Theatre Review - Distant Memories of the Near Future
David Head in Distant Memories… [Carys Hughes]
AN Edinburgh Fringe hit, David Head’s debut solo show combines multimedia, storytelling and satire to great effect.
In five overlapping narratives, Head explores how romance might pan out in a dystopian near future, dominated by cynical advertising campaigns, artificial intelligence, a reliance on algorithms and the exploitation of personal data.
A lonely man in need of cash sells his personal data to a company that collects real-life experiences in order to give AI convincing backstories. He agrees to sign up to a dating app, Q-Pid, in order to create a “love story”.
In another tale, a tech guru obsessed with building the future is forced to confront the failure of his relationship. He can’t help feeling heartbroken whenever he recalls his ex, so decides to turn the search for love into an app.
An astronaut (represented by a torchlit puppet) trapped on a lump of meteorite while mining for diamonds yearns to hear her partner’s voice one last time.
Finally, a creator, aka known as a content engineer, uses her talent as a poet to develop an advanced AI program she names Hope (Jessica Munna appearing on a screen). But this AI soon has a life of her own to relate.
Distant Memories of the Near Future unfurls like a series of mini lectures as Head, a genial narrator dressed in a purple boiler suit, examines our relationship with technology and the commodification of our emotions, while posing questions about human connection.
In Laura Killeen fast-paced 70-minute production, the stories are unpacked like Russian dolls, each one shedding light on the one before.
It’s brilliantly imaginative and eloquently written by Head with snappy video design by Joseph Peecock and Katya Shipulina, graphics by Liz McLeod and evocative audio by Carlos Bricio.
Until November 30