Dear Reader,

How are you? Yes, you, the one reading this right now. How are you doing? Having a nice winter? Oh, good. Or maybe not good, we don’t actually have any way of knowing how you just responded to that, but doesn’t everyone say it’s the thought that counts? Oh, us? We’re doing fine! That’s so kind of you to ask, and it means a lot to us lonely dramaturgs.

Look, we realize that this whole thing, us talking directly to you, isn’t something that usually happens when you go to see a play. Taking part in live theatre, whether as an actor or audience member, comes with certain expectations. You go out to the theatre, maybe grab some refreshments in the lobby, sit in your seat, skim the program for a bit, and then take in the performance. Actors audition, rehearse for months, discover their character, connect emotionally to the script, and work with their director to bring a great performance to life. The live nature of theater fosters a flow of energy where these separate processes mesh together; performer affects audience, and vice versa, but there’s always a degree of separation, the invisible “fourth wall” acting as a barrier between the actors and the spectators. But, as you can tell, with Intimate Exchanges we’re doing things a little differently. The reins have been handed off to you, dear member of the audience; it is your turn to play god.

That’s why we’re writing to you today. Because it’s quite a responsibility, isn’t it? Exciting, yes, but also rather intimidating, and we wanted to make sure you understood the importance of your role. As an audience member in Intimate Exchanges, you’re asked to make choices at crucial moments in the characters’ relationships, guiding them to pick one path or the other. You’ll help one of two ordinary women, Celia or Sylvie, navigate all the complicated possibilities of love, heartbreak, dependence, independence and–perhaps most terrifying of all–garden parties.

Though you may have the sense of the result you want, you won’t know the broader consequences of your decisions any more than these characters would in the moment. You might disappointed in the outcome, or maybe you’ll be pleased. Perhaps, just as in your own lives, you may realize that your choices led Sylvie or Celia to a place that you didn’t initially intend. You’ll see the shifts of the play’s reality in the faces of our actors as their characters’ lives unfurl before you. You might feel a sense of guilt or a rush of triumph at the outcome. Either way, when you leave the theatre and step out into the chilly Cambridge air, your choices will have been made–you can’t do them over. That is, of course, unless you decide to see the play again to experience the other options Ayckbourn wrote, which would be exciting both for you and for our Box Office staff.

Intimate Exchanges is unique in terms of its narrative complexity and branching storylines, but it isn’t without precedent in the world of theatre. Several other plays feature multiple endings, though their plots often focus on murder and mystery. Long-running hit show Shear Madness and the musical adaptation of Charles Dickens’s The Mystery of Edwin Drood both poll the audience to determine who they think the killer is. In Night of January 16th, a play by Ayn Rand which depicts a murder trial, the audience votes on whether the defendant is found innocent or guilty. The interactive nature of video games mean their creators are able to allow players’ actions throughout the game to determine the ultimate ending, a device that’s used in blockbuster games such as Bioware’s Mass Effect series as well as smaller works like recent indie hit Undertale.

Studies of these games have yielded surprisingly optimistic results; it seems that everybody wants to do the right thing. Statistics about players of adventure games like Telltale’s The Walking Dead suggest that most people try to make good choices even when everyone involved is a pile of pixels. Why can’t we help but be kind even to people we know are imaginary? Psychologist Andrew Przybylski has explained that the fundamental appeal of video games is to allow people to play the role of their ideal selves. In other words, when we control the choices of a character or characters in a story, we get to explore different decisions in an environment that’s free of real consequences. Rather than freeing us to make choices that are random or negative, however, it turns out that this environment encourages most of us to imagine which choices we would ideally make. While in real life our decision-making might be clouded by fear or selfishness, in a game we have more freedom to be heroes.

Of course, in a drastic situation like the zombie apocalypse, the difference between what’s right and what’s wrong can be clear to see. But what about the ordinary decisions people make every day, such as how to react to a sudden change in circumstances, resolve an argument with a partner, or respond to a romantic advance? For the characters in Intimate Exchanges, the choices they face don’t deal with objective right or wrong; Celia and Sylvie are more concerned with what’s right for them, which can be much more difficult to figure out. These are the decisions we face every day of our lives: what to say, when to go for something we want, and whether or not it’s best to walk away. We can’t see the future, so how can we really know which path will make us happiest? Is it possible to identify which small moment or miniscule decision led us to where we are?

The commonplace quality of many of the play’s most crucial moments is just one of the intimacies Ayckbourn hints at in the title of the play. One of the other meanings, dear member of the audience, concerns your role and the role of those around you. The intimate exchanges in question are not only between Sylvie, Lionel, Celia, and Toby. The exchanges are between you and the play, you and the performers you’ll get to know over the course of today’s show. So do your best, and vote responsibly! But don’t be too hard on yourself if things take an unfortunate turn. In an Ayckbourn play, just as in life, the course of events can be incredibly tricky to predict, and there will always be a lingering doubt or two in regards to what could have been.

Best regards and best of luck,

The Dramaturgs (Erik, Annabeth, & Noelle)