Rising Ape Collective

Interactive theatre, games and events with big ideas

Tag: theatre

2 minutes with Tom the Scientist from Publish or Perish

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Rising Ape Collective are busy preparing our next live action choose-your-own-adventure show.

During rehearsal last week we found a befuddled scientist wandering around backstage and demanded he explain himself.

Oi. Who are you and where have you come from?

Hi, I’m Tom the Scientist. No last name I’m afraid. I’m a pretty one dimensional character right now but I really feel like I’ve got a lot of potential. 

As far as I can tell, I was grown in a big fish tank by Rising Ape Labs. I emerged last year, fully formed and ready for science and have been sciencing away in their Publish or Perish show ever since.

You seem a bit unsure of yourself. Why is that? 

The problem is that my history, character and actual behaviour are all decided for me each night by this weird group of people called an ‘audience’ so it’s hard to know anything for certain in my life.

Well can you at least tell us why the show is called Publish or Perish?

As you probably know, publishing research papers is a really big deal and I’ve got a big deadline for a very important paper coming up. I should make it as long as I’m not distracted by any bizzare characters or side quests.

The ‘perish’ part is quite worrying, personally. There are rumours around the uni that a shadowy yet powerful cabal exact painful punishments on those who fail their departments. But as long as the audience make the right choices for me, I’m sure I’ll be fine. I hope so anyway.

How does it feel to have your destiny completely out of your hands each night? 

It’s actually pretty exciting. Last week I had to go to the Moon to research the best way to put tiny hats on spiders. I guess it must have made sense at the time.

Wild stuff. Any advice for audience members aspiring to be a researcher? 

The best way to put a tiny hat on a spider is to open a tiny hat shop. They just come in and try them on themselves!

Thanks, Tom. We can’t wait to decide your fate!

Rising Ape Collective perform Publish or Perish on Saturday 22 February at The Room Above, Bristol, as part of a comedy double bill with improvisers The Free Radicals.  Book your tickets now

Publish or Perish @Bristol Improv Theatre – Recap & photos

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‘Is Taylor Swift really swift?’ With this crowd-sourced question pulled from a top hat, the audience of Play This Show! loaded up Publish or Perish and took control of luckless PhD student, Tom, to start their journey into the world of fantasy academia.

As ever, the course of good research never did run smooth. Together, the audience faced down nagging undergraduates, impossible deadlines, shadowy senior management figures, office equipment come to life, and overcame them all. They drank coffee, they let down their friends, they gained and (mainly) lost health, they even became a fantastic machine for measuring cow manure. They survived. Just.

I loved being able to vote on the outcomes and the actors’ amazing ability to make things up on the spot. Also I’ve never laughed so much for so long… (the show) really brought an audience of strangers together in a way that I didn’t think was possible!

– Jennie, audience member and player

Thanks to everyone for coming and being such willing participants of this weird, hard-to-describe show. Putting you in control of the action can feel terrifying so we were genuinely blown away by the generous response and the imagination you demonstrated throughout. Huge thanks also to Alistair Aitcheson and his Incredible Playable Show in the second half- Who knew we’d all enjoy becoming supermarket managers so much?

Enjoy the pictures of the nonsense below (thanks to James Pepper for the photography) and look out for the next chance to ‘Play This Show’!

 

Play This Show double bill – 12th April at Bristol Improv Theatre

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We’re teaming up with award-winning game developer Alistair Aitcheson to bring you Play This Show, a night of playable and improvised comedy featuring two shows like nothing else on stage- well, like nothing else on a Thursday night in April anyway.

Grab your tickets now from the Bristol Improv Theatre website

Publish or Perish

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Publish or Perish is the choose-your-own-adventure show where the whole audience gets to play together.

Alongside your friends, you’ll take control of a young scientist trying to make it through the strangest day of their life, guided by the all-knowing game master.

Mashing up daft songs, live action role play, deadly punning photocopiers, a lab full of improvisers and an unhealthy dose of audience suggestions, surviving the sci-fantasy world of Publish or Perish ultimately depends on your choices – democracy taken to the next level!

After a fantastic couple of shows at Green Man Festival 2017, we’re really excited to be bringing this show to a hometown audience at the brilliant Bristol Improv Theatre. And if you caught it last year, there’ll be new cast members, new games and even more pop culture surprises to challenge your spur of the moment decision making skills.

The Incredible Playable Show

Created by game developer Alistair Aitcheson, The Incredible Playable Show is an interactive video game comedy show where you, the audience, take to the stage!

Become human buttons, take on the Power Rangers, zap each other with barcode scanners, and play Pac-Man using inflatable toys. Or sit back, and watch your friends literally become cogs in a hilarious machine!

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The Audience gets Bristolians talking with algorithms

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‘Really clever concept, good fun and I really liked the way the science is woven in!’ – Audience member

‘I feel grotty’ – Another Audience member

ALIC at the Bristol Improv Theatre
ALIX meets her latest data input devi- sorry, latest colleagues. | Image: Nick Moylan

After a busy 2016, Rising Ape squeezed one more event in before the end of the year. A freezing, foggy 1st of December saw a small, boisterous crowd weathering extreme elements, limited visibility and the Conan Doyle-ish Capital D dread of it all to make it down to the Bristol Improv Theatre. There, together they became the audience for, well, The Audience.

Guided by courtroom algorithm ALIX, the Audience became shaped into a cohesive unit, passing judgement on the sentence for a dramatic court case, and getting a glimpse into what justice in the future might be like. The immersive experience aimed to get people thinking about the consequences of trusting machines with our thoughts and biases. And all through the brandishing of LED lights and making friends with a slightly sarcastic A.I.

