What happens when the imaginary "fourth wall" between theater actors and audiences is actually a translucent scrim? And how about a play that doubles simultaneously as a movie, using cameras to film and project the action back onto that scrim in real time?
Such questions will find an answer this week in "Helen Lawrence," an ambitious cinema-meets-live-theater event at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, created by the boundary-pushing visual artist Stan Douglas with TV screenwriter Chris Haddock.
Drawing its story and spirit from the bygone world of film noir, "Helen Lawrence," running Wednesday through Saturday as part of BAM’s Next Wave Festival, features live actors in a hybrid performance format meant to be both unsettling and bemusing.