Paper Cells

The pieces of paper used to create a cell for each individual audience member each have written on them either a lie or an accusative statement. This is intended as a visualisation of the point I make at the end of the performance, that “there are two things in this world that divide us. Lies and fear.” I did not want to state this early in the performance as I felt it would be too overt and contrived. I had hoped that maybe my audience would be able to reach their own conclusions about what it meant.

Non-Inclusion of the disabled lighter.

I intended to have a lighter with all flammable liquid removed for my performance. However, I wasn’t able to procure a lighter that had a separate spark wheel and valve operator. The only ones I could find were ones which combined the two. I wanted the components to be separate as these models are harder to light. When I would attempt to light it in the performance, it would appear as though I was struggling to light it. With a combined components lighter, it would be clear that the lighter was disabled.

Another reason for it’s non-inclusion is that the sparks from the lighter may still have posed a risk.

Cape and Beard/Over-Theatrical Introduction

One thing I aimed for in the performance was authenticity. One way in which I tried to create this was to initially introduce my self in an inauthentic, over-theatrical way, then to remove these theatrical items and perform more naturally. The removal of inauthentic elements from the show is intended to highlight how genuine the rest of the performance is.

“Remember the most annoying irritating thing that’s happened to you this past week.”

I tried to apply the psychological theory of ‘Gradual Commitment’ to the performance. By asking an open question near the beginning, I wanted to begin a dialogue with the audience and make them aware that they may be asked for their input. As the performance continued, I wanted them to be more prepared to co-operate when I’d ask them to name a horrific crime and later to be more open to the suggestion of burning another audience member alive.

Due to time constraints, this section was cut from the main body of the performance. Instead, an abridged version was done while the audience were entering the studio.

“Ladies and Gentleman. Among you is a [perpetrator of what ever crime they named]”

This was intended to spark curiosity over who among them it might be.

Salem incident description.

I wanted to present the facts about how one of the most notorious witch hunts began to give some context for my performance and to lead into the interview I did afterwards. However, I didn’t want to fully explain these facts or give my opinions on them because hopefully my audience would be capable of forming their own opinions.

“I’m going to calmly ask this monster if he has anything to say in his defense.”

This was changed in the performance to, “do you have anything to say in your defense?” I did this after I realised that asking an individual to answer an open question with no preparation time and a lot of pressure to give an answer usually leads them to giving a basic answer despite the fact the question called for more. In this case, “I didn’t do it” was the answer I received. By pressuring the ‘perpetrator’ into a weak defense, I’m able to make a stronger case against them on an emotional level, not a logical level, that this person was the villain they were hunting.

Masks.

When people have something that obscures their identity, even slightly, they are more likely to act irrationally, aggressively and violently, eg. wearing a hood, tribal war paint, Guy Fawkes mask. This isn’t just because they are less likely to face repercussions, but because the anonymity the mask brings makes people ignore social conventions and societal norms, they are more likely to make decisions based on emotion rather than reason. So when a group come together who anonymised by masks or something similar, they operate on a pack mentality.

Although I knew I could not truly replicate the effect, I thought that by giving each member of my ‘angry mob’ a mask to wear, they would gain an insight into what was like to be part of such a group.

The lack of a joker card.

Because I never gave out a joker to anyone, nobody was assigned the role of the ‘perpetrator’. The point I tried to make was that despite the fact there was no ‘perpetrator’, some one got persecuted anyway. As with many moral panics, this persecution was kick-started by a lie.