The Audience discussion theatre bristol
“I, for one, welcome our new AI overlords” proclaims controversial, yet out of shot, audience member, to everyone’s amusement. | Image: Nick Moylan

After the interval, the energised group began a passionate discussion with a panel consisting of:

  • Dr Sabine Hauert, Lecturer in Robotics at the Bristol Robotic Laboratory
  • Andrew Charlesworth, Reader in IT & Law at the University of Bristol
  • Dr Rosie Clark, Research Associate in Experimental Psychology at the University of Bristol
  • Antony Poveda, Producer for Rising Ape Collective and member of the cast.

Together the experts and audience discussed how far we are willing to trust algorithms with important decisions, personal experiences of the effectiveness of juries, and how little society is aware of the companies behind the technology we give data to. The engaging and highly productive session was filmed and we’ll be publishing the full video later in the New Year.

This production of The Audience was also incredibly valuable from our viewpoint. Learning from the performance at Green Man, we took the opportunity to tighten the script, take advantage of the new venue to really up the atmosphere (the mist certainly helped a bit there), choreograph new immersive moments, and, best of all, discover how well the performance works as a stimulus to get an audience talking with experts about these timely issues.

Want to experience The Audience for yourself? Follow us using the button below and look out for news of performances in 2017, as well as the film of the panel discussion, coming soon.

The Audience is in session – 1st December, Bristol Improv Theatre

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Your voice is ‘important’ to us.

MSG FROM: Ministry of Justice PLC
SUBJECT: Have you RSVP’d?

MSG BEGINS: Dear Citizen. Fresh from being the most packed, “disturbing”, and ethically confusing interactive show of the Green Man Festival Einstein’s Garden tent, The Audience is hitting Bristol with a heady mix of mob rule, computer smart-arsery and LED lights.

In the latest immersive show from Rising Ape Collective you’ll meet ALIX, the friendly courtroom AI, and get to have your say on what society thinks is morally right and wrong.

The show will be followed by a Q&A with the writers and a panel of local researchers ready to discuss your questions on the future of AI, our legal system, and whether robots will take all our jobs.

Attendance is voluntary, yet strongly advised. Please respond to your video invite, ALIX can’t wait to meet you.

Vote Justice. MSG ENDS.

More details, and RSVP on the event page.
Tickets available at  improvthreatre.co.uk

 

Eruption! ft. Nicky Young… The Movie!

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Rising Ape Eruption

It’s fair to say that ‘Rising Ape Presents… Eruption!’ was a blast. You became vulcanologists for the evening, vulcanologists who knew a surprising amount about the career of Pierce Brosnan. Using your in-depth knowledge of lava flows, increasing pH levels and the correct pronunciation of Ejyafjallajokull you came to the aid of the perilously located town of Rising Apeton. You were then regaled by researcher Nicky Young and her tales of studying Hawaiian volcanoes and dodging Aberdeenian seagulls. Thank you once again for making it a fantastic evening (and some of the most tortuous quiz team names ever imagined)!

There was just one problem. The next day, when your work colleagues asked what you did the night before, they probably didn’t believe you, it all sounded so incredible. That’s where we can help.

Please enjoy the video evidence of your heroics in our highlights reel below, and show those doubting friends of yours what they missed out on. We hope you like it.

Finally, a massive cheers to the highly professional crew of Raw Frames for making the film. We can heartily recommend them to anyone looking for a video of their event.

Eruption Ft. Nicky Young

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03/06/15 7.30pm, Bristol Improv Theatre, ÂŁ3.50 entry

“What was that?” gasped Carol, one of Rising Apeton’s oldest residents. She’d been hearing worryingly strange rumblings for weeks. This was partly down to her astute, matriarchal, cautious nature; but also the amusing fact that ever since she’d sent her hearing aids in for service, they were now so sensitive she could even pick up three channels of Croatian TV. “It’s nothing, you’re hearing things again you old bat,” barked her ogreish neighbor. But Carol wasn’t that old, and if she were a bat she’d have been smart enough to leave this damned place long ago. What Carol had been hearing was the murmuring of Risuvious, the apparently dormant volcano that lay at the centre of the Bristol ‘Bubbling Cider’ fault line. The birds had left weeks before, but in their arrogance the clever humans had stayed far too long. The end drew near for Rising Apeton…

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Rising Ape returns with a real lava palaver! What’s your mission? To work out how to save Rising Apeton. As always, you’ll need your best quiz heads on, and of course the winning team will get a sizzling prize. The night will end with an incandescent talk from bubbling volcanic researcher Nicky Young. So come along, grab a drink, and get planning!

Nicky Young studies volcanoes as a PhD candidate at the University of Bristol. An early love of rock-hounding and geology-based movies such as Dantes Peak, Volcano, and Journey to the Centre of the Earth (factual or not as they may be) led her to beginning a Geology MSci at Bristol 6 years ago. This was followed by a 6 month stint in Hawaii at the Volcano Observatory where Nicky explored the signals Kilaeau volcano emitted to try and discern volcanic movement. Since then studying volcanoes has been her passion, which is why she returned to Bristol for a PhD. She studies the movement of active volcanoes to understand what is happening deep below our feet.

Location: Bristol Improv Theatre, St Pauls Road, Bristol, BS8 1LP

Ticket Price: ÂŁ3.50 on the door or available online from the Bristol Improv Theatre website

Time: 3rd June 2015. 7:30pm – 10:00pm