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First of all, I saw Missed Connections (a live interactive online play with magic) in a preview, and liked it enough to want to see the show again–which I did, on the very last day of its run presented by A Red Orchard Theatre.
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No, that’s not first of all. First of all, Alex Gruhin, the producer, invited me to the preview, to see a show by his good friend, the magician Jon Tai...and then let me know that they’d done some tweaks and that I might want to revisit it.
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Actually, that’s not first of all, either. First of all, there’s the reason I know Alex at all, and that is because I met Jim Knable, long ago on a train, which would absolutely have been a missed connection had I not tracked him down a few years back to see if he was still making music. And when Jim invited me to see the show he’d been working on, Nightcap Riot: Mombucha, I was greeted at the door by Alex, whom I got to know a little bit better afterwards. (I also met Pauline Turley that night, another non-missed connection.)
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But back to Missed Connections, the show: it’s a really lovely combination of sleight of hand, mentalism, and storytelling, an interactive virtual performance making brilliant use of technology (Zoom, email, cell phones, calculator apps) to connect, and to delight, a small audience. Defiantly hopeful, it’s about the optimism of potentiality, the magic of connections both found and lost, the strange fact that we’re all part of many people’s stories, alternate universes, Craigslist, the road not taken, and a fateful Halloween party.
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Jon was kind enough to answer some of my questions after the show, and here’s what he had to say:
Name: Jon Tai
Occupation: Magician
Current town: Pittsburgh, PA
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What artists (or writers, musicians, magicians, or whoever else) inspired you the most in coming up with Missed Connections?
The show was inspired in many ways by the work of author Haruki Murakami (in particular, his short story “On Seeing the 100% Perfect Girl One Beautiful April Morning”), by Marshall McLuhan‘s “The Medium is the Message,” and by the magic and theater of Derren Brown and Derek DelGaudio.
I love that Murakami story and have always found it very powerful. And I really enjoyed experiencing Missed Connections. I love the small group, which manages to create a feeling of intimacy and connection among people over Zoom of all things, and how you use technology to bring your audience together–do you have any particular stories of any interesting or amazing or unusual things that have happened in one of these performances?
When the show ends, I walk off stage, but leave the virtual room open and running. Most nights, audience members will offer warm goodbyes to one another, wish each other well and leave the room. There have been a few nights, however, when most of the audience simply stays on and just…talks. They were people who didn’t know each other prior to the start of the evening–total strangers–and yet, the experience made them feel safe and willing and curious enough to stay and spend some real time together, outside the defined confines of the show. One of these groups stuck around and chatted for over twenty minutes! That was just incredibly beautiful and especially meaningful to us as it spoke directly to the ethos of the show.
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What’s next for you? It looks like you’re booking further shows, either privately or through other theater companies….do you have another show or something further in mind, especially for when live theater is possible again?
Our show is live theater. As Kirsten Fitzgerald, A Red Orchid Theatre’s Artistic Director, said: “Missed Connections is not a passive viewing experience, a livestream or a virtual magic show. It is a totally unique theatrical event, designed for a new performing arts media landscape, enabled by and co-created with its audience on a performance-by- performance basis.”
During our run in Chicago, we facilitated connections between audience members all across the globe–from Anchorage to Los Angeles to Chicago to NYC to Dublin to London to Madrid to Grand Cayman to Perth and Taipei! And that’s an incredible thing. So we will continue to develop the show and grow its reach…with further, exciting engagements to be announced soon.
Fair enough! You’re right, it absolutely is live theater even though the audience is scattered. I will look forward to the further, exciting engagements. On another note, if you could give the whole country a book assignment, what should we all read?
I hesitate to give a blanket strong recommendation since no work is right for everyone, but my favorite novel by Murakami is Kafka On the Shore.
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And what is your favorite children’s book?
There was a picture book I was absolutely enchanted with as a kid called Animalia. It has 26 pages, one for each letter of the alphabet, and an alliterative phrase describing an animal scene on each page (e.g. “Proud Peacocks Preening Perfect Plumage”). The illustrations are whimsical and detailed and playful and have a fairytale-like quality to them, and I remember just getting lost in the pages.
I am not familiar with that one but may just need to get a copy for my younger daughter. How about a movie that you’d recommend?
One that comes to mind right now is Pan’s Labyrinth. I’ve found myself thinking about that movie in recent times because my experience with it evokes how I hope audience members perceive the mystery in my work.
Without giving too much away for anyone who hasn’t seen it, the movie involves a young girl in a traumatic situation, and she begins to enter into this dangerous parallel world in which fantastical things happen. But it’s never made clear whether these things are “actually” happening in the world of the film or if they are simply fantasies conjured up in the child’s mind. I remember watching the movie when it first came out, back in 2006, enjoying it, but really getting hung up on the question of, “Was it real?” Was what the girl experiencing actually happening or was it just in her mind? And that not-knowing that the film left us with really bothered me. I just couldn’t get past it.
I recently watched the movie again, and this time I enjoyed it so much more than the first time I saw it…because of the not-knowing. Because it left me with a Mystery with no easy answers. I guess age has taught me to embrace that idea. To know that to be given the experience of a real Mystery–one that cannot be solved by a quick search on the Internet, or penetrated by the application of logic or intellect–is a real gift.
That’s really how I feel about magic shows. I mean, I know they aren’t “real,” you can’t actually change universes on us, but I’m not motivated to figure out how you pulled it off. I just appreciate the wonder of it and enjoy the ride. So…what is the best advice you’ve been given?
Don’t eat before bed.
I can’t argue with that!
