Spend an Evening People-Watching at Sackerson’s Hindsight in Downtown Salt Lake City

By Susannah Whitman

Sackerson’s immersive new play, Hindsight, starts at a bus stop in downtown Salt Lake City. You and four other audience members are given headphones and instructions for the evening. If you don’t know your fellow audience members when you arrive, you may leave feeling a strange sort of bond with them—there are only five of you per performance, after all. The tiny audience size is just one of many elements that makes this experience unique.

After making sure your headphones are working, you’ll follow your “guide” for the evening onto a bus, and the play will begin with a phone call, made by one of the actresses sitting on the bus with you. Actors are all wearing microphones, so you can hear the dialogue through your headphones. The action takes place throughout about a six-block area of downtown Salt Lake. You’ll be sitting with actors in a pizza place, following them down streets, watching them through restaurant windows, and riding buses and trains with them (all in the “free-fare zone,” so no additional cash is needed).

There is so much to love about Hindsight. There’s a pleasant blurring between audience and atmosphere. Because the action takes place in public, non-ticketed spectators catch glimpses of the story as it moves along. There are no “sets” built for this script, since everything is already there—the city streets, the TRAX stop, the restaurants. Costumes are simple, and there’s no lighting beyond what the city provides. The production still manages to include a stunning sound design, sending music to audience members’ headphones between scenes. (It truly was a perfect soundtrack, and I would like Sackerson to please post the track list so that I can have it for my own.)

But the immersive elements of this production are not just a gimmick. They’re perfectly suited to the show. Local playwright Morag Shepherd’s script is equal parts funny and heartbreaking. It tells the story backwards, allowing you to see the ending first, and then understand it more deeply as you see all of the moments that lead up to it. Alex Ungerman seems to have hit on just the right directing style for this piece: hire capable actors and then get out of their way. The pacing (which is actually pretty complicated in an immersive work like this one) is excellent.

Mary C. Nikols plays romantic lead Lorraine (double cast with McKenzie Steele Foster), and it is her story that we follow (literally and figuratively). Nikols does well in her portrayal, and we can sense her internal conflicts, occasionally hidden beneath her witty replies but slipping clearly through the cracks in her facade. As the earnest but rather manipulative Chase, Brandt Garber (double cast with Tyler Fox) somehow manages to be both sympathetic and appropriately unlikable. I felt like I recognized Chase—someone who believes they’re sincere, but doesn’t realize how self-centered they are. Shawn Francis Saunders (double cast with Connor Nelis Johnson) plays the endearingly odd Ford, the other love interest. Saunders’ work is alive and unpredictable, which is what you want in theatre, especially when it’s happening with so many other distractions around.

It’s something I kept thinking of as we walked downtown, finding places to lean or stand to watch the action of the play. There are plenty of distractions, but the work is compelling, and no number of onlookers could draw my attention away from the actors. I wanted to know what was being said. Shepherd’s writing is dense with meaning, and it resonated more and more deeply with me as the story progressed.

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And I kept thinking, too, during moments between scenes, when we walked as a small group up a city block, how many unseen stories were happening all around us right at that moment. Hindsight is a chance to be a “fly on the wall,” to watch a condensed, Reader’s Digest version of a relationship. But the conversation between characters in the restaurant isn’t out of place. Neither is the confrontation at the TRAX stop. Nor the phone call on the bus. Those things are happening in real life, all around us. It’s part of what makes the experience of Hindsight so extraordinary, realizing that the story you’re watching is just one of the hundreds of stories that are unfolding everywhere, all the time. Sackerson’s production has captured and distilled that truth into a compelling and moving theatrical experience. I left the show feeling invigorated and fulfilled, both by the content of the story, and by the mode of delivering it.

Sackerson presents Hindsight by Morag Shepherd
Downtown Salt Lake City (various locations; starting point specified via email after ticket purchase)
May 17 – 19, May 24 – 26, May 31 – Jun 2, Jun 7 – 9, Multiple evening shows each night
$18 students, $25 single ticket, Tickets must be purchased online prior to event
Sackerson Facebook Page
Hindsight Facebook Event
Content advisory: Some strong language
Important notes: Patrons should be able to walk briskly and navigate stairs, and to walk approximately 1.5 miles over the course of 90 minutes. There is no bag check, and the performances will go on as scheduled through most weather. Audience members are encouraged to wear comfortable walking shoes and bring a water bottle. Contact Sackerson with any further questions.