" on stage interacting with actors is interesting, then autonomous robots onstage would be much more interesting in my opinion. Imagine a robot programmed to respond to its environment that includes lines and movements prompted by the activity or communication of an actor, or even other robots. Like the Roomba that sucks up your kitten's tail, the results would be predictable only to an extent, which of course would be half the fun. All live performance is inherently on the edge of fiasco at all times, which is part of the draw, and deep down, everyone loves a train-wreck. The real issue with autonomous robots on stage is the potential for bodily harm to the human actors. Once robotics can be controlled to the extent where potential for injury is mitigated, I think we will see more forays into this genre that will be more interesting than these remote controlled animatrons.
This is something I really want to see more in theatre. I know that I really want to try working in robots to a show some time in the next few years. Using robots defiantly has a lot of challenges, but so does everything we do in theatre, and the advantages can be worth it if done right. I think that the actors comments on working with a robot are really intresting. I actually feel that the biggest problem with using robots on stage is the humans working with them not the actually tech problems that come with robots. Over the next few years I see robots becoming much easier to use and cheaper. Hopefully this will let us see more robots on stage.
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