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• 1 2015-11-17T14:06:46-08:00 The Role of the Audience in Sleep No More: The Choice is Yours 20 By: Yuka Niwa image_header 2015-11-23T19:03:00-08:00

  The Sleep No More experience begins the moment you relinquish your coat and bag as you enter the antiquated Scottish hotel. You are first given a memoir, whether it be a card, ring, or both, and are then asked to enter a dark zig-zagged hallway. The hallway is narrow, allowing only a single file line, and you are bombarded with eerie noises as you maneuver yourself in the dark, trying to figure out whether you should turn left or right. This sensation mirrors Alice falling down the rabbit hole and you are disorientated. Upon reaching the end of the tunnel, you are greeted by a dimly lit bar with a handsome host and hostess entertaining the crowd. It is already unclear whether your are still in New York City or not. However, it is not until you are asked to put on a white Venetian mask, to keep silent, are you ushered into an elevator and allowed to enter yet another alternate universe, the Shakespearean world of Macbeth as an anonymous ghost. “Fair is Foul, and foul is fair, hover through the fog and filthy air.” (1.1.11-12)

   

  The play is meant to be “interactive”. From the beginning you are encouraged by the givers of your anonymity to “explore” and discover “secrets” of the world beyond the bar, which in of itself is already an alternate space. The masks are meant to serve as a barrier, or a protection from the characters so that you many fearlessly rifle through their things as they scurry off to the next scene in their act. However, as a result of all the “guests of the hotel” wearing the same mask, they also serve as an indicator of your identity as an audience member, separating you from characters such as, Lady Macbeth and Duncan who spend their time sometimes ignoring and avoiding you completely or purposely trying to get your participation. What is interesting about the performance is the fluidity of your role as an audience member. Throughout the play you are constantly given the choice of what you want to do while inside the infernal space. You can follow various characters and “observe” what they do, and what is going on, you can ignore the majority of the storyline and spend your time trying to discover the secret rooms hidden throughout the hotel, or you can chase down specific characters until you are granted a “one-on-one” experience. As a result of these choices, you can constantly change roles of being either an observer or a participant in the performance.

   

  For our “Underworld Journeys” in this course, we have analyzed different kinds of texts, each which required either “passive” reading or “interactive playing”. With texts such as Macbeth or Dante’s Inferno, you are unable to “physically” enter the text and therefore are only able to read and analyze them. With texts such as UnderTale, interactivity is as much of a key component as reading and following the storyline is. You are given choices to make, that can affect your gameplay and ultimately your ending. Although “passive reading” may seem as though it is less engaging than being able modify the storyline, what you are actually doing is mentally engaging, critically thinking, and performing close readings. Although Sleep No More seems as though it is a text that seems as though you could only get the most out of it if you constantly try to physically engage yourself with the action and the characters, you are able to get just as much out of it by merely being an observer of the surroundings and the storyline. As an observer you are able perform a close reading of the actions of the actors. Instead of chasing after a character, you can examine what they left behind. For example, I entered a room right has Macbeth received his prophecy stating that he would become king. Instead of following him and the crowd behind him when he left, I decided to see what the card he left behind was. It was the King of Hearts, and at that moment I learned something that I would have missed if I had only chosen to engage with the character. “All hail, Macbeth! Hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor!” (1.3.49-50)

   

  My approach to Sleep No More differed to what seemed to be the average response. I wanted to understand the story as a whole, so I followed not only the various characters of the play, but also spent time exploring the “empty” spaces once the actors had finished their scene in a room and the huge crowd of people had left with them. However, during the times where I thought I had the room or corner behind the lobby counter to myself, the action would somehow find me, and in those situations I decided to run away rather than retrieving the keys Lady Macduff wanted or coming forth when beckoned by the Porter. I decided to stand by my choice of being an observer, to choose who I wanted to follow, or not follow, and in return had the opportunity to better understand the whole story.  As an observer you become a part of the text without even realizing it. You are constantly observing the actions of the characters as a whole, and are constantly performing close readings.

   

  Some may advocate to engage in the storying by chasing the characters and that “one-on-one experience”, however there are discoveries to be made by merely being an audience member. After all, you never know what you are missing when you are getting that solo experience with an actor, unless of course, you return.