Evolutions of the Invitation

This chapter, new in the second edition, reflects on the status of audience participation as an exceptional phenomenon within theatre as we understand it and speculates about processes of change that are under way and to be expected in the future: processes driven from within our art form and by changing circumstances exterior to it. Thus, it reconsiders the historicity of audience participation, focusing on the following questions: Two performance examples—Coney’s The Hidden and ZU-UK’s Within Touching Distance—serve to illustrate how technological mediation drives new ways to invite participation, and to facilitate participation across hybrid spaces.