“Karen” by Blast Theory (2015) Analysis

When my parents says that we are going to the theatre tonight, they mean we are going to a nice building with air conditioning, sitting is some comfy seats, and that we will be entertained. We will watch others perform a story. After two to three hours we will get up and take a taxi home. Blast Theory is a collective from the UK who blows this set up into dust. At the moment, I am experiencing their project Karen that is a digital life coach who you speak with every day. This project in collaboration with national Theatre Wales takes us into the realm of intimacy, entertainment and the uncanny. One interacts with this piece through an app on your phone. You begin and it feels like a real Skype type conversation, and then the questions begin. They reach these themes through use of advanced technology, play with how humans interact ion the digital age, and trust.

The media technology behind this is a phone app and the analysis of hundreds of personality tests. Karen asks you questions and you answer in words or a sliding scale from agree to disagree. From the questions you have answered behind the scenes technology processes that data to come to conclusions that seem almost magical. It seems as if Karen has been spying on you. “We’re interested in the intimacy of mobile phones,” Matt Adams, one of the creators, said. “How they might be thought of as a cultural space. Karen was an opportunity to take this strategy further — how you might engage with a fictional character who is software-driven.’ Phones are a part of everyday life, so Blast Theory harnessed that technology to put it towards a different end then normal. Phones are as much of a cultural space as a coffee shop. One can chat or pontificate with or at others with a touch of the screen. Karen is successful in that it extends theatre using fairly simple technology that’s already in our pocket.

Phones are how we as a society now live. The NY Times reported “The Pew Research Center survey found 63 percent of mobile phone owners now use their phone to go online. And because 91 percent of Americans now own a cell phone, this means that 57 percent are cell Internet users.” Blast theory is building on this societal mechanism, which is constant in our lives. One goes to dinner and everyone is on his or her phone. People use it for fitness tracking, calendar, research, entertainment, and actual mental health. There are many actual therapy apps such as Talkspace, My Psych, and Couples Counseling. People use these in moments of desperation and on a daily basis. The space Karen plays with is really a way people reach out for help. Karen allows people to naturally slip into this world of theater. It’s not jolting like leaving a street and going into a luxurious theatre. I pulled out this piece of theater and watched a scene in between doing classwork in a computer lab. Karen achieves the goal of integrating into my life through using the space and terminology that I am used to.

This use of technology does more than take us out of a white box gallery space or theater, it immerses theatre into our every day lives and breaks down barriers. Guy Debord wrote in Towards a Situationist International from 1957 “The most general aim must be to broaden the non-mediocre portion of, to reduce its empty moments as much as possible” (97). This from of expanding theatre is the epitome of reducing empty moments. If you have a free second in between riveting action in life, you can call up Karen and have a chat about your day. This is a way to have immersive theatre enter people’s lives and all that is required is a smartphone. This form of theatre is quite strong because it breaks down barriers such as transportation and intimidation. No one is nervous to type on their phone but many people are scared or lack the ability to pay for a ticket and get to a major theatre. The way technology is expanded in this piece is required to get the message across and introduces the world to a new way to interact with performance.

The premise of this piece is to play with our relationship with big data and the way in which corporations quietly collect data on us for their own use. This combines with the makers research into psychotherapy to create a disturbingly uncanny experience. Evgeny Morozov the author of The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom called out the “disturbing trend whereby our personal information—rather than money—becomes the chief way in which we pay for services—and soon, perhaps, everyday objects—that we use.” Karen does not cost paper money unlike most theatre pieces but it does require vast amounts of personal data to interact with it. The user has to answer on a sliding scale how they feel about themselves, how smart they think they are, and how happy their childhood was. I wouldn’t want this info getting to my professors, bosses, or parents! Yet to interact one must continue. This is the same as using gmail or facebook. Google’s terms of use state “Our automated systems analyze your content (including emails) to provide you personally relevant product features, such as customized search results, tailored advertising, and spam and malware detection. This analysis occurs as the content is sent, received, and when it is stored.” That means Google is checking for keywords to let advertisers know whom to target. Our everyday is affected by big data like Google’s ad system, we just don’t normally notice. Karen is a form of this, but more in your face. She asks you personal questions and you don’t really trust her but you give it anyway. The questions range from quite tame to intensely personal as time goes on. She then analyses that data and assumes things about you. These conclusions tend to be true which is the scary part.

