A.I. Love You
Studio 16, September 8, 9, 12-14, 2019
Tickets at vancouverfringe.com or at the door
Posted September 7, 2019
“It would make me happy if you would . . . “ These are the magic words Adam (Peter Dewhurst) must say to get all his desires fulfilled by April (Fiona Hardy), his compliant, beautiful, robot wife. She has been programmed with a “core performance function”: make Adam happy. Designed to be absolutely perfect for him, April has no free will and no way, other than appealing to the ‘Creative Biolife Ethical Steering Committee’ (that’s us) to de-activate herself. And she is starting to malfunction.
Written and directed by writer Joe Ball (Exit Productions, UK), A.I. Love You raises issues of right-to-die, strengths and limitations of artificial intelligence, the concept of ‘the perfect marriage’ and, ironically, relationships between real humans. (That particular ‘aha moment’ dropped for me partway through the show.)
On about 5 or 6 occasions, we have to vote by raising a white card: are we for Adam or are we for April? Each character gets a chance to defend his/her position before we vote and the audience even gets a chance to question both of them.
And here’s where Dewhurst and Hardy really show their stuff: they respond to different questions every night and they must respond in character. On the night I attended questions included, “What if the situation were reversed? What if it were Adam who was terminally ill and wanted to die?” “Couldn’t another April simply be manufactured and life, for Adam, continue on as usual?” “If Adam truly loves April, shouldn’t he let her go?”
And then the final vote.
A.I. Love You is fascinating, provocative and as innovative as it gets. It’s all about what it means to be truly human. Activate yourself. See it. You might want to see it twice.