The further adventures of Lear Online
The performance at Telakka Theatre in March 2017 did not mark the end of King Lear Online. Over the following year, scenes and working methods developed during the project were adapted for three very different events: a civic banquet connecting Coventry and Tampere, a university gala built around informal social interaction, and an international showcase linking Finland with Hong Kong.
These were not new curriculum projects or productions of King Lear. They were extensions of the original collaboration, using existing material to test how telepresence might function beyond the rehearsal room. Across the three events, the system became a place for performance, civic conversation, shared hospitality and unexpected encounters.
A shared banquet across two cities
In October 2017, Coventry University and Tampere University hosted a Telepresence Banquet in support of Coventry’s bid to become UK City of Culture 2021. Academics, business leaders, cultural officers and civic representatives gathered in both cities, connected through the life-size telepresence spaces.
An identical meal was prepared and served at each venue, allowing guests in Coventry and Tampere to dine together across the screen. The shared menu gave the event a structure that went beyond watching a remote presentation. Participants ate at the same time, responded to one another and experienced the two dinners as parts of a single event.
The mayors of Coventry and Tampere were able to speak directly through the connection, while guests in both cities watched students perform extracts from King Lear Online. Material originally developed within an acting course became part of a wider civic exchange, linking conversations about culture, education and the relationship between the two cities.
The banquet showed that telepresence could support several kinds of interaction at once. It became a stage for the actors, a meeting place for civic leaders and a shared dining room for guests separated by more than a thousand miles.
Coventry was subsequently named UK City of Culture 2021. The banquet was one contribution to a wider campaign, but it demonstrated how the universities’ relationship could create a visible connection between international partners during the bidding process.
The video on this page follows some of the preparations and includes an extract from the performance as it was viewed from Tampere.
A party without a performance
In February 2018, the project created another shared social space for Tampere University’s annual Winter Gala. The Finnish equipment was installed in the university dining hall, while the Coventry connection operated from a drama studio.
Moving the system out of a controlled black-box environment created a different relationship with its surroundings. The Tampere dining hall remained part of everyday university life while the equipment was being installed, so people passing through encountered the large projected image without having been invited to a rehearsal or performance.
Students stopped to investigate the screen and speak with people in Coventry. On one occasion, a group of firefighters carrying out a fire drill appeared within the connected space, producing a brief and entirely unplanned encounter between the emergency team in Tampere and the Coventry participants.
These moments occurred before the formal gala had begun, but they revealed something important about the system. In a rehearsal studio, almost everyone present understands why the connection has been created and what they are expected to do. In the dining hall, people discovered the space accidentally and had to decide how to respond. Curiosity became the starting point for interaction.
During the gala itself, there was no scheduled performance. Guests at both events were encouraged to talk, drink and dance together through the connection. Without scenes or actors directing their attention, the participants determined how the shared space would be used.
The Winter Gala demonstrated that a sense of presence did not depend upon formal theatre. The technology could become part of a party, supporting casual conversation and spontaneous interaction between people who had not rehearsed what they would say or do.
King Lear travels to Hong Kong
In March 2018, the project was invited to the GREAT Festival of Innovation in Hong Kong, organised by the UK Department for International Trade. Coventry performers travelled to the Asia Society Centre in Hong Kong, while the Tampere actors remained in Finland and appeared through the telepresence connection.
Once again, the team used extracts originally developed through King Lear Online. The Hong Kong event was therefore a showcase of existing student work rather than a separate curriculum project. Alongside the performances, the team gave demonstrations, interviews and question-and-answer sessions explaining how telepresence had been used for international actor training, rehearsal and performance.
The arrangement placed considerable demands upon the Tampere participants. The time difference meant that they were performing at approximately 5 a.m. in Finland while the Hong Kong programme took place during the day.
The connection also operated across a much greater distance than the original Coventry-Tampere partnership. Hong Kong and Tampere are approximately 7,800 kilometres apart, but geographical distance was only one factor affecting the signal. Network routing, institutional configurations and the processing of sound and image all contributed to greater latency.
The performance space created another challenge. The Asia Society amphitheatre was outdoors, while the telepresence system had been developed in acoustically controlled studios. Traffic, activity around the venue and local wildlife created ambient noise that could not be removed from the performance. Sound had to travel from the outdoor space to Finland and back while remaining clear enough for actors and audiences to follow Shakespeare’s text.
The performers had to adapt timing, vocal delivery and concentration to conditions that differed sharply from those in Tampere or Coventry. The outdoor setting also made it harder to control lighting and the relationship between the live actors and the projected image.
Despite these difficulties, the event demonstrated that the work could be presented outside the university spaces in which it had been created. An international audience encountered a live performance divided between Hong Kong and Finland, while the interviews and discussions allowed the team to share the educational thinking behind the technology.
The video on this page records the second performance of the day and the question-and-answer session that followed.
GREAT Festival of Innovation website
What these events revealed
The further life of King Lear Online showed that a student project could continue generating new forms of exchange after its original rehearsal and performance period had ended.
At the Telepresence Banquet, the system supported civic conversation, identical meals and a shared theatrical event between Coventry and Tampere. At the Winter Gala, it became an informal social environment shaped by dancers, passing students and even firefighters. In Hong Kong, existing scenes became an international demonstration performed across a more demanding network and within an outdoor venue.
Each event placed the technology in circumstances for which it had not originally been designed. The rehearsal room moved into a dining hall, a civic banquet and an open-air amphitheatre. Some encounters were carefully planned; others emerged because people happened to pass the screen and became curious about those appearing within it.
These events also extended the project’s reach without being counted as additional curriculum iterations. The actors were revisiting and adapting work developed through King Lear Online, not beginning three new productions. Their experiences demonstrated three different forms of presence: performing together, socialising together and representing the project to an international audience.
The continuing journey of King Lear Online revealed that the most interesting results did not always come from making the technology invisible. They often emerged when a new location, an unexpected visitor or an imperfect connection changed how people understood and used the space.