Trial by Jury: Immersive and Interactive Performance as Public Practice

    In a multitude of respects, trial by jury shares countless inherent attributes with interactive theater. Although this popular performance genre is notoriously difficult to define in all-inclusive terms, at its foundation, "interactive" (or "immersive") theater is a category of performance whose structure is characterized by active, physical relationships between audience and production. It often makes use of site-specific performance venues around which audiences are free to roam, and its doctrine dismisses divisions between visual art, live art, and theatre while promoting exploration and imagination.

    Interactive theater techniques are especially evocative when applied in the context of Performance as Public Practice, which is an avant garde interdisciplinary and intersectional approach to creating theater that often seeks to raise awareness and propose solutions issues of social justice. It unconventionally defines performance in varied and wide cultural contexts and focuses on the historical development, artistic significance, and practical applications of theater techniques in public spheres. With these staging techniques and approaches in mind, we can begin to consider the ways in which the accuracy and fairness of civil jury trials may be improved by enhancing juror understanding, engagement, and overall experience. 

    According to the Honorable Judge Mark I. Bernstein, both trials and live theater educate as they persuade by linking a series of events that appeal to human emotion. Bernstein posits that both trials and theater afford us the opportunity to scrutinize private details of others' lives and to learn from them while attending to cathartic and voyeuristic needs. However, he also points out that examining jury trials as theatrical events is not a novel undertaking. For example, consider classical Grecian trials, which were political events that employed juries numbering in the hundreds; the Salem witch trials and their equal focuses on justice and ridding society of taboo, macabre conduct; and early colonial Massachusetts trials which provided the primary source of community entertainment, since stage plays were illegal in the state until the 1790s. 

    Theatrical theorists and scholars agree that movement, storytelling, real spaces (opposed to proscenium stages), and interactions help build engaging and transformative experiences for audience members. In the parallel world of civil jury trials, jurors enter the courtroom and are seated in a jury box, which occupies real space within the action of the proceedings. Judges and other courtroom staff provide procedural and structural confines in which parties, witnesses, and attorneys craft narrative stories to present the legal and factual bases of a matter. When every element of a given story is presented, jurors move from the courtroom to a separate space for deliberation by interacting and debating with one another. When these interactions eventually produce a decision, jurors move back into their space within the action to take part in influencing the story themselves by standing to deliver a verdict. In these respects, civil jury trials closely resemble immersive and interactive theatrical performances so that it is a useful exercise to apply suggestions for making great immersive theatre to improving juror experiences. 

    In his book Creating Worlds: How to Make Immersive Theatre, Nick Hern suggests that creators understand and anticipate audience behavior, plan and influence movement through real space, and balance interaction with narrative. Proceeding under the theory that improved juror experience during trial yields more accurate verdicts, attorneys should understand and address jurors informational needs, plan for the ways in which juror minds and senses will explore the courtroom space, and carefully connect the number of direct addresses made to jurors with the legal and factual narrative.