Sojourn Theatre BUILT

Not knowing exactly what to expect from Sojourn Theatre’s BUILT, I pedaled south into the new South Waterfront district with an eye on the construction. There is an abundance of street signs directing multi-modal streets, which cut through towering buildings that look unused. Whatever the performance would hold, I already was thinking about building and the magnitude of what the city is undertaking here.
The piece itself consisted of many hands-on activities, independent at first, but with groups progressively growing in size. At times, the actors seemed more like facilitators, or tour guides. Techniques of having brief interaction with various media reminded me of recent Hand2Mouth theatre work. The content had to do with our priorities for living spaces and the design of an ideal city; the entire audience selected parts of a city that you would like to live near to, and distance yourself from. We were given facts about population growth in Portland over the decades to come and the inevitability of answering the question, how do we want to live? How would you like to design your community?
The emphasis was on the personal, having the audience examine our own point of view on wants versus needs, and boundaries we set for ourselves in our journey from private life to public. A good part of the theatrical piece includes an active audience; BUILT works to make the experience performative. One section of the show included a multiple-choice survey of our collective values on community issues and personal relationships. For instance, when was the last time you were in an argument? In the last day, last week, last month? Our answers were anonymously tallied and projected.
My role as audience member flowed into participant and by the end I thought of myself as having taken part in a process that we all were taking part in. These ‘active audience moments’ help frame conventional moments of watching actors; a tightrope scene features two performers in vocal dialogue about desires and needs in life, with simultaneous physical dialogue consisting in a tightrope performance. The delight of watching the dance was tempered by the voices which revealed ambiguity and fear, with personal resonance.
Posted by: Benjamin Adrian