Schedule

My narrative design and writing work has covered the range from more traditional game writing and narrative path design to procedural narrative designs making use of storylet systems, character simulation and procedural content generation. In this talk I survey some of my design experiences and share the hard-won lessons learned.

What are the daunting cultural problems of the digital age as they relate to performance? How can ancient thinkers give rise to solutions to modern problems? Michael Chemers rejects the incompatibility of theatre with robots, digital media, or video games. Instead, he argues that technology is the original problem of theatre: How can we tell this story and move this audience with these tools? And if we have different tools, how can that change the stories we tell? This talk will attune listeners to the concept of “systemic dramaturgy”—the recursive elements of signification, innovation, and history that underlie all performance—arguing that theatre must be understood as a system of systems, a concatenation of people, places, things, politics, feelings, and interpretations, ideally working together to entertain and edify an audience. He will discuss the application of time-tested dramaturgical skills to extra-theatrical endeavors, including multi-platform performance, installations, and videogames. And they identify the unique interventions that dramaturgs can and must make into these art forms.

Marianne will present an artist talk covering several of her experimental theater productions combining live theater with digital storytelling and performance technologies. Her productions often address issues in labor politics, and the impact that transactional technologies have had on labor practices in America and abroad. She has created performances about outsourcing and corporate colonialism, governmental and commercial dataveillance, and the role of online Amazon workers in the gig economy.