Brisbane Festival 2017
CASE STUDY
Guilty or Not Guilty? - Placing the Audience in the Jury Seat
Congress Rental assisted in breaking the fourth wall for the Brisbane performance of the controversial Terror Play in September 2017.
The courtroom drama asked the audience to become both the judge and jury of a mock courtroom trial that evoked moral and ethical dilemmas for all audience participants. The play follows the trial of pilot Major Lars Koch, who is tried for the murder of 164 people which, he claims, was to save a further 70,000 lives.
The revolutionary Terror Play breaks down the boundaries between the audience and the stage by asking the viewers to decide the pilot’s fate by voting ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty’ at the end of the performance.
The play ran over five consecutive nights throughout Brisbane Festival, and each night the audience gave a different verdict. Congress Rental supplied the audience with 850 keypads which provided instantaneous results for the show.
Each keypad was fastened to the seat in the theatre so audience members could vote with ease at the end of the show.
The courtroom drama asked the audience to become both the judge and jury of a mock courtroom trial that evoked moral and ethical dilemmas for all audience participants.
The Congress Rental technicians had an additional laptop on-hand for redundancy in case of any errors to ensure precision.
The numbers on the keypads were used to determine the verdict of the pilot’s fate, with 1 indicating “Guilty”, and 2 indicating “Not Guilty”. Each audience member could change their vote within the 45-second time frame and only their last vote was counted in the results.
The Congress Rental team performed rigorous testing to ensure that all 850 keypads were running perfectly. Each keypad underwent a trial vote and the room was analysed for any potential 2.4 GHz interference. Each keypad delivered a wireless signal to the seven base-stations located with our technicians at the back of the stage.
The show laptop then collected the data from the base stations to collate the results from the audience. Another laptop with a direct connection to the judge on stage was also used to deliver the results at the end of each performance. The Congress Rental technicians had an additional laptop on-hand for redundancy in case of any errors to ensure precision.
Congress Rental supplied the audience with 850 keypads which provided instantaneous results for the show.