This thesis questions relationships between theatre making practice and conspiracy theory culture. It understands conspiracism to be diverse, widespread, politically influential and often reductive, producing dangerous convictions. At the same time, it acknowledges that attempts to address conspiracism are themselves sometimes superficial, approaching conspiracists and conspiracism as homogenous entities when these terms actually describe a heterogenous milieu. I ask how theatre intervenes in this discourse, and what strategies practitioners can employ to establish more thoroughly representative engagements with conspiracism. In particular, this research asks how one can establish critical distance between a theatre audiences and various claims associated with conspiracism. The approaches developed in this work are therefore designed to address conspiracy theory culture without either advancing its dangers or marginalising conspiracists.
I begin by observing some core qualities of conspiracism, arguing that conspiracy theory culture encompasses diverse perspectives and positions that span epistemological conditions, geographic boundaries and socio-political spectra. I also discuss its dangers and explore methods employed by theatre makers whose work already addresses these issues. Analysing several notable performances, I seek out strategies and techniques to be developed. In the process, I articulate philosophical and methodological frameworks central to those works and my research, suggesting that autoethnographic theatre allows practitioners to activate concepts of deconstruction, and that doing so provides them with a means to call conspiracism into question. These findings inform the research questions I go on to address in this thesis, and moving on, I explore my intentions to do so through practice research.
I then proceed with three chapters, analysing my own theatre. Interrogating original performances that were developed within this research, each explicates and assesses the techniques and strategies I established when addressing conspiracies, conspiracy theories and conspiracists. Reflecting on my findings, I argue that theatre is able to engage constructively with conspiracy theory culture by employing such approaches, producing uncertainties contrary to its dangerous convictions.
