Understanding Modern Audience in Traditional Settings.

While audience members of theatre productions are generally discouraged from using their mobile devices, as mobile technology is interwoven into our daily lives use in theatres still goes on. Some of this use is encouraged by the artists and built into the performance, however the furtive use by audience members during non-interactive performances has not been studied. In this poster we report on our work-in-progress consisting of preliminary analysis of in-situ observation and video analysis of four out of seven performances currently recorded to understand when and how mobile devices are used. This analysis is supported by interviews of selected audience members to better understand why and for what purpose these devices are used in this setting. These preliminary results draw attention to the correlations between (i) the audience’s distance from the stage, (ii) the engagement of the current scene, and (iii) the audience’s personal connection to the art work or the performers, and frequency of mobile phone use.