Culture

The Clinic (Christchurch), 3/5.

Love You Approximately (with the really cute tagline “a virtual love story”) was all about long distance relationships. The play consisted of two characters using Skype, Facebook and phone calls to grow and nurture their budding relationship. Pere lived in Spain, and Imogen in Christchurch, and Love You Approximately explored their developing love and how we, in this growing technological age, experience “intimacy without proximity”.
 

The story line wasn't revolutionary or particularly exciting, but the way the play was produced and performed was pretty wicked. The actors rehearsed using webcams and have never actually met in real life, but you couldn't tell. The play had an interesting dynamic because one actor was on the stage, while the others were videoed beforehand and projected onto the screens that made up the set. Imogen (Lara Fischel-Chisholm) was on-stage, talking to the projections and reacting with them. It was exciting to see how director Julieanne Eason was able to successfully integrate the videos into the play.

 
There were two things I have beef with. First, the Fortune Theatre Studio space is not easy to perform on as the shape of the stage is a bit wack. Granted, this isn’t Love You Approximately’s fault but I’m just saying. However, I did find it offensive when the only physically present actor had her back to me for extended periods of time. I mean, really? Did she always have to look at the screen? I could see Pere’s face brilliantly, but I missed a lot of her smiles and “in-love” eyes, which made me sad. Second, the breaks in between the scenes were a bit too long and blackouts lasted for about half a minute. These qualms aside, the play was very interesting. It is daring to rely so much on technology and projection but Love You Approximately made it work. Kudos.