Bricolage

At Bricolage, our mission is to immerse artists and audiences in adventurous theatrical experiences that foster connections and alter perceptions.

Bricolage envisions theater not as a passive experience, but as a vehicle for heightened involvement for artist and audience alike. Our approach encourages artists to take the creative risks necessary to create full- blooded, high-quality theatrical experiences that challenge audiences to engage in new ways, react, and express openly their opinions about our work - to have a stake in the creative discussion. The word Bricolage means "making artful use of what is at hand." What excites us is the connection and interaction between seemingly disparate elements, and the potential for these components to resonate as one cohesive event. We use the distinctive resources of the Pittsburgh region to create theatrical experiences that stimulate a heightened sense of involvement for the audience. "What's at hand" is the city's changing landscape, its plentiful human and material resources, and the salient political, cultural, and ethical issues we all encounter and react to each day. By combining different artistic mediums, nourishing local talent, producing provocative work, and facilitating audience engagement, Bricolage seeks to revitalize live performance for a new era.

PROGRAMS
Midnight Radio
Bricolage's Midnight Radio program is a long-time fan favorite that takes the form of a classic 1940s radio broadcast complete with commercial parodies, musical underscoring and live Foley sound effects. Over eight seasons, Midnight Radio episodes have ranged from zany, original variety shows to new adaptations of classic productions like It's a Wonderful Life and War of the Worlds.

At Midnight Radio, attendees are cast as the live studio audience. Participants can watch the spectacle of the sounds being brought to life or simply shut their eyes and build the look of the show in their own imagination.

Immersive Theater
Immersive work is a genre of theatre where the audience is placed at the center of the experience from which everything else spins. In this intimate, personalized form, the individual audience member becomes a participant and actively interacts with and affects the world in which the production exists.

Bricolage's work in immersive theater has received both local and national acclaim. 2012's STRATA was dubbed the "most ambitious production in local theatre history" by Pittsburgh's City Paper, the production garnered unprecedented attention with a cover story in American Theatre Magazine. The company's production of OjO at La Jolla Playhouse's 2015 Without Walls Festival was noted for innovation by the Wall Street Journal and sparked a series of blog posts in HowlRound and American Theater Magazine's blog.

With each new immersive production, Bricolage seeks to explore new methods of audience engagement and create a heighten sense of involvement for audiences.

Immersive Encounters (IE)
IE's are intimate, personal, and sensory-based theatrical experiences presented in bite-sized portions, designed to awaken, challenge and allow the audience to affect the performance. IE's are Bricolage's cost-effective approach to experimentation and development of ideas between larger projects, while also continuing to provide Bricolage's audience an affordable opportunity to be an integral part of the artistic experience.

B.U.S.
Bricolage Urban Scrawl (B.U.S.) is Bricolage's annual fundraiser that takes the form of a 24-hour theatre festival that celebrates the artists of Pittsburgh. Utilizing 6 playwrights, 6 directors, and 40 performers, six 10-minute plays are written, rehearsed and performed within a single day. Audiences have the opportunity to see the full creation of a play, from casting to performance.

WordPlay
WordPlay is a new spin on the age-old tradition of storytelling. With brazen honesty and creativity, actors, comedy writers, and everyday people read their own stories while our DJ spins a real-time soundtrack using anything from Brahms to Beyoncé. You'll laugh, you'll cry and you'll get an extremely intimate look into the life of a total stranger.