Abstract
She stabbed him repeatedly; his knuckles drained white as he gripped the edges of his iPad; he gasped audibly, then scrambled to his feet and quickly disembarked the train. I am referring to my tube journey a few mornings ago, when I observed a fellow passenger watching the particularly horrific murder of Bill by Villanelle in an episode from the BBC hit drama, Killing Eve. My experience mediated between the on-screen visuals, the subtitles, and this passenger’s extraordinary moment-by-moment reactions. It made a truly memorable live performance, and inspired me to reflect on the performative nature of responses to audio-visual material. The ubiquity of today’s technology means that we consume TV shows, films, vlogs and music, in a range of public spaces where others around us are privy, to a greater or lesser degree, to what we are consuming. Performative consumption of popular culture is something we all engage with, perhaps unknowingly creating what I am going to call (tentatively) a new improvisatory genre of active reception.
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