Theatre History Studies

When COVID-19 crept its way across the globe, public community spaces were among the first to shut down. Over a few weeks—or, in some areas, a few days—performance and art venues worldwide became uninhabited spaces, inaccessible to the public. Just as quickly as venues shut down, millions of people became unemployed, with artists across the world losing their main source of income. Through public discourse in outlets from the New York Times to the newly created Flashpaper, theatremakers asked a daunting question: "What do we do now?"

Like the Great Plains Theatre Commons and Theatre Rhino, some theatres chose to host play readings online via Zoom. Others, like Playwrights Horizon, published radio plays. Many artists turned to social media platforms such as TikTok to continue their creative work. But two things became commonplace during the global quarantine. The first is that performance spaces and art venues were abruptly and simultaneously inaccessible to the public majority. The second is that the digital became a critical and necessary tool for sustaining the arts, the economy, and community. Suddenly, digital storytelling became our prime avenue for entertainment across multiple artistic fields.

Dramaturgy, at its core, is the theory and practice of dramatic composition. And digiturgy—as Alison Koch, digital content producer at Playwrights Horizons, so succinctly defines it—is the "art, technique, theory, and practice of composition for digital storytelling."¹ Digiturgy includes not only the traditional facets of dramaturgy—critical analysis of text and performance, archival work, and facilitation between art and audience—but also the application of digital tools, mediums, and transmedia theory to its practice. It incorporates paratexts [End Page 49] such as marketing, social media, and virtual platforms into analyzing performance. It allows us to ask questions about the future of digital media in theatre. What does it mean to have an audience of one in a virtually performed theatrical space? How might theatremakers adapt a play into a video game? What opportunities can we discover from Zoom play readings? In this article, I offer a provocation for the possibilities of access and accommodation provided by and through digiturgy.

Virtual meeting platforms such as Zoom, Discord, and Facetime had been used for years before the pandemic by the disabled community as a way to connect, organize, and build solidarity. Virtual spaces allow for a wide variety of accessibility practices, such as the ability to live-caption conversations, to have a larger audience capacity than a physical venue, and to watch and listen from home, particularly for those who are bedbound. While attending a virtual performance or conference, audience members can worry less about financial burdens such as paying for childcare, travel costs, parking, tiered seating, and much more. However, able-bodied and neurotypical people did not think of this technology as necessary for their working spaces. Attending work or school via Zoom wasn't a viable option for the majority of people before the pandemic, regardless of their access needs. When showing up in physical spaces became an impossibility during the pandemic, access to virtual meetings and performances became a necessity. For able-bodied, neurotypical folks, the benefits of online access were revelatory.

Of course, virtual-only access also has its share of issues. People may not have access to reliable internet or a digital device. The cost of online livestreams is still a barrier for many, particularly those in marginalized communities. If you're working from home and attending virtual readings or rehearsals, being on a screen for hours a day can cause physical ailments like migraines. Some accommodations, such as captions or audio descriptions, may not always be available during performances.

My point isn't to ask whether the practices of the theatre industry were more accessible and ethical before or during COVID-19. Rather, I ask: Will we continue to make our art more accessible to our communities in the future, particularly now that we better understand digital tools and access needs? Disability scholars Terry Galloway, Donna Marie Nudd, and Carrie Sandahl break down an Ethic of Accommodation into four parts: "At its core, an Ethic of Accommodation means that the majority...