Love Among The ‘Lonely Hearts’ (Review)
Birch House Immersive changes up their yearly Valentine’s show
Much of Valentine’s Day as it’s currently celebrated is about quick and straightforward displays of affection, forgoing examination of the love you share with your partner (if you have one). It’s a celebration of love without acknowledging how love works. So what does make the relationship you have with your partner special? Why do you open yourself up to them emotionally and romantically rather than someone else? These are the questions that this year’s edition of Birch House Immersive’s yearly experience Lonely Hearts, this year subtitled The Sweethearts’ Soiree, hopes to provoke.
It’s a freezing night and my partner and I arrive early to the performance. We elect to stay in our warm car since our instructions are to meet The Gentlewoman Giles Henry (Janie Killips) outside on a street corner at a specific time. Once closer to the arrival time, we head to the corner. Without a jacket on, Henry guides us quickly down a block to an apartment building, buzzing to have us let in. With an audible “buzz-click” from the door, we head upstairs, greeted by The Gin Savant Beatrix von Hopper (Lauren Fields). After hanging up our coats and getting our IDs checked by the ever-vigilant Mackenzie Rigby (Dean Corrin, No Proscenium’s former Chicago Curator as well a past professor of mine at DePaul University), drinks are served; we engage in polite chit-chat with other audience members who’ve previously arrived.
Once all audience members are with drinks in hand, our party planning hosts Henry and von Hopper thank us for meeting here at the apartment instead of Rigby’s bar like in previous years. They explain that they’re hosting a party here over concerns that their friend Julia (Christina Renee Jones) is struggling with her decision to call off her wedding during last year’s party. When Julia arrives, she’s caught off guard to see everyone, insisting that everything’s “fine” between her ex-fiance-yet-still-current-and-live-in boyfriend. Yet, when pressed, Julia admits that her boyfriend has grown more distant as this Valentine’s Day approached. She’s been unable to get a hold of him today. Despite this situation, Henry and von Hopper proclaim the party is still on, guiding the audience into conversations or entertainment in the hopes of raising Julia’s spirits.
In past years, Lonely Hearts has occurred in one of the bars at The Den Theatre in Wicker Park, where the audience is guided through conversations and moments with different characters. While the location is different for this year’s Lonely Hearts, the structure has remained the same. To start, each audience member receives a button with a letter or number that allows Henry and von Hopper to break the audience into pairs, thrusting strangers together, followed by making an introduction to a character they want this set of audience members to meet this evening. After the introductions, this guest, either a personal acquaintance of Julia’s or a psychic brought in by Henry and von Hopper, guides a conversation or activity examining an aspect or element of love for the two audience members. Then, once the interaction has run its course, Henry or von Hopper reappear to break up the pair of audience members, pairing each of them with a different audience member and another guest to meet per button’s letter or number. The constant shuffling creates a lively pulse to the evening’s action, creating the atmosphere of a packed and busy party where you’re always being bounced around between conversations.
My first pairing has me meeting with Julia in her kitchen along with a tall, stocky man I’ve never met before. Our chat with Julia is about what things make for a strong foundation in a relationship, such as emotional honesty and respecting our partner’s wishes. We discuss this over mozzarella sticks she’s made in the oven. Having attended Lonely Hearts in 2019 (her wedding last year), the details Julia brings up, such as feeling the pressure of getting married on Valentine’s Day, instantly jog my memory. These reminders allow me to specifically respond to her throughout our conversation, like reassuring her of the fact that cancelling her wedding was the right choice. It’s an engaging and rewarding bit of continual world-building from last year. It turns my investment in what’s happening this evening into something personal, and I begin feeling less like an audience member and more like a close friend of Julia’s.
Additionally, my interactions with the two psychics during the evening are moving and illuminating. I first meet with Adora (Kristen Alesia), the more mystic of the two psychics, creating a love potion to be shared between myself and a bearded well-dressed man. While making the potion, Adora has the well-dressed man and I lock eyes as we respond to her questions that range from the mundane (“Flowers or chocolates?” for example) to personal preferences (“To only give love or to only receive love?” as another example). It’s deeply intimate and each response the other gives cements a unique and personal connection, with any sense of this person being a stranger quickly disappearing. Later on, when meeting Jubilus (Quinn Leary), I’ve been paired with my real-life partner. Jubilus is a tarot reader, guiding us through a reading that becomes emotionally revealing for my partner and me. While responding to Jubilus’ questions, each response we give has an impact on the other, tears welling in our eyes. The interactions with the two psychics is a humbling reminder about the importance of being emotionally open, either to make those around us less of strangers, or to be more openly expressive with those already we know and care about.
While what I was supposed to be getting out of my time with the psychics is clear, I was less sure of the intended purpose of my interactions with Rigby, the owner of the bar previous Lonely Hearts parties has been held at, and then later on with Olive (Isabella Coelho performing a puppet), the sister to one of Julia’s friends. My discussion with Rigby and another audience member is about circumnavigating the struggles of how best to “meet someone” today, with Rigby pressing us for advice. Olive, a green Sesame Street-like puppet, talks about lacking confidence in meeting people when looking so different from everyone else. While both interactions felt like perfectly organic conversations, I struggled to find the dramatic beats laced within each one. I’m glad that not every interaction in Lonely Hearts is a structured activity but I do wonder if there could have been a stronger focus in my conversations with Rigby and Olive. Additionally, there is no clear reason why puppets exist in this world, leaving me with my educated guess that they symbolize otherness.
Additionally, I found the change in venue for Lonely Hearts from The Den Theatre to someone’s apartment welcoming, creating a more personalized space for the action to unfold. The freedom to use the space as Birch House saw fit came across in where and how each interaction with a guest was set up, allowing the apartment throughout to be stylized, and support and heighten the dramatic elements of each interaction. For example, the apartment’s sun room had black and white curtains put up, so entering the room to meet Jubilus felt like being in a tarot reader’s storefront space. Or when meeting with Olive, the furniture is set up to invite us to sit closely together with only one lamp lit, creating the rare treat of finding a personal and private place to talk at a large party.
However, throughout the evening, the two hosts, Henry and von Hopper, would walk around, talking loudly to each other in different areas of the apartment. Most likely this is done to cue the performers about how much time they have left within the current interaction. But in the tighter spaces of the apartment, it felt disruptive, particularly when I was meeting with Ribgy in a hallway. I couldn’t hear the performer over Henry and von Hopper’s voices, and I began focusing on their conversation instead of the one I was currently in.
Despite a few growing pains, each intimate scene in the show was well matched with a strong examination or interaction about love that proved the change in venue for Lonely Hearts was the right one. The chance to interact with all the characters present along with heightening the physical elements of the space were examples of strong changes I enjoyed. So like the quest so many couples find themselves upon to celebrate a personal and meaningful Valentine’s Day, Birch House Immersive continues to explore, grow, and foster the experiences the audience can have in each year with Lonely Hearts, ensuring that each year is as romantic as the last one for all involved.
Lonely Hearts’ run for this year has concluded.
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