Culture | The Guardian: One crisp spring evening, the Wasteland Theatre Company gathered to rehearse Romeo and Juliet. Jonathan “Bram” Thomas was playing Romeo. A self-confessed Shakespeare geek, he’d graduated with a BA in theatre, and this wasn’t his first time playing one half of the star-crossed lovers. But it was the first time a mutant scorpion the size of a Jeep had rampaged on to his stage.
4 comments:
I love this idea. I remember in spring of 2020 hearing about a group that performed plays in what I believe was minecraft and though the idea was brilliant because instead of the echo of theater zoom theater can tend to be a whole new world that can be just as immersive as live theater can be brought to life. There are also so many things that could become possible in a videogame that simply are not doable in real life. During the pandemic I got to watch a conference that was brought to life using an open world system and AR. I wonder if some technology similar to video conferencing could be adapted to theater. With the use of augmented, Cad and other modeling software I could totally see a future where full scale shows were rehearsed, designed and produced on an open world software from the comfort of one's home. I had always associated AR and virtual world tech with the pandemic but I am excited to see that it is evolving for the future.
Theo
This is a great idea and I’m looking forward to what it will do in the future. As someone who have been playing video games for a decent amount of time, I love the idea that these theatrical production will be blend into video games as it is a blend between the “old” and “new” industries as theater is often being seen as old and video games seen as the younger industry. I would also love to see things similar to this in other games and maybe some of the games can be used on stage. This is such a fascinating idea and I truly look forward to the possibilities that it provides to the entertainment art and also the audiences like myself. I have played Fallout before with my friends, the map and interpretation that Fallout provides to its players similar to what Shakespeare’s work provides to its audiences.
Theater and performance has always been able to jump mediums and I think it’s pretty cool that Shakespeare has made it to videogames. There’s a very fair point in this article that bands of theatermakers large and small used to (and still do) go from town to town putting on shows - and I agree that doing this in Fallout really isn’t that different in our digital age. I would really be interested to see how they implement some parts of the performance like lighting having never played Fallout. Doing Shakespeare in particular must be interesting as well for folks who just are playing this game and wandering around to stumble on a performance of Romeo and Juliet or Midsummer. I didn’t know that Fallout had so many Shakespeare references built into the game and I’d love to figure out why. Overall this troupe is really doing something cool and entertaining folks who play Fallout, both expectedly and unexpectedly.
Ah, when my friends and I used to go on a Minecraft server, put on different skins, and perform Frozen in its entirety on a stage we built, using fireworks as Elsa’s powers. Vivid memory. I thought about that immediately when I saw this article. This kind of thing is delightful, and it’s been going on in games like this for years. There’s something beautiful about the gamers stumbling upon and experiencing Shakespeare. Absolutely WILD that they can put on a successful production in Fallout - I’m not very acquainted with the game, but I guess the mechanics of the characters can be used for adequate performance. I remember reading an article about a play VR experience, which was similar, except that it was prearranged for the audience to participate in the production. Whereas here, gamers just happening to see the show gives it this ephemeral quality. I also love that the shows are streamed on Twitch - I may have to jump over there and watch some of one.
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