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(Believe it or not, I ask a lot of people this!) If you could go back in time and do something over, what would it be?
The Me I am today is composed of everything that has come before. The good, the bad, the triumphs, the losses, the mishaps and mistakes, the decisions made and not made, the chances taken and the ones I’ve let pass me by. And I’m very lucky not to have made decisions with serious enough negative consequences to warrant wishing I could actually change them, even if I could. Also, as explained in Missed Connections there are no magic crystal balls, so I do my best to live the path that I live, and happy to leave all of the what-ifs to the multiverse.
Thank you so much for your time and for the excellent show!
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Laura LaVelle is an attorney and writer who lives in Connecticut, in a 100-year-old house, along with her husband, two daughters, and a cockatiel.
Laura can be contacted at laura@newswhistle.com
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Images Courtesy of Jon Tai
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Other Q&As by Laura LaVelle
* Alexi Auld, author
* Simeon Bankoff, Executive Director, Historic Districts Council
* Eric Bennett, author
*Lydia Bourne, Rastrello
* Jay Bushman, author, producer, storyteller
* Victor Calise, NYC Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities
* Alexander Campos, Executive Director, Center for Book Arts
* Victor Carinha, Journey Lab
* Mark Cheever, Friends of Hudson River Park
* Yvonne Chu, Kimera Design
*Claudia Connor, International Institute of Connecticut
* Sarah Cox, Write A House
* Betsy Crapps, founder of Mom Prom
* Cynthia Davis, Our Woven Community
* Ameet Dhillon, US-Africa Housing Finance
* Margaret Dorsey, anthropologist
* Mamady Doumbouya, Jonathan Halloran, & Robert Hornsby, founders of American Homebuilders of West Africa
* Wendy Dutwin, Limelight Media
* Kinsey Dyckman, Board Member, Dyckman Farmhouse Museum
* Rhonda Eleish & Edie van Breems, interior designers
* Martha Albertson Fineman, law professor
* John Fletcher, photographer
* Christopher Fowler, author
*Guy Fraser-Sampson, author
* Bob Freeman, Committee on Open Government
* Les Friedman, Mikey’s Way Foundation
* Alex Gaudelet, INVEST HOSPITALITY
* Dr. Ramis Gheith, pain management physician
* Robert Girardi, author
* Carrie Goldberg, internet privacy and sexual consent attorney
* Alex Gruhin, co-founder of Nightcap Riot
* Leslie Green Guilbault, artist, potter
* David Halloran, City Running Tours
* Bill Harley, children’s entertainer and storyteller
* Tracey Hecht, author, Fabled Films creative director
* Garnet Heraman, brand strategist for Karina Dresses, serial entrepreneur
* Meredith Sorin Horsford, Executive Director, Dyckman Farmhouse Museum
* Margaret Pritchard Houston, author and youth worker
* Camilla Huey, artist, designer
* Dr. Brett Jarrell & Dr. Walter Neto, founders of Biovita
* Michelle Jenab, anti-racism activist
* Beth Johnson, Townsend Press editor
* Mahanth Joishy, founder of United States – India Monitor
* Alexandra Kennedy, Executive Director, Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art
* Jim Knable, playwright and musician
* Jonathan Kuhn, Director of Art & Antiquities for NYC Parks Department
* Elizabeth Larison, Director of Programs for apexart
* Ann Lawrence, Co-Founder of Pink51
* Jessica Lee, dancer, Sable Project Administrator
* Najaam Lee, artist and sickle cell advocate
* Devoney Looser, English professor
* Amy Losek, author
* Chris Mallin, theorem painting teacher
* Melanie Marks, CT House Histories
* Anthony Monaghan, documentary filmmaker
* Ellie Montazeri, Tunisian towel manufacturer
* Heather-Marie Montilla, Executive Director, Pequot Library
* Lorin Morgan-Richards, author
* Zoe Mulford, folk singer/songwriter
* Yurika Nakazono, rainwear designer, Terra New York
* Jibrail Nor, drummer
* Doreen Odom, Mental Health Project, Urban Justice Center
* Nick Page, composer, song leader, conductor
* Craig Pomranz, cabaret singer, children’s book author
* Alice Quinn, Executive Director, Poetry Society of America
* Laurie Richter, 100 Who Care Alliance
* Ryan Ringholz, children’s shoe designer, Plae Shoes
*Carrie Roble, Park Over Plastic / Hudson River Park Trust
* Alanna Rutherford, Board Member, Andrew Glover Youth Program
* Deborah Ryan & Frank Vagnone, Historic House Anarchists
* Steve Sandberg, musician
* Bill Sanderson, author, reporter, and editor
* Lawrence Schwartzwald, photographer
* Rose Servitova, author
* Lisa Shaub, milliner
* Marjorie Silver, law professor
* Peter Sís, writer and illustrator
* Charlotte Smith, blogger, At Charlotte’s House
* Patrick Smith, author and pilot
* Juliet Sorensen, law professor
* Jeffrey Sumber, psychotherapist and author
* Diana Swartz, Liger Leadership Academy
* Rich Tafel, life coach and Swedenborgian minister
*Jonathan Todres, law professor
* Andra Tomsa, creator of SPARE app
* Maggie Topkis, mystery fiction publisher
* Pauline Turley, Irish Arts Center
* Vickie Volpano, Goodwill of Western and Northern Connecticut
* Carol Ward, Executive Director, Morris-Jumel Mansion
* Krissa Watry, Dynepic & iOKids
* Adamu Waziri, creator of children’s television program Bino and Fino
* Ekow Yankah, law professor
* Brigit Young, author
