foolsFURY is a theater ensemble from San Francisco that sees advantages in working with playwrights and devisors, and seizes opportunities to become a touring company. As they come up on their fifteenth year, artistic director Ben Yalom sheds some light on their transitions, and lets me in on how they are working toward what is next artistically and financially.

Alvina Krause, one of twentieth century’s most famous teachers of acting, believed, “if you can act Chekhov, you can act anything!” In the summer of 1976 she was 83 years old, long retired, yet still taking private students in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania. Little did she know that seven students from Northwestern University in Chicago would come to study “acting Chekhov” with her, and end up settling into the town for a much longer stay as the Bloomsburg Theatre Ensemble (BTE).

Creating ensemble-based theater is one thing. Paying for it is another. Jeffrey Mosser does three case studies of established ensemble theaters exploring the creating and paying for the art.

Over the eight hours of How to Build a Forest audience engagement was varied…. I sat on stage briefly while the forest grew. The “Builders” had a goal, and worked around me; I never got the feeling that they were “acting”—or that there was any sense of urgency. Every member of the Forest cast was present. In addition, Builders would occasionally come into the audience and open up a conversation by describing what was happening on stage. 

Can the audience play? How much can the audience play? Are they in control? When? Where? How? Is control taken back in order to progress the story? Is there a story? Are we as creators okay not telling a story?

Once we enter a space we strive to understand the parameters—including how vital our role as an audience is. We want to hold up our end of the bargain as patrons because we came here to see the show as it was intended. The degree of interaction required by the show may be active or passive, but we seek to know if we (as audience members) are important to telling the story.

Seeking insight into what makes immersive theatre work for an audience, Jeffrey Mosser observes three productions: How to Build a Forest, Sleep No More, and Mikhael Tara Garver's Fornicated From the Beatles. This four post series includes interviews with creators as well as with patrons pre and post show.