My Sites Set on You: Site-Specificity and Subjectivity in ‘Intimate Theatre’

Abstract

The first decade of the twentieth century saw the opening of August Strindberg’s Intimate Theatre in Stockholm on 26 November 1907, its diminutive stage (6 by 4 metres) and small auditorium designed to intensify the theatre experience.¹ The first decade of the twenty-first century ascribed new meaning to ‘intimate theatre’ as a face-to-face interaction between performer and audience, at its most concentrated in one-to-one dynamics.² In reviewing the 2009 Edinburgh Festival Fringe, Lyn Gardner re-invoked the term ‘intimate theatre’, acknowledging that, while the participatory experience that she categorized was not new, its new ‘widespread availability’ (2009, p.22) was noteworthy.³ Gardner also voiced concern that such ‘intimacy’ placed ‘audiences in situations they would never encounter in a traditional theatre’ and that this raised ‘ethical issues — both for those making and watching the work’ (2009, p.22).