Immersive Theater Production · 2014–2015
The Speakeasy
Audience interaction design for an ambitious immersive theater revival.
Goal & Strategy
Turn an audience of onlookers into accomplices.
Goal
Improvise with the audience without breaking immersion.
Strategy
Use common social scenarios with implicit scripts we already know.
The Project
The Speakeasy is an acclaimed immersive theater production set in a fully realized 1920s nightclub—cabaret stage, casino tables, and a working bar—hidden inside a clock shop in San Francisco. A cast of 40 performers ran and visited the club among an audience they treated as patrons.
I developed interactive experiences between cast and audience members that let guests slip from spectators into participants: an interactive radio that tuned between period stations and scenes, a bouquet to be delivered to a chorus girl, a missing wallet that, once returned to its owner in the cast, earned the finder a drink.
For about a year before opening I also ran Club 1923, the production’s pop-up speakeasy, with a full bar, live stage performances, and a casino. I opened and closed the club, managed patrons and staff, and kept the night running on schedule.
The Venue
The Experience
- 01 Robotopia
- 02 Magic Circle
- 03 The Racket
- 04 What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stranger
- 05 School Daze
- 06 See You in Heck
- 07 NDA
- 08 Elsewhere
- 09 Hoax
- 10 Fucking Medals
- 11 The Rambler Tourney
- 12 Art Hack Day: DETHRONE
- 13 The Speakeasy
- 14 The Exchange
- 15 The Department of Decontamination
- 16 Party Crashing
- 17 The Gelt Standard
- 18 Future Repasts
- 19 Alternative #Tigerstyle
- 20 The Museum of Cheeselantian Archaeology
- 21 Starship Titanica
- 22 The Order of Byzantium