Like any city that relies on mass transit, New York forces its citizens into intimate moments with each other. Commuters share seats on the subway and taxi cab drivers become impromptu therapists to their passengers. But with the invention of MP3 devices and eBook readers, these interactions happen less and less as people become less attune to their surroundings. That is, until, a celebrity is thrown into the mix.
Every Friday from 6:30–8:30 p.m., hundreds of people form a single-file line in Bryant Park to meet a mystery guest, a star in an 8-by-8, Mylar box. While they wait, they’re given non-disclosure forms that serve as figurative mullets. It’s all business up front and all party in the back. The front side consists of a bunch of legalese and a signature portion, so that the person inside the box’s identity remains a secret. The back lists a cast of 30 characters for spectators to spot in the park while they wait in line, forcing them to shut off their iPods and pay attention. They soon become aware that they’re part of something bigger than a celebrity. It’s called Starbox and it’s all arranged by the art.party.theater.company.
“It’s like the ultimate dramatic question. It’s like the kid who finds the Christmas gifts too early. What’s inside? That’s not going to not affect anyone,” said Starbox playwright Mattie Brickman. “Everyone responds to the, ‘I want to open this box! This big present in Bryant Park!’ What became clear when I sat down to write was that suddenly I was writing about, not the box, but everyone who showed up to find out what was in this box.”
Audience members are first greeted by “Shorts,” (at left) the newbie production assistant who hands out the forms. He immediately makes them feel good by complimenting them on their outfits and then nervously hands them pens and pencils to sign the agreements. It becomes apparent why he’s fidgety because his superior comes barreling out, yelling at him to do his job faster. But he’s not the only one with lines. When every spectator exits the box, they belt out something having to do with fame, such as “Starbox? More like, star rocks!” Meanwhile, the line is moving painfully slow, but that’s the point. Standing in line isn’t just standing in line; people are watching a 70-minute, 90-page play unfurl around them.
“We’re cycling through the entire show about twice. It’s very structured. They’re not making it up as they go,” Jess Burkle, artistic producer and actor, said.
Which characters are lurking around Bryant Park? There’s Sasha and Rue (otherwise known as Twitterdee and Twitterdum), who squeal each time someone exits the box. A street vendor selling Starbox T-shirts. A musician strumming his guitar. Kiki Chakamora, a news reporter, with her camerawoman Bobbi. But sometimes, it’s not always clear who’s fiction and who’s real.
“We found at the end that Mattie didn’t need to write anything. Essentially there were doppelgangers of all of her characters,” Burkle said.
Starbox director Mary Birnbaum added: “A woman the week before pulled me aside and goes, ‘The jig is up.’ And I was like, ‘What?’ She goes, ‘Oh, I know the star of That 70′s Show is the guy passing out waivers.’ And I was like, ‘You’re right! Yes!’ And she goes, ‘And now what do I win?’ Because apparently the Bryant Park security guards had been telling people that they just had to guess what was inside the box. So I let her win meeting Mattie and taking taking her picture with Daniel, who’s not Topher Grace.”
But before they were fielding off fans, Birnbaum (at right) and Burkle were two Harvard students, experimenting in theater. Upon graduation, the two moved to New York and started art.party.theater.company in 2008 and had a few successes with similar performance installations, like last year’s reading of William Cullen Bryant poetry through a megaphone. In 2010, Yale graduate Brickman completed the Three B’s.
“This is the first time we’ve worked with a playwright,” Burkle said. “And it was great to have that dialogue fueling always. We were never like, ‘Oh, this was wrong.’ It was like, ‘Yes! Yes!’ It totally worked out.”
What’s “worked out” is that a fledgling theater company has unified the city with the dangling carrot of the unknown. Every Friday night, New Yorkers and tourists gather, shut off their personal distractions and listen to one another.
“Everyone loves hearing stories, but everyone also loves telling stories,” Brickman said. “And the chance to actually talk to someone, to get attention for three minutes in a box? You don’t get that kind of attention in this fast-paced Twitter world.”
“And Mattie also wrote all of these beautiful interactions where somebody offers somebody else a sandwich,” Birnbaum said. “And I saw that happen yesterday. Somebody took it.”
Art.party.theater.company has also redefined the way we see a performance and how we interpret celebrity.
“I always say that people want to go in [the box],” Burkle said. “And people want to meet famous people, but often times it’s under the guise of ‘Oh, I really respect their work,’ or ‘I’m a real big fan of them.’ But when they don’t know who it is, they just want to meet somebody famous. And so it strips out the component of whoever that person is. It’s not about who’s inside the box; it’s about them meeting somebody famous. So the act of going inside this box and having this experience is the exact same thing. If the person is actually the least important component of that, it’s just the story that they can tell the people afterwards, so that they are the star. It’s essentially when you meet a star, you absorb that kind of star quality from them, and they get to tell everybody, ‘Oh, I met Cameron Diaz,’ and I don’t really care for her, but now I can tell the story about it and now you’re all focused on me. So it became much more about the people, which I think is why the box is that mirrored shape on the outside [see above right].”
So who’s inside the box? We’ll never tell, but we advise you to think outside it.
Starbox is free and is showing in Bryant Park tonight at 6:30. Its final showing is Aug. 13, 2010.
Photos 1 and 2 by Kathryn Wilson; photo 3 courtesy of Birnbaum.