Effective Dreaming in the Time of Zoom Theatre: Reflections on Directing The Lathe of Heaven

Using the production of Natsu Onoda Power's adaptation of The Lathe of Heaven that I helmed at Brandeis University in the spring of 2021 as a case study, I sharpen particular focus on how engaging the project with openness, curiosity, and generosity compelled me to rethink many of my artistic habits and assumptions and reconsider how I view my role as a theatre-maker in higher education. Even as my colleagues and I had come to recognize the ways that modes like "Zoom theatre" had, in a very short time, become crucial instruments "for theatrical institutions to make performances they [could] sell, as a way to keep themselves, their staffs, and their performers alive during the pandemic," there were brewing concerns about what engaging with these technologies might mean for the future of the profession, our approaches to theatre education and pedagogy, and the vitality and viability of the art form (184). The havoc that physical distancing and social isolation were wreaking on students' mental health and well-being had already become a source of concern for us. In an essay written for the site's "Devising Our Future" series, which was launched in the aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis and the global protests against anti-Black racism and police violence spurred by the murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, projection designer and director Jared Mezzocchi made a passionate case for theatre-makers to welcome the opportunities that working in new digital and virtual modes afforded them to experiment with different aesthetic strategies and practices.