VHS-Themed ‘The Tape Escape’ to Blend Escape Rooms and Immersive Theatre (Q&A)
Outside the March’s new experience is set in a real-life former video store
This summer, the upcoming The Tape Escape will take theatre company Outside the March into new territory—a story-driven, puzzle-infused experience that has more in common with escape rooms than previous works like Dr. Silver. The intimate production (co-created by Artistic Director Mitchell Cushman, writer and actor Vanessa Smythe, and video artist Nick Bottomley) will be set in a former historic Toronto video store on Bloor Street, Queen Video, and transport participants back to the year 1999. They’ll have the opportunity to explore three different stories, each one based upon a film genre, as they browse the shelves which contain 5,000 VHS tapes.
We spoke to Mitchell Cushman of Outside the March to learn more about the experience, which is planned to open in July.
No Proscenium (NP): Can you tell us a little about yourself and your background?
Mitchell Cushman (MC): I’m an immersive theatre director, and founding Artistic Director for Outside the March — one of Canada’s leading immersive companies, about to celebrate our 10 year anniversary! I’ve also worked as a freelance director across the country, including five years at The Stratford Festival. I’m particularly excited about working with emerging writers to develop original work, and creating work in found spaces that combines the intimate and the epic — in close proximity to the audience.
NP: What is The Tape Escape about?
MC: The Tape Escape is our love letter to the lost art of browsing. We began developing the piece a few years, when it became apparent that video stores were very much an endangered species. We’ve chosen to set the piece in the late 90s, during the dying days of VHS — as a stand-in for all of the aspects of brick-and-mortar shopping, community space, and human interaction that are become remnants of the past. It’s also a project that combines aspects of the escape room genre with immersive theatre — creating a unique hybrid of an experience that’s unlike anything we have ever tackled before.
NP: Can you tell us about the unique venue you have for this experience?
MC: We are thrilled and honored to be take up residence for the project at the former site of Queen Video — one of Toronto’s most iconic and historic video stories. Sadly, Queen Video announced they were shuttering their doors a month ago. We met with the store owner, and he was really excited about our project, and the tribute is was looking to pay to the lineage of video stores. He graciously introduced us to the landlord, and we took possession May 1st. We’re in the midst of a two month design build, and we’ll be ready to open our doors to the public the beginning of July!
NP: How are escape room and immersive theatre elements mixed together into the experience?
MC: The Tape Escape is made up of three different “in store rental” tracks — 45-minute narrative stories each themed off of a different film genre (Romance, Sci-Fi, and Family). Each story unfolds through a series of puzzles that lead small groups of audience members to interact with different video tapes, live actors, installation design, and secrets buried deep within the store. The overall concept is that you are delving into the stories of the people who have rented those tapes, and walked through the story’s aisles in the past. Our aim is to create something that is accessible, fun, and transportive to a wide array of audiences — whether you’re an old pro at escape rooms, or have never tackled one before. And we’re not locking anyone in the store — we’re using the term escape room pretty loosely here. To quote my co-creator Nick Bottomley: “we don’t want you to escape from the past, we want you to linger in it!”
NP: What should participants expect in The Tape Escape? And what kinds of choices can the participants make during the experience?
MC: Each “in store rental” is quite a different experience. For “Love Without Late Fees,” the audience gets to play matchmaker for the store’s video dating service — helping an aspiring couple choose the right movie rentals to get them to “happily ever after” through a series of romance-inspired puzzles. For “A Grown-Up’s Guide to Flying,” you are re-tracing the footsteps of a treasure hunt an older sibling has left for a young sibling in their favorite video store, to mark a particularly special birthday, and a life transition. And “Yesterday’s Heroes” is our most mysterious track. Don’t want to say too much, but the experience leads the audience through the mysteries of the store’s origin story, and examines why it is that this store exists as a preserved time-capsule of 1999.
NP: How are you designing around audience agency, consent, and safety?
MC: That is something we are very conscious of and prioritize on all of our experiences. The audience is very much in the driver’s seat of the experience, and can take as active or passive a role in their journey through the show as they wish. Each experience will be facilitated by one of our video store clerks — the staff of The Tape Escape, whose job it is to ensure that each customer finds the tape they are looking for, safely and happily. I think, and sincerely hope, that people will feel very taken care of. Again, this is not a “lock people in a dark room” kind of escape room challenge. It will be far more reminiscent of the experience of browsing a video store — many different groups of people co-existing amongst the shelves.
NP: What do you hope participants take away from The Tape Escape?
MC: There is no substitute for live, communal experience! Netflix, Amazon, something fundamental is lost when we take what used to be an interpersonal experience and move it online. We’re working to create new public, gathering spaces, to take the place of dearly departed neighborhood stores like Queen Video.
The Tape Escape will open in July 4 and run throughout the summer at 480 Bloor St. Each story is designed for 4–8 audience members at a time. Bookings will be available soon on the Outside the March web site.
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