The Post-Cinematic Landscape

Abstract

In recent years an increasing number of contemporary theatre works have employed a variety of mixed media and film techniques to enhance, but also potentially disturb, the perception of the worlds they create. The general term ‘intermedial theatre’ or ‘multimedia theatre’ may apply to these pieces, which range from multi-million-dollar mainstream Broadway shows and high profile opera stagings to radical avant-garde endeavours. Despite the variety of forms and aesthetics, as Freda Chappie and Chiel Kattenbelt suggest, the general form of intermedial theatre can be defined through one of its significant features, ‘the incorporation of digital technology into theatre practice, and the presence of other media within theatre productions’ (Chappie and Kattenbelt 2006b: 11). In that sense, intermedial theatre is essentially a hybrid art form encompassing theatre, film, live performance, computer generated virtual realities, communication technologies and so on. As a result, there is a blurring of generic boundaries at play which can crucially be associated with a ‘self-conscious reflexivity that displays the devices of performance in performance’ (Chappie and Kattenbelt 2006b: 11) — a process of re-perception and reconstruction through performance occurs (Chappie and Kattenbelt 2006b: 12). Thus there is more at stake here than technological innovation, since intermediality is not only a technological phenomenon but also concerns a hybridity of forms and conventions, resulting in styles that inspire different modes of perception.