This work is stunningly invasive which calls to mind the subtlety of the big data giants and the way in which humans automatically trust them. The app sends you notifications late at night to remind you to call Karen. Half an hour after our fourth call, she calls me again. This time she shows me a man she lives with stark naked. Logically you know this is not real, but your mind is unable to separate this interaction from the reality of talking to someone, seeing his or her facial expressions. Karen becomes part of your life, a hectic part. Karen plays with how humans trust and interact with each other. Trust is an integral part of being part of a functioning human society. Amanda Palmer, a musician and do-gooder, said, “When you trust people to help you, they often do“. Karen sets of this situation where we are encouraged to trust her yet something feels off. She looks (really sees nothing) at you and it feels just as real as skyping your parents. The user trusts Karen as a life coach to help, but she is not helping you.

Karen is using the power of everyday instead of relying on fantastical. Seen through the exact wording of Technology and the Avant Garde by Terry Eagleton, this work is an absolute failure. Eagleton asserts that technology means novelty. He says, “What do all moments of modernity supposedly have in common? – just the fact that they are new, the bald formal property of novelty”. Karen is new, created in 2015, but it is not novel in its mechanisms. It is not a new form of visually enticing theatre, but it is a new way of distorting everyday life. It injects theater into the banality of a phone and our everyday. Karen is successful if seen through the core sentiment of this writing. Eagleton seems to mean that new ways of using technology in theatre captures people’s attention which allows the creator to assert his or her own moral imperative onto the viewer. Karen is not a new exciting firework, but it is an extension of non-typical theatre. Eagleton would be amazed by what Karen is able to produce in the viewer.

Karen is building on our relationship with corporations, our trust in technology, and our state of being, quite well, but the question is if it succeeded as a piece of theatre. Theater entertains and educates. It amazes and frees. This piece in not glittering on a Broadway stage and never will be. It relies on blending into the continuation of daily life. It succeeds in planting itself into your actions. You get a notification and you stop what you are doing and experience Karen. Karen cannot be escaped or forgotten because your phone will remind you. This work does not allow you to be an ambivalent spectator; you have to divulge your dark secrets to this sentient program. This piece is successful because it extends the way one interacts with theater while presenting interesting technological and moral issues. It takes on the issue of how we trust big data while entertaining the viewer/participant.

Citations:

“5 Encouraging Therapy Apps for When You Need Some Support.”Mashable. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Sept. 2015.

Asay, Matt. “”Big Data Ethics” Sound Great, But They Won’t Stop The NSA—Or Facebook.” Weblog post. Readwrite. N.p., 24 Nov. 2014. Web. 16 Sept. 2015.

Debord, Guy. “Towards a Situationist international.” in Bishop, Claire. “Participation, Whitechapel”, 2006.

Eagleton, Terry. “Cultural Technology and the Avant Garde”, from CULT 2001 Conference Copenhagen, 2001.

“Google Terms of Service – Privacy & Terms – Google.” Google Terms of Service – Privacy & Terms – Google. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Sept. 2015.

“Phones Growing as Primary Source of Internet.” NY Daily News. N.p., n.d. Web. 17 Sept. 2015.

Rancière, Jacques. “The emancipated spectator”. Verso Books, 2014.

Rose, Frank. “Karen, an App That Knows You All Too Well.” The New York Times. The New York Times, 04 Apr. 2015. Web. 17 Sept. 2015.

Vimeo / Blast Theory – via Iframely