SPACE IS THE THEATRICAL PLACE

... continued from yesterday.

"It's an Emily Dickinson poem," Edgware Marker explains, reciting the text of the tattoo that runs across his chest. "'Tell all the truth but tell it slant...'"

‘Slant’ is also one of the names Edgware gave to his in-world theatrical project. We’re standing in the space station that Starax Statosky created for him, which is actually a set, intended for one of the group's debut performances. “[It’s for a] short play I wrote," he says. "[M]ore as a way to get things started, to see what the experience is like.” (The play’s pitch, says Marker: “An alien travels to earth exploring the notion of humanity.”)

“I am interested in the relation between these kinds of environments and (experimental) theatre,” Marker continues, “So, I want to create a theatre space in Second Life. Partially to explore the idea. Partially because I love theatre.” To do that, he’s bought the rental rights to two adjoining sims, Norwall and Backstage. (“One was supposed to be more of a backstage working area,” he explains, “the other for performances. I don’t know if it will actually work that way.”)

At some US$400 a month, it’s quite a price to pay for an experimental staging area. But, Marker says, “Compared to renting real life theatre space, it is pretty cheap... two sims cost less than a space in a parking garage in New York City.” So the main task for him now is to find a company of players and artisans, to help him bring his live stage productions to life.

“One of the challenges I am finding here is the lack of interest that people have in ‘serious’ theatre,” he says. “I really am not interested in doing bad theatre.”

“By ‘serious’,” I ask, “do you mean like highbrow, abstract, Brechtian or absurdist or experimental, [that] sort of thing?”

”Any of those would be fine. Perhaps ‘professional’ quality would be a better way to describe it… I see lots of theatre of all different kinds [and] I think the possibilities here are fairly unique-- and the limitations are unique as well.”

Edgware asks me if I’ve come across other residents interested in bringing theater to Second Life, and I refer him to a recent entry. The thing is, I point out earlier, while there have been many plays staged in Second Life, theater hasn’t quite become a regular part of the culture.

“I think I will need to look for people in the real life theatre world and bring them here to get things going,” he muses. “London is filled with people in that space.” (Originally from the States, Marker recently moved to England, where he plans to pursue graduate studies in digital culture and technology.)

“By the way,” he adds, “I am really not in a rush to get things done here-- I have a medium term vision for all this.” That sounds like a signal to wrap the interview up, for now, but as I turn to go, Edgware Marker asks: “Why do you think theatre has failed here in the past?”

“In a word,” I say, “Chat. It's just very difficult to type your dialog. I suppose you could copy/paste [it]. But even then, you go into that weird typing mime.” (In Second Life, when users enter dialog into their chat window, their avatars’ hands go into a pantomimed motion of typing.)

“With [custom] animations you can get rid of that easily,” Marker suggests. I nod. “I am thinking of combining text and actual sound,” he continues. “And if actors memorize their lines, or use pre-programmed dialog…”

We talk some more about the feasibility of bringing theater in-world. “Ultimately,” Marker concludes, “I think this will work by having the ‘audience’ play the parts. Rather than watching Hamlet (not you, the other one), one could be Hamlet. I think that is where the real fun will come in… it's premature at the moment, technology is not quite there, but six-twelve months? Perhaps.”

“Meanwhile,” I note, “you have a space station to play with.”

The bald man with the Emily Dickinson tattoo smiles. “Yes.”