January 24–30, 2020 Brooklyn Paper • www.BrooklynPaper.com • (718) 260-2500 9
Assembly required
New show turns a furniture store into a stage
Photos by Talya Chalef
Active sitting: “Assemble” requires its participants to interact with
some of the objects in the furniture store. An “Assemble” participant
reflects on the past.
and they likely do not care, but I still
felt like an outsider, sneaking around
the store like a freak.
The entire experience takes around
75 minutes, most of it spent walking
around a cavernous box store. “Assemble”
can be exhausting for the legs, but
it thrills the ears with a convincing and
absorbing narrative.
“Assemble” at an undisclosed location
in Red Hook (revealed after ticket
purchase at www.projectassemble.
org). Thu–Mon through Feb. 2; every
15 minutes from 5–7 pm. $20.
Great rates like ours are always in season.
By Ben Verde
Brooklyn Paper
This show has a lot in store!
A bizarre and exciting new immersive
theater show sent me creeping
through a waterfront furniture store
early this week, seeking drama and romantic
tension somewhere between the
curtains and the bookshelves. The experience
transformed the familiar space
of the home goods retailer — a space
where I had every right to be — into
a secret stage for an epic exploration
of choice.
“Assemble,” running as part of the
Exponential Festival, is a “choose your
own adventure” style experience delivered
through a smartphone app. After
buying a ticket for Monday night at 6:45
pm, I was given a secret address in Red
Hook. There I was given an app access
code, put on my headphones, and was
ushered, along with a pair of other participants,
to the store in question.
The app delivers instructions and a
story directly to your ears, telling you
where to go inside the store. As you
travel through the maze-like furniture
retailer, you hear the story of Jane, a
woman who has just turned 40, as she
reflects on her life. Stop in a particular
room, and the app urges you to choose
an item there. Do you step into the bathtub?
Sit on the rug? Turn on a lamp?
Each choice triggers a different scenario
in Jane’s memory or her imagination,
along with — literally — a new path
for the narrative.
Wandering through the faux-domestic
showrooms, I heard Jane’s memories
of parties, hookups, and breakups.
Other rooms acted as portals to her fantasies,
where I could eavesdrop on intimate,
imaginary moments. And at every
turn, I was forced to make choices,
without knowing how it could affect the
story — just as in life, when we have
no idea the impact our responses will
have on our futures.
The audio turns the otherwise sterile
location into an impressive storytelling
device, and Jane’s story of middleaged
aimlessness will sound familiar
to anyone who has ever felt like their
life is going nowhere. Her nervousness
was echoed by my own — I felt conspicuous,
wandering around the store
with my headphones on, the only person
there not picking out a bedroom set
with a partner. Store employees have no
idea the performance is taking place,
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