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Before writing a vignette, perform in a few. Playing with spects strengthens your ability to write for them. You can get started with 50 Interactive Vignettes, a collection of open-source scenarios available for download at interactiveplaylab.com/101-extras.
Exercises
Players choose an animal to become. They move about the room, embodying the animal with their bodies, voices, and attitudes. They begin as 100% animal. After fully inhabiting the animal, players become 80% animal, and 20% human. They move around in this state for a while. Then they become 60% animal and 40% human. The process continues until the players are 100% human, while still embodying the essence of the animal.
Exercises
Go where a variety of people are gathered together, e.g., on a subway, in a store, at a park. Observe individuals and guess what they might know about or be good at. Describe how you could incorporate each person’s strength if they were a spect in a given scenario.
Exercises
Think of an object that seems like your character. Identify three qualities of the object, two positive and one negative. (E.g., a shoe: comfortable, laced up, stinky.) Mingle with a group, playing as a character who embodies the qualities of the object.
Exercises
Two players look deeply into each other’s eyes. After a while, they briefly look away, and then re-establish eye contact. One says, “Hello,” and the other says, “Hello.” They hold eye contact for a while, then look away and back again. When ready, one player says, “I see you,” and the other says, “I see you.” They hold eye contact, then break and re-establish it again. When ready, one player says, “I could be hurt by you.” The other says, “I know.” They continue to hold eye contact until one looks away. Then the exercise is over.
Exercises
Two players improvise a scene in which the only line they can say is, “I love you.”
Topics
a performance where the audience is surrounded by the world of the story
Immersive theatre embeds the audience in the story world. They may sit in seats or move freely through the space. There is often a degree of spectacle. The setting is visually compelling, often with a significant sound design. It may be an elaborate set, a real-world location, or a virtual world. In any case, the audience is surrounded by the environment of the story.
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If you instruct a spect to do something, they may do it, but only because you told them to. To have a sense of agency, spects need to feel like they’re doing things because it’s what they choose to do. This is why it’s better to imply than instruct. You imply by establishing a context within which spects can connect the dots for themselves, which leads them to an action that you have in mind.
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