Love Game
Produced by Last Call Theatre
As experienced in Silverlake ~ February 2025
The Experience & How it Works:
You purchase your ticket and receive a letter responding to our response to a Lead Researcher’s posting seeking a Research Assistant (RA). When you arrive at the venue, you select a “dater” to be assigned to (based on their photos on RA ID badges). Then when the bar opens and the event begins, you find your dater, get to know them a bit and shadow them, providing support on and after their speed dates. At the end of the speed-dating portion, you help your dater narrow down to their top two prospects.
Why it’s Interesting, IMHO:
This show answers the question we’ve never thought to ask: what’s it like to be at a speed-dating event and not be one of the people speed-dating.
Initial Impression & Critical Discussion:
This is in many ways a much more ambitious show than it seems. Here’s what the show is up against:
Most dates are bad dates
This show asks the audience to sit through the same exposition multiple times (e.g., where your dater is from, what their job is, that for fun they watch movies, etc.).
Even going on real speed dates, you’re not invested in most of them
… and in the real-life scenario where you’re the dater, your future arguably depends on it.
While romantic comedies are proof that it’s possible for audiences to invest in fictional relationships, the characters in this show, while fun, aren’t grounded enough to fool us into thinking they’re real people and not the actors and they’re not broad enough to be comedic sketch characters.
RAs are asked to invest in the romantic lives of fictional strangers
Questions that feel high-stakes when you’re out with your best friends like, “What if you guys sing karaoke, and I dance with her?” just don’t carry the same weight in this kind of scenario.
That being said, the RAs I worked with had a great time and really enjoyed their experience. Their favorite parts were:
- That you didn’t have to be specially chosen to get to interact meaningfully with actors
- That the interactions felt organic
- You weren’t responsible for the dater’s choices, but you could influence their choices
Additionally, the time-travel to the future at the end is a fun, unexpected twist. It seemed to be the most significant thing the Lead Researcher contributed science-wise.
HOT TIPS:
- A Tale of Two Bartenders. When the character’s refer to the bartender, e.g., “I think that belongs to the bartender,” they are talking about the bartender character at the “show bar” and not the actual bartender at the venue bar. It can be confusing because it would make no sense that the venue bartender would have information relevant to the plot, but if you follow leads and ask the bartender character questions it may lead to story-related quests.
- Spend that Ticket. The show needs to vacate the space shortly after the performance ends, so make time to use your drink ticket during the show. If you haven’t gotten a drink by the time the speed-dating portion is over, you may want to head to the bar. Also, drink tickets are good for any drinks, not just the specials.
- Love at Any Volume. The space does not have great acoustics and it does have a lot of people talking at once. If you’re sensitive to sound, consider bringing noise-cancelling earplugs (or skipping the show altogether); this is definitely not a performance for anyone hard of hearing. If you plan to join in the karaoke portion of the evening (not at all a requirement), consider warming up your voice or prepare to lose it.
Experiential Viewpoint Expression (E.V.E.):
Embodied, 1st person visual, 1st person narrative, participant, mortal
Story Anchor:
When you’re accepted as a Research Assistant for an upcoming matchmaking event, YOU along with other RAs choose a dater and support their speed-dating experience (essentially as “wing people”), and then the Lead Researcher time-travels us three months into the future to learn how the matches are faring.
Pillars of Game:
Voluntary Participation — check!
Goal — “ensure the event goes off without any deviances,” as set out in the welcome letter sent via email prior to the event.
Rules — the rules given at the outset mostly pertained to the show (e.g., don’t touch performers without consent, etc.). The rules of the “love game” seem to be mostly being a “wing person” to the dater you’ve chosen, taking notes on their speed dates and acting as a sounding board during the 2–3 minute reflection period that follows each 5 minute date.
Feedback — there isn’t any feedback as far as the goal is concerned. The dater does share feedback about her dates, as do you, the Research Assistant.
Conclusion: This isn’t quite a game, though it does in some ways endeavor to be. When speaking with insiders, there are “quests” happening for performers behind the scenes that are triggered by audience actions. However, because the audiences are not aware of the quests, they are also not aware of the consequences. Unless audience members come back for multiple performances, it is impossible to understand that events could’ve unfolded otherwise. Even if one does come back again, the feedback may not be clear as such because the audience is not aware of the action they took that triggered something. Additionally, while there is ostensibly a goal, it is not clear what the audience would need to do to achieve this goal, nor is it clear that there is any obstacle to this goal being achieved without the involvement of the audience.
Who Should Experience This?
Individuals who are deeply curious what it would be like to go speed-dating but are unable to go under traditional circumstances. People who have strong opinions on other people’s dating lives and enjoy sharing them.
