Hyperdrama on film

The more I think about it, the more I think hyperdrama on film or video really fails to demonstrate what I consider the major attraction of the form, which is counterpoint. The action occurs on a flat two-dimensional screen, whereas in live performance the audience member can take a place within the circumference of two or more scenes, which then can play against one another. It is almost impossible to control this counterpoint, given the inevitable improvisation that is part of live hyperdrama, but in my own experience watching hyperdrama, nothing matches the excitement or revelation of witnessing dramatic counterpoint in this way. Here, I think, is the greatest potential in the form to create very different ways of storytelling.

In Chateau de Mort in the Pittock Mansion, I witnessed such a counterpoint while standing halfway between two scenes taking place on opposite ends of a large room. The scenes spoke to one another. I did not consciously write them this way but the effect was larger than the sum of its parts -- it was a magnificent moment of theater. I tried to duplicate it in subsequent productions but the timing was not the same. But this moment suggested incredible dramatic possibilities, if the artist could figure out how to control the timing.

Nothing close to this happens on a screen. In this sense, then, the Pittsburgh demonstration fails to communicate something very important about hyperdrama.