by Noah J Nelson | Aug, 2022 | No Proscenium: East of Los Angeles, in an unassuming strip mall just off of Route 66 one can find a portal to the strange: The Ministry of Peculiarities. In the brief time that the Ministry has been revealed to the public, the Ministry’s Hope End experience has developed the reputation for being one of the best escape games in Southern California.
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One of the more underrepresented types of theatre in my opinion is immersive theatre; when learning about theatrical design, a lot of what is discussed deals with live theatre on a stage, but not the immersive spheres. One of the first points about this article that caught my eye was that this specific venue is within a strip mall, which is an oddly specific detail unless you understand the economic downfall of strip malls and other in-person shopping experiences within the past decade. Within the article, the The Ministry Of Peculiarities asked some really interesting questions:
- What does “immersive” mean to you, and what terms do you use when talking about your own work?
-What should every creator be thinking about first and foremost when designing for the audience?
-What did you wish you knew when you were starting out with this stuff and what’s the one thing you’d tell a creator starting out today?
-Why do this kind of work and not something more “traditional” that might have more mainstream appeal at the moment?
-What inspirations — and anything is fair game here — are currently shaping your creative practice?
These questions are some really important questions for not just the immersive field, but the creative theatre field as a whole. Specifically, I think their most interesting answer was to their response to the third question, asking what they wished they knew starting out, and this was their response: “”I think one thing that all of us at TMoP can agree on is that the road to creating isn’t always direct and it will be met with challenges, both monetary and conceptual. We designed Hope End for people that are fully willing to assume a role and explore choices from the moment they walk in the lobby, but there are also those who prefer puzzles and environment to narrative, and a surprising amount of those who have never done an escape room or immersive show before. Taking a concept to reality means adapting to unexpected events as they arise and working within your capabilities.” (https://noproscenium.com/the-immersive-5-with-the-ministry-of-peculiarities-e44489f87bfc).” I think this is one of the most powerful statements from the article, because it goes to show that designers are often faced with ideas and concepts they have never been presented with before, and the best way to adapt to said environment is to work with what you know, and build your skill sets from there. Even though immersive theatre is not the first type of theatre most people think of, it is a very important part of the entertainment field as a whole, and being able to adapt to the creative abnormalities of the industry is key to becoming a more well rounded designer.
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