Livecasting in Twenty-First-Century British Theatre

Heidi Lucja Liedke is Interim Professor in English Literature at Goethe University Frankfurt, Germany. From 2018-2020 she was a Humboldt Postdoctoral Fellow at Queen Mary, University of London, UK. She is the co-editor of a special issue of Theatre Research International on “Presence, Politics, Resistance: Tendencies in (Post-)Pandemic Performance and Theatre” (March 2023). Her work has been published in Performance Matters (2019), Journal of Contemporary Drama in English (2021) and Participations (2021). Twitter: @heidilulie

List of Figures
Acknowledgements

Introduction: Locating Livecasting – Twenty-First Century British Theatre on the Threshold
Locating Livecasting
Constructing the Live
Distractions, Slippages and Turns: Spectacle – Archive
Research Overview
Aims and Structure of the Book

Part I: Spectacle and Materiality

Chapter 1. Old New Media: The Optionality of the Theatre Space and Different Forms of Embodiment in Early Live Theatre and Music Broadcasting
Early Broadcasting Technologies as Substitutes
Acousmatic Livecasting in the Nineteenth Century: Visual Landscapes
Not A Substitute for the Real Thing – The NT’s Dip Into Broadcasting in the 1940s and 1950s
The Launch of NT Live
Then and Now: The Fifth Auditorium
Chapter 2. Watching Others Having Fun – Livecasting as Spectacle
The Best of British Theatre
Spectacle and Theatre on Screens – Images and Deception
Sports Events, Spectacle and NT Live
Framing Livecasting: Mediated Spectacle and Communitas
Livecasting as Affective Spectacle: A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Bridge Theatre/NT Live)
Chapter 3. Capturing the Atmosphere: The Material-Theatrical
A Word on Wires, Screens and Electricians from a Brechtian Perspective
Theatrical and Cinematic Modes – Filmed Theatre
Spatially Extended Atmospheres: The Materiality of the Theatrical Space Shifts
Making the Theatrical Experience Porous: Stuttering Screens

PART II: Engagement

Chapter 4. Livecasting, Liveness, and the Feeling I
Spectator-Centric Theatre and Modes of Engagement with Livecasts
Livecasts, Liveness and “We”
Bakhtinian and Benjaminian Traces—Fabrics of Engagement
I Feel, Therefore I am (a Spectator)
Chapter 5. Quasi-Experts in the Context of Livecasting
Immediacy and Afterlife
Quasi-Experts at Work: Liveness and After-Liveness Enabled by Social Media
We Are In It Together: Critiquing the Experience Online
Against a Stagnation of Theatre
Chapter 6. Covidian Theatre: The Move to Small Screens and into Homes
Masks and Socially Distanced Theatre
Viral Affect on Screens
Covidian Theatre
Retrospective Synchronicity and NT At Home
Chapter 7. Concluding Discussion and Future Directions: What Remains of Livecasting?
Responsible Responsiveness and Liveness
What Remains of Livecasting?

Works Cited
Index