We This Way

115270 original

A real air of mystery surrounds We This Way, the latest interactive theatre show from Seth Kriebel. Few details are available to guide our expectations, while he personally asks that we don't give specifics away to potential attendees. As such, a palpable tension hangs over the queue outside the theatre. The mood softens as we're greeted by the performer and handed pairs of glow sticks, but our apprehension and curiosity remain. What follows is a sustained exercise in deflating any lingering sense of excitement.

We're about to play a game, Kriebel tells us before offering permission to talk throughout. Admin out of the way, he proceeds to let rip with what is essentially a spoken choose-your-own adventure story in which decisions are reached by consensus. After our host has described a scenario, we're to hold up whatever colour glow stick corresponds with our desired course of action. Having memorised all possible outcomes, Kriebel follows the will of the majority. At certain points we hear a disembodied voice say 'again' and we're back where we started.

This format is presumably intended to facilitate a discussion on group dynamics and behaviours. We don't always learn from our mistakes, and so there's lots of repetition over the course of the show. Ultimately though, there's no sense of pay-off to justify the maddening tedium.