Boho Interactive +
Applespiel in Association with The Street
Devised and presented
by Nikki Kennedy, Nathan Harrison, David Shaw, Rachel Roberts, David Finnigan
Designed by Gary
Campbell
The Street Theatre to
22nd August 2015
Review by Len Power 14 August 2015
If you enjoy those management course hypotheticals or just an
evening with friends playing a board game, ‘Best Festival Ever: How To Manage A
Disaster’ has all the elements of those experiences but on a larger, more
theatrical scale.
Boho Interactive is a science-theatre ensemble from Canberra
who produce interactive performances based on sciences including Game Theory,
Complex Systems science and Network Theory.
For this production they are joined by members of Applespiel collective
from Sydney.
At the show I participated in, there were 32 of us around a
long table in the Street Theatre’s intimate Street Two space which had been
dressed and lit to create a living room ambience complete with red curtains, bar
and standard lamp. The goal of the evening
was for the group to experience what it takes to create a music festival and
run it successfully.
Cleverly managed by facilitating performers, participants were
quickly drawn into an entertaining scenario with the table top representing a farmland
space with a river running through it where a music festival was scheduled to
be presented. We were required to choose
the artists who would perform at the festival and build the necessary infrastructure
while ensuring the environment was impacted as little as possible. Little did we know that a potential disaster
was waiting for us to manage as well!
A lot of imagination has gone into the design of the elements
of the experience. The series of games played
as the scenario progresses were amusing and involving and managed in a way that
no participant would feel intimidated. We
really had a great time while being educated about the sciences underlying the
whole experience.
At the end of the game we were given a choice of drinks from
the bar set up in the space and then Nicky Grigg from the CSIRO, who had also participated
in the game, gave us a very interesting academic’s perspective on the sciences
behind the experience. The guest speaker
will be different at every performance.
This was a highly entertaining and instructive experience. You’ll learn a lot but you’ll also have a lot
of fun.
Len Power’s reviews
are also broadcast in the ‘Artcetera’ program on Artsound FM 92.7 on Saturdays
from 9am.
