Such Tweet Sorrow: world's first Shakespearian Twitter performance

Yesterday, I was invited to, but unfortunately unable to attend, a press conference to launch the world's first Twitter performance featuring contemporary characters inspired by Romeo and Juliet and bearing the clever title "Such Tweet Sorrow." Now I know this is naught to do with fashion, but I was so intrigued by the possibility of this mixed media conundrum that it warranted a second look. Royal Shakespeare Company? Twitter? Do mine eyes mistweet me?

Romeo, Juliet + Twitter, a harrowing love tale

But no, tis indeed true. The world famous players' company has taken the leap into the 21st century with this forward thinking experiment in how social media can be used to play with ideas of performance, of theater. Isn't logging onto Twitter or carefully culling through iPhoto to select the right profile picture a bit like acting anyway? Not that you're not your real "self" online, but certain personas are no doubt crafted, evolved and cultivated (bloggers of course being no exception!). And just imagine the pulsating drama had the young star-crossed lovers taken their Blackberries instead of their life? Juliet could have merely put up an out of office, Romeo banished to Mantua, and hence the whole tragic mess avoided: RT@RomeoMon1 FYI Just sleeping, not dead.

Leave it to the Royal Shakespeare Company to be the first to brave the unknowns of the digital stage.

For the next five weeks, the "actors" i.e. Tweeters, will respond to each other and to the "audience" and real world events via Tweets, retweets all the rest and not much more. The familiar plot of Romeo and Juliet is the meat of the Tweet, but the nuances of the tale, appropriately enough, are set through the lens of modern-day Britain. RSC actress Charlotte Wakefield plays the Tweet-happy Juliet (or, Julietcap16, rather) and has been tweeting away since Saturday. That day, she linked to a YouTube video she'd made of her room. The frame pauses momentarily on a photo of her dead mother, Susan Capulet. Other key Tweeters include the affable LaurenceFriar, the fiery Tybalt_Cap and Mercutio. I feel a "Follow-that-Friar-Friday" coming on!

Daily diaries are kept by the actors and posted blog-style on the project's website in order to streamline and cohere the narrative.

All in all, I think it's a fantastic experiment. The obvious uses of the internet for performance (ummm hello YouTube) are no longer grounds for innovation. But the use of Twitter, a written medium, to shape a story over time, is somewhat genius. It actually reminds me a bit of the Facebook Aeneid, a brilliant bit of online comedy gold from a few years ago where the story of Aeneas' journey from Troy to Rome is told via Facebook status updates (see below, it's hilarious. Gets my geeky side going everytime).

But the brilliant thing about Such Tweet Sorrow, indeed Twitter in general I suppose, is the general interactiveness and accessibility of it all. Anyone can follow the starcrossed lovers, anyone can reach out to the actors with a direct message or retweet, and reasonably expect a response. If Ashton Kutcher can have nearly 4.5 million followers and devoted perusers of the blogosphere can have direct chit chat with the likes of BryanBoy, why shouldn't we also be able to reach and tap the cyber shoulders of the monumental figures of our literary past? We use Twitter to fill one another and strangers in on even the most minute details of the narratives of our daily lives, so it was only a matter of time before Twitter turned to fiction. I'm just glad they started in the right place.

Two Tweeters, both alike in followers

In fair Twitterdom, where we lay our scene.

From ancient theater break to new media,

Where cyber blood makes cyber hands unclean.

From forth the fatal laptops of these two foes

A pair of star-crossed Tweeters take their life.

 

Such Tweet Sorrow is a co-production with Mudlark, which produces entertainment on mobile phones, TV and the internet, with funding from Channel 4's digital investment fund. 

The Facebook Aeneid.