Lin Jie

In recent years, immersive performing arts have won the popularity of young people with their unique sense of scene and participation. What kind of enlightenment does immersive performing arts bring to the prosperity of literary and artistic creation and the promotion of cultural consumption, and are there any hidden worries that cannot be ignored under the boom? Through nearly 5 years of field research, the internal laws and prospects of the development of immersive performing arts have gradually become clear.

There are four main types of immersive performances on the market.

The first category is game theater, including script killing, escape room. Under the guidance of the host, consumers carry out games with role-playing and logical reasoning as the core. This type of experience is an immersive experience, and it has little to do with "performing arts".

The second category is the repertoire of the new space of performing arts that have been performed for a long time. Located in dozens of "Star Gallery" in Shanghai Asia Building, First Department Store, Shanghai Great World, World Trade Plaza and Hangzhou Baiyue Butterfly Theater's Yue Opera "New Dragon Gate Inn", the repertoire scene and the audience seats are organically integrated, and the audience enters the performance space to enter the drama scene.

The third category is the repertoire that selects the space or creates a space specifically for creation. For example, the Shanghai Performing Arts Xintiandi Arts Festival customizes or transforms works according to the spatial form in Xintiandi; The Shenzhen Shekou Theatre Festival invites creators to come to Shekou and create local materials in different environments such as cafes and cultural and creative parks. Long-term tourism and performing arts projects such as "Only Emei Mountain", "Only Love", "Only Henan" and "Only Dream of Red Mansions" directed by Wang Chaoge also belong to this category. The content of the repertoire is closely connected with the regional landscape, culture, architecture, etc., and the building with an investment of hundreds of millions of yuan is a space specially created for the repertoire and audience experience.

The fourth category is performances with deep audience participation. For example, "One Man's Game", which has only one audience per show, "Crazy Barbershop", which is performed by Happy Twist in many places and the audience participates in solving crimes, and "Fun Explorer", where the audience tastes food while watching the performance, etc., the audience promotes the development of content.

沉浸式演藝的火熱，首先由消費者尤其是年輕消費者減壓放鬆和社交娛樂的需求推動。沉浸式演藝劇碼《不眠之夜》在上海已駐演8年，累計超過2100場，觀眾超62萬人次，總收入超5.5億元。據統計，2023年上海音樂劇演出場次佔全國的37.8%，票房佔46.7%，演藝新空間已成為場次主力，分佈在寫字樓、商場的演出更帶動了餐飲購物住宿等消費。上海市文化和旅遊局發佈的數據顯示，過去遊客在上海的停留天數為2天左右，豐富的演藝內容使這一數位增加到2.84天。

沉浸式演藝方興未艾，向傳統劇場輸送了觀眾。據上海市演出行業協會發佈的數據，2024年上半年，上海100家演藝新空間完成演出活動9927場，吸引觀眾168.3萬人次，演出收入共計1.47億元。在爆款劇碼和明星演員的吸引下，一些沉浸式演藝的觀眾逐漸進入大劇場，拓展了消費者的增量。新的消費群體對劇場服務也提出了更高的要求，反推劇場更加關注觀眾的多元需求。

Immersive performing arts has created opportunities for more young practitioners. Man Ding, the former artistic director of Beijing Inside-Out Theater, founded the "Hard to Satisfy" drama studio, which has produced a number of plays and operated a number of performing arts spaces in Shanghai's Asia Tower and World Trade Plaza. Director He Qi and screenwriter Hu Xuanyi established the "Studio That Can't Sleep Well", which used to only have the opportunity to perform at the theater festival, and since 2024 has had the first commercial residency work "Secret" in Shanghai World Trade Plaza...... More talents join, more creativity gathers, and through the selection of audiences and the elimination of the market, it is possible to retain high-quality programs.

The expectation and guidance of offline performances to drive consumption in commerce, tourism and other aspects will further promote the rapid growth of immersive performances. The Ministry of Culture and Tourism has clearly proposed to build a "small but beautiful" new performing arts space, and Beijing, Guangzhou, Chengdu, Changsha and other places have introduced policies to support the development of new performing arts spaces to drive the large-scale development of new performing arts spaces and immersive performing arts.

How to create more high-quality repertoire suitable for current consumers, so that the works have a longer vitality, I am afraid that it is a problem that needs to be calmly considered under the craze.

You can't just pursue the form of immersion and ignore the quality of acting. In the fast-paced world, people often choose to watch performances out of the need to relax, decompress and be entertained. However, in order to attract audiences, some performing arts repertoire caters to consumers with elements such as vulgarity and comedy. Some repertoire believes that "taste is the enemy of traffic", and only pursues fast food products that provide consumers, especially young people, with a momentary sense of refreshment. Immersion is the medium of expression, and performing arts provide the audience with an aesthetic object, which means that the artwork must have indispensable good value and spiritual nourishment, and it also means that practitioners have an unshirkable social responsibility.

The cost of small projects is relatively controllable, and large projects need to be rationally predicted. New performing arts spaces are generally injected with performing arts functions on the basis of the original facilities, and the area is small, and the investment is mostly limited. If we put aside the factor that the land price may increase in value, whether the actual income from cultural, commercial and tourism consumption driven by performing arts programs is proportional to the huge investment is also a risk worthy of vigilance.

Homogenization and low-level repetition will consume the patience of the audience and will also affect the long-term development of the industry. Some practitioners pursue temporary popularity, are satisfied with the label of "immersive performance", or are superstitious about high-tech, large investment, specific venues, and multi-sensory experiences. Immersion is not just a sensory experience, the audience feels everything on the stage with their hearts in the theater, and being spiritually baptized is also a kind of immersion. A longer and intrinsic immersion is the immersion of the mind.

As an innovative form of performing arts in the relationship between space and spectators, immersive performing arts meets the needs of different groups of people and is experiencing great waves in market competition. Industry and art are the two wings of immersive performing arts, and only by going both ways can we achieve symbiosis and win-win results.

(The author is an associate researcher at the Cultural Development Strategy Research Center of the Chinese Academy of Arts)

People's Daily (20/0/0 0 Edition)