The Curiosity Experiment isn’t your usual theatre experience. A fully immersive and interactive storytelling experience born from the mind of writer and director Nathan Schulz, this is one haunting night in that isn’t for the feint-hearted.
After a successful run of shows at Melbourne Fringe, Anywhere Festival and a myriad of functions in between, we caught up with Schulz to dive deeper into what exactly this unique experience was all about, and why you should be very, very afraid of what you’ll find within.
How far do you dare to dive into your own imagination? We investigate the ins and outs of Australia’s spookiest new live experience, The Curiosity Experiment.
HAPPY: The Curiosity Experiment isn’t really like something I’ve ever seen before, what’s your elevator pitch for the event?
NATHAN: Would you sit in the dark, blindfolded and listen to a ghost story? You can peek through the blindfold, but do you really want to see what’s there?
HAPPY: Have you encountered any legitimate freak-outs during the performances?
NATHAN: People who have managed to sit through the show have walked out unnerved and scared. Twice I have escorted people out with their blindfold on, as it was too much for them. But during our season in Melbourne Fringe we had someone in the audience try to legitimately ‘communicate’ with what was happening in the room and at another performance at a Museum in Noosa one woman climbed up her chair in fright in one sequence, and let out a scream that could be heard from outside! That was a proud moment for us all.
But to be honest, myself and the cast have been more freaked out then most of the audiences have, believe it or not, we have seen some rather haunting things happen during this show when performed in certain locations.
HAPPY: Blindfolding your patrons seems risky. Can you talk about this choice a little?
NATHAN: I feel people are so used to watching a performance and being fed an image that they tend to forget that their most powerful tool in their body is their brain and imagination, story-telling is the oldest form of theatre… especially ghost stories. You can watch films like The Conjuring, Annabelle or The Exorcism of Emily Rose but at the end of the day, reading a good old fashioned ghost story beneath the covers of your bed by torchlight is a way better experience. Especially with an overactive imagination!
The idea came during a show I directed and performed at Brisbane Anywhere Festival where I told ghost stories by candlelight (in Victorian fashion) incorporating live, old fashion radio play and foley sound effects behind the scenes. This was performed in Ecclectica, an oddities shop, to an intimate audience. Watching the audience react and listen to these stories whilst candlelight kept the darkness at bay was an interesting and eye opening experience, especially when a lot of people closed their eyes! It was here that a good friend, cast member and one of my collaborators – Dave Fraser – dropped the idea in my head of “What if you BLINDFOLDED an audience, take away their sight, and TOLD them a ghost story where they had to really rely on their imagination & senses to transport them into the story.”
Intrigued I set to work upon it, combining the idea with concepts from three of my favourite ghost stories, one of them written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. As the idea developed for The Curiosity Experiment it soon became apparent that the audience would need to be small and intimate for people to feed of each other’s fear or emotion, and members would need to be seated around a table like it was an old fashion séance. This also fuels a person’s superstition and makes the show quite manageable if anyone got too scared.
HAPPY: How do you ensure a proper otherworldly experience with so much left to the audience?
NATHAN: I don’t really want to give away any secrets, but a big part of this production utilises the dark, even if I’m already asking the audience to sit in it blindfolded! I’m also working on the theory that no matter how old a person is, give them a story or location that has some sort of ‘supernatural’ or ‘Urban Legend’ element to it, then take away their sight and let their imagination run, they will be just as afraid or unnerved of the dark as when they were children.
The audience’s imagination is a very powerful tool, so they have no other option but to use it, and be a little open minded, to get the full experience. Everyone has different scare factors, but what scares a person the most, I believe, is when they let their imagination run free.
HAPPY: Now I heard there was a little debacle with a gramophone. What’s the story?
NATHAN: A new addition to the The Curiosity Experiment was the inclusion of a 110-year-old His Master Voice gramophone which also included a record of nursery rhymes. In fact, despite the stories, I have this record player set up in my lounge room as nice focal piece, occasionally it even shocks me. A few nights ago I awoke to an unfamiliar sound coming from downstairs. Walking noiselessly down my staircase with only a nightlight as my guide thinking there was a prowler in my living room, I switched on my phone torch and saw the turntable turning before it just automatically stopped. Last time it was used and wound up was at the end of December 2016.
During the Melbourne Fringe performances, the player would start on it’s own at times and slowly wind itself down before suddenly starting again or when it comes to Humpty Dumpty it will constantly skip, as if stuck, on the word “broken” and the needle would be pulled across the record as if someone had heard enough. These are just some of the stories, the cast could tell you a few too. In all honesty, it’s not the gramophone I fear… it’s the three porcelain dolls I have stored in a suitcase, what happened at a graveyard one night where we used them for promo-photos, and what I brought home with me attached to them. I have since stopped involving them in the show, and whatever is associated with them is quite happy to be locked away in the suitcase. I keep the case out of curiosity.
HAPPY: Has The Curiosity Experiment changed since last year? What can we expect?
NATHAN: The wonderful thing about this is that it’s constantly evolving in each location that we have performed in. So, I can’t exactly tell you what to expect, as we don’t know ourselves until we rehearse in the location and that’s half the fun. All I can tell you is that this show first started off with f0ur large suit-cases, now I pack the entire show into two hand held vintage portmanteaus (except for the gramophone of course). In fact, one of my cast members has just finished re-formatting the story so it can now be performed on a cruise ship or boat! So, this show no longer just haunts houses and land based locations, and we are looking forward workshopping this script when we get home, as we are going to start advertising The Curiosity Experiment for private parties and corporate events.
Audrey Cadzow (one of my actresses) has spent almost 12 months with me workshopping, performing, and editing this concept through Anywhere Festival, Melbourne Fringe, and other performances we did in between. She has been instrumental to the creation of this show along with my other cast members Shantelle Kerwin, Dave Fraser, Libby Scales and of course my producer Emily Edwards. From the moment, these guys came onboard they have believed in the concept and have helped it become what it is. We have two new additions to the cast this time in the form of Sasha Cuhan and Noelle Criminova whose experience and work has also been valuable to the success of the show.
HAPPY: What’s the greatest reaction you got in 2016’s run?
NATHAN: Aside from slowly scaring people around the country, the greatest reaction came from our first professional review in Melbourne, by Myron My, who said: “it is still a unique and enjoyable immersive experience where it is up to your own imagination to decide how far you go into the darkest corners of your mind.” This is followed by the first time my producer saw the show in Melbourne. She didn’t know what to expect, and she was the only person in the room at the time. When the lights came back on, her first words were “Fuck! That was intense.”
HAPPY: What’s your best advice for someone looking to get the most out of the experience?
NATHAN: Come in open-minded and allow your imagination and senses to take you on a ride.
