Chatbot Challenge
A Performative AI Jam Session
In CHATBOT CHALLENGE, human performers welcome an AI as their show guest live on stage. The AI participates in dialogues, tries out show acts, interacts with the performers, the audience, and the control knobs of the theater machinery – every evening is new and different.
Chatbots are like theater machines: They engage in lively dialogues with users; they generate empathy, respond spontaneously in the here and now, and astonish with their (Brechtian) ability for self-reflection on their own illusionary effects. The chatbot users give directions – prompts – and often indulge, sometimes self-critically, in the suspension of disbelief created by the AI. The evolution of the latest AI systems opens not only new technical possibilities for the performing arts but also raises the question: How much theater is there in AI systems? How do AI-generated fake news and deepfakes change our perception of reality? How can theater, as the art of assembly, critically reflect and make tangible the impact of AI on our everyday social life?
In CHATBOT CHALLENGE, the audience can collectively “prompt,” thus collectively determining the rules by which the performance chatbot, developed specifically by Interrobang, operates. These ethical codes of conduct are then tested and progressively developed in various play and conflict situations. In this process, the performance chatbot gains access to the entire theater machinery, including video, music, stage, lights, and sound. Which feedback loops are triggered in this process? And what happens when the artificial theater intelligence goes out of control?
CHATBOT CHALLENGE exemplarily discusses the societal questions and challenges of the current AI era: How can the profit-oriented and often discriminatory structures of AI be made transparent and changed? How can AI systems be demystified? And what can AIs themselves contribute to these questions?
Credits
Concept: Interrobang Performance: Christiane Kühl, Nina Tecklenburg, Artificial Intelligences Dramaturgy: Lea Goebel, Anna Krauß Dramaturgy-Assistent: Lara Domke Creative Coding: Manus Nijhoff, Florian Fischer Stage and Video: Theresa Reiwer Music: Friedrich Greiling Graphics: Jürgen Fehrmann Technical Direction & Lighting Design: Dirk Lutz Production Management: ehrliche arbeit, Sandra Klöss Head of Communication: Alexandra Lauck Public Relations: Tina Ebert
Production: Interrobang. Co-production: HAU Hebbel am Ufer, Schlachthaus Theater Bern. Funded by Berliner Senatsverwaltung für Kultur und Gesellschaftlichen Zusammenhalt und durch Mittel des Hauptstadtkulturfonds.
Dates
Kleintheater Luzern
15.-16. April 2025
Schlachthaus Theater Bern
13.-15. November 2024
HAU Hebbel am Ufer Berlin
Premiere, October 10 2024 at HAU2 during the festival “Spy on me”, further performances until October 13 2024