Streetnotes

PLAYDATE was a cellphone-oriented, neighborhood-wide, beyond-the-stage play. Through GoPro cameras, the performance documented a cast of roving players as they performed sequenced tasks that engaged local businesses, public facilities, and various contingencies in Downtown Brooklyn, New York. The main cast and the audience were physically separated and only viewable via social media and GPS. Posts were digitally projected in the auditorium of ISSUE Project Room, a non-profit performance venue in Downtown Brooklyn. Viewers, however, could interact with the piece through their own social media accounts. By submitting comments, questions, and likes through their cell phones, viewers became part of the work and created individual perspectives with no single vantage point. In this transcribed conversation led by PLAYDATE director, Ying Liu, two players[1] (Kuan-Yi Chen and Kenneth Pietrobono) and audience members (John Matturri and Seth Cohen) share their experience of the play to figure out “What Happened” in PLAYDATE.

The director uses the term “player” to refer to the performers in PLAYDATE as it encompasses the idea of a “performer”–someone who takes direction or instruction from a director, as well as the concept of a “sportsman”–someone who responds and makes quick calls to different situations while adhering to the set direction.