The Hideaway

Performances added!

"Maybe this will help you climb out of your fear."

It is not about being anonymous or even pretending to be someone else. It is about controlling which subsets of true facets of a person are relevant in different social contexts. This is fundamentally not deceptive but actually enables one to be authentic.

“What are you afraid of?”

And part of that technological perspective is also because there were all of these great hopes and dreams — the Internet would be this magical transformation, it would create a level of egalitarianism, it would be the freeing democratic mechanism for the world writ large, it would bring about the next Enlightenment — all of these big dreams. And I sort of scratched my head, being like, “I'm not sure this is how this is going to play out.”

“Governments of the Industrial World, you weary giants of flesh and steel, I come from Cyberspace, the new home of Mind. On behalf of the future, I ask you of the past to leave us alone. You are not welcome among us. You have no sovereignty where we gather.“ – John Perry Barlow, A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace

MR: You often explore identity in your work, and there’s this whole idea of a virtual identity, that you can craft yourself a completely different identity over the internet. Is this identity authentic? It seems like it’s distancing: you can have a different name and behave in a different way.

“We already live in our cultural imagination” – @jenniferhaley in an interview with The L.A. Review of Books

Our world is different.

Cyberspace consists of transactions, relationships, and thought itself, arrayed like a standing wave in the web of our communications. Ours is a world that is both everywhere and nowhere, but it is not where bodies live.

We are creating a world that all may enter without privilege or prejudice accorded by race, economic power, military force, or station of birth.

We are creating a world where anyone, anywhere may express his or her beliefs, no matter how singular, without fear of being coerced into silence or conformity.

Flat Earth Theatre presents

The Nether

by @jenniferhaley directed by Sarah Gazdowicz June 8 - 23, 2018

The Mosesian Center for the Arts Watertown, Massachusetts

The Nether is an immersive online wonderland where anything is possible. “Papa” holds court in his virtual garden, a sensory utopia where patrons may indulge their darkest fantasies under digital anonymity and without real-world consequences. But when Detective Morris investigates Papa’s dealings, she uncovers a series of darkly unsettling acts which throw morality, the law, and human nature itself into question. Hailed by The Independent as “a gripping and deeply disconcerting look at the Internet and its role in one of the most disturbing issues of our time,” Jennifer Haley’s science fiction crime drama The Nether tackles the impact of technology on human relationships, identity, and desire.

The Nether contains adult themes, language, and imagery. Parental discretion advised.