Repossessing Spectatorship in Immersive Theatre and Virtual Reality

Repossessing Spectatorship in Immersive Theatre and Virtual Reality proposes that material constructions borne by the ambitions of “immersion” do not fulfill their intended purpose: total passage to the reality of the performance. These materially constructed doorframes are not fully functional portals, as they ultimately have no bearing on the impassable barrier between our actuality and the virtual reality of a performance. Due to that barrier, encounters with the reality of a performance are still necessarily virtual; the spectator’s perception must traverse the performance through a sort of astral projection, as a dis/embodied ghost still tethered to corporeality and ultimately returning to it. Although these doorframes reveal and conceal no more than the actuality that already haunts spectators, these constructions produce exciting new theatre practices. Through a combination of the author’s embodied research, interviews with immersive theatre practitioners, and performance theory related to immersion, embodiment, and liveness, Repossessing Spectatorship in Immersive Theatre and Virtual Reality explores two contemporary case studies of immersive theatre that model the virtual reality headset as a visible, tangible example of one such “doorframe.” These case studies both integrate the virtual reality headset for the sake of immersion: 1. Tequila Works’s The Invisible Hours, one title in an expressly immersive and theatrical genre of virtual reality (VR) gaming, and 2. The University of Iowa’s Elevator #7, a mixed-reality production that adds an additional layer of tangible stimuli through live theatre, in order to supplement the immersive experience of wearing the headset. This thesis articulates its larger, abstract argument about spectatorship by tracing these case studies’ applications of the VR headset. Overall, Repossessing Spectatorship in Immersive Theatre and Virtual Reality encourages a reframing of the idea of immersion, away from total passage and toward a conscious repossession of the corporeal body in virtual visitation with a performance.