Trouble on Planet Earth
A live, choose-your-own-adventure performance that put narrative control in the audience’s hands, powered by bespoke wireless controllers.
Trouble on Planet Earth was an early and formative exploration into interactive storytelling for me. Created in 2008, just before smartphones reshaped how we think about audience participation, the show used custom-built wireless controllers that glowed in different colours, allowing the audience to vote on decisions that shaped the story in real time.
It was one of the first times I’d seen technology so directly and playfully woven into dramaturgy — and it became a touchstone for much of the experience-led work I would go on to make.
The structure of the work was designed as a branching narrative tree: 113 scenes, 24 possible endings and more than seven hours of performance material. Each performer played over twenty characters, navigating a story that constantly shifted depending on the collective choices of the audience. No two performances were ever the same. Each show effectively generated a “portrait” of that particular audience — their instincts, curiosities, hesitations, and desires.
The Approach
At its heart, the project was an investigation into how audiences relate to narrative when given genuine agency. What kinds of stories do people choose when faced with uncertainty? How do they negotiate responsibility when every choice has a consequence? And what happens to classic dramatic structure when control is shared?
The show’s bespoke technology — developed by Matthew Gardiner and Ray Gardiner — was central to this experiment. The controllers were intentionally simple, tactile and almost toy-like, creating a sense of collective play that sat alongside the ambition of the narrative design.
The Premiere & Reception
Trouble on Planet Earth premiered at the 2008 Adelaide Fringe at the Fringe Factory and received two major awards:
- BankSA Support Act Award, Adelaide Fringe 2008
- The Advertiser Fringe Award, 2008
The cast included Katherine Fyffe, Cameron Goodall, David Heinrich, Jude Henshall, Amber McMahon and Alirio Zavarce, with writing by Finegan Kruckemeyer, design by Matthew Kneale, lighting by Ben Snodgrass, and executive production by Heidi Angove.
Legacy
Looking back, this project marked the beginning of my long-term interest in interactive and immersive design — particularly the tension between audience agency and dramaturgical clarity. Many of the ideas we explored in Trouble on Planet Earth became foundational to my later work in museums, digital installations, and large-scale cultural experiences.