Emergence
"You'll love your children no matter what they turn out to be."
Emergence is an experiment in social interaction, governance and human development. A Choose Your Own Adventure tale with more than one reader and more than one possible outcome.
Emergence is a fascinating exploration into what a group believes makes for a human being. Personality traits and emotional connectivity as dictated by the many for the few. Or in this case, the one. The standard parenting rule of "do as I say, not as I do" falls into effect with this experiment.
The Department Head (Richard Cartwright) keeps the night in check with a mix of an affable and apologetic sense of humour. The Head outlines the rules of the game with simple and straightforward instructions. Though with directions mainly involving moving into one of two coloured sections of the studio, there's less on the host if that isn't simple enough to follow.
Nick Curnow, who plays Ram, the creature being sculpted and bred, cunningly solicits sympathy all the while simmering with an underlying creepiness. Even when lying asleep in his cot. On each step along his development, Ram manages to hold onto both qualities with an unnerving charm. Fragility with a slight distance to his eyes carrying forth his tortured and potential soul.
Never more than two choices are offered to the audience. A limitation on the calculation of story probability and possibly as a way to limit the need to have the story makers over think as they're being entertained. While the group may work on consensus in the initial stages, the quiet conflict arising between breaks down decisions into that of a democracy.
Synarcade (click left for more info) do a fantastic job in blending pre-recorded segments with live interaction. Seamless in the overlap, the vjammers keep the audience guessing at which is which and are never really certain either way. A wonderfully deceptive achievement, though when Ram takes the stage it's clear that that is most definitely not pre-recorded.
An industrial noise permeates the soundscape with a visceral energy of a mechanical heartbeat. Sounds of which envelop the environment in this raw feeling of a science lab inside a fun house. However strange that may seem.
Given that no two performances are ever the same, every show of Emergence is as individual as the mix of people standing around the theatre as they move the narrative to what they believe to be in the best interests of their creation and the story at large.
According to the producer, Mark Bolotin, Tuesday night's audience created a monster.
Lovingly, he was set free into the world.
Emergence played at The Studio, Sydney Opera House, as part of the Scratch Nights development program, for three nights only in October 2005.
Soon Van
Published October 2005 at The Program - NSW Stage reviews
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