Hello and welcome to another edition of The Storymakers Institute.
In 2020, five hundred pilot whales turned up unexpectedly on the West Coast of lutruwita / Tasmania, leaving rescuers scrambling to try and save them. Over the weeks that followed, community members rallied around each other, in a race against the clock to prevent a major ecological disaster.
Over the past two years, I’ve been working with writer, James Jackson on uncovering this remarkable tale, taking numerous trips down to the West Coast of lutruwita / Tasmania (Australia) to comprehend the story from all angles - and we’ve turned that - into a theatre show.
Introducing Hells Gates which premiered at the newly reimagined Geelong Arts Centre is now available to live-stream on-demand worldwide via the Australian Digital Concert Hall.
In this episode, James Jackson and I talk about how the story of Hells Gates came about, what was involved in the writing/research phases of the production, and the things we learnt along the way.
Also for paid subscribers: James Jackson and I have a bonus chat about the impacts of AI on storymaking, what Wagner did to theatre, and James shares what he’d change if he could be a fairy godmother for a day. That’s also below.
“Hells Gates” has been assisted by the Australian Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body; by the Victorian Government through Creative Victoria; by the City of Greater Geelong Community Grant, Geelong Connected Communities, the Robert Salzer Foundation, Rydges Geelong and by the Geelong Arts Centre’s Creative Engine program.
BONUS CHAT WITH JAMES JACKSON:
JOEL: Do you think AI is going to take our jobs? Do you feel like we’ll get to a point where the human voice becomes redundant?
JAMES: I think it depends on what we allow to happen. You know, if we regulate and if we ensure there are rules about what AI can do and what AI can’t do - and I’m thinking about this in terms of keeping people employed. You know, having said that if the invention of AI leads to the four hour work week, I’m all for it! I’ve tried to write plays on AI and I spent so long trying to craft the perfect prompt that no matter what I did, it was just this rudimentary pile of poo basically, and it wasn’t really worth it at all.
JOEL: At a weak moment James, I did put ask ChatGPT to “write a play about a whale stranding…”
JAMES: This is the moment where I also have to admit that I tried to write “Hells Gates” using ChatGPT! But as a tool, it’s a hard balance because you don’t want to reject it outright and then have egg on your face when you sound like the person who said that “steam power was a joke and it would never work”… you don’t want to be that person.
JOEL: You don’t want to bring forth your own demise either.
JAMES: Well, I’m not going to go anywhere. I was thinking about this in terms of the four brains that humans have. And it’s a bit of a weird one - but it does give me some comfort. You know there’s the head, the heart, the gut and the genitalia. And we think with all of these things. Now I don’t know if ChatGPT has genitalia. But if it did, I would be more concerned than I am now. I think it’s also a bit of a misnomer, you know, that it is intelligent.
It is a very, very complex algorithm or piece of software that relies upon continual input from humans in order to improve its responses. It’s a very complex machine, but it doesn’t think for itself. It’s not sentient. So in that respect, to admit that AI might take our jobs is to admit that we don’t create things and respond to things with our souls, our hearts or with instincts. I think that’s true for good lawyers, or doctors, or pilots. They respond to things with sometimes their gut. It definitely goes beyond the brain, the thinking part of the head.
Look, I think AI is really cool. And I’m not going to ban it tomorrow if I had that power. But I don’t think we’re at any huge risk at the moment. Having said that, I might be wrong.
JOEL: If you could be a fairy godmother and change the way that theatre was made in this country, what would you do?
JAMES: The rules of engaging in theatre probably need to be rewritten. We could probably go a long way if we just rejigged what our expectations are when we engage in theatre. And it could be as simple as - for the love of God - stop dimming the house lights and stop expecting audiences to sit silently in a room and shush. That is a very non-human thing.
Imagine for a moment if you went to see a football match and that the lights over the audience dimmed and then everyone was expected to be very quiet for the sportspeople to do their thing. And then the game just went on in silence. I mean, during COVID, the AFL players were so weirded out by the fact that there wasn’t applause, that they had pre-recorded cheers that the were playing during the games.
JOEL: Yeah when you go back a few hundred years and the way audiences would engage, they weren’t just sitting there… They were snogging each other at the back, drinking, having a great time!
JAMES: Wasn’t it Wagner, who dimmed the house lights? That did take us backwards a bit. But I think we’re well and truly broken out of that box. There’s a lot of artists in live art, performance art, that have really shifted the whole mentality away from house lights and shushing. But to a large degree, the majority of audiences who come to see the theatre expect that.
Also, as a magic fairy, I would just want more funding to come into the arts as a whole so that we’re not fighting over scraps of funding. Right now, it’s a competitive marketplace, but it should not be competitive or a marketplace because it’s the creation of new work.
JOEL: Yeah just living wages. That’s the answer. Living wages for creative endeavour is the answer.
