COMING SOON: HIKER TRASH

Linked Dance Theatre, long a NoPro favorite, is celebrating their 10th anniversary season this year. Their latest work goes off the beaten path to weave a small group into the story of an Appalachian Trail hiker who is looking for perspective, trying to decide whether or not to go on with her journey.

The new show takes place at Outlandish in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, a new hiking supply store with its own story.

We checked in with Kendra Slack — Co-Artistic Director of Linked Dance Theatre about the new show which opens on July 24th and runs through August 29th, and why Outlandish is in the mix.

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This is No Proscenium’s COMING SOON, a look at ongoing immersive experiences & events. To learn more about how your event could be considered for the feature check out How To Get Covered By NoPro.

NO PROSCENIUM: Tell us a little bit about your experience! What’s it about? What makes it immersive?

Kendra Slack: Hiker Trash is about Marianna Gonzalez, a person attempting to thru-hike the Appalachian Trail and blogging about it along the way. You as the audience member have been following their blog and suddenly, Marianna has suggested you meet them in person as they pass through NYC to pick up a resupply package. Marianna has been struggling with whether they should keep going or not and is looking to you as someone who has been following their journey, to help them find some perspective. This piece’s immersive nature is grounded in the audience’s relationship with Marianna. The audience is there because Marianna needs them and wants their help and they are integral to helping Marianna process this journey.

NP: What was the inspiration for your upcoming experience?

KS: The piece is inspired by my real life thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail in 2021 and the unique culture that the trail creates. It is also inspired by the mission of the location of the piece. Outlandish is a new gear shop that opened up in Crown Heights, Brooklyn and their goal is to empower POC to explore and connect with nature by providing top-quality gear and fostering a diverse outdoor community. As a Black-owned business, they are dedicated to lowering the barriers of entry and promoting inclusivity in the outdoor space. Though things have been changing, the outdoor adventure community and thru-hiking specifically is still very white and the financial barriers to contemplating such an extended adventure can be very limiting to some folks. These ideas of how do you keep going in the face of feeling isolated and what does it mean to live the life you dream about are ultimately the foundation we built the piece upon.

NP: What do you think fans of immersive will find most interesting about this latest experience?

KS: Hiker Trash’s tone and themes are very different from a lot of what you see in Immersive Theater these days. Though we ourselves are also huge fans of the sexy, film noir aesthetic, when it comes to making our own work, we are interested in exploring more real life landscapes, albeit in magical and whimsical ways. We want to try and investigate what it means to be human in the world we’re living in, not just provide escapist entertainment. We hope the people who come to this experience will enjoy the intimate nature of it and the ability to have genuine interactions within its framework.

NP: Once you started designing and testing what did you discover about this experience that was unexpected?

KS: As Linked as a company celebrates 10 years of making this kind of work together, we really do see all these different lessons we’ve learned reflected in this process. Our ability to lean into our constant lack of budget, to make choices intentionally, to lead our audience in and out of our worlds with care, and to design these pieces specifically for the spaces they inhabit. This experience has shown us that maybe we do know what we’re doing at this point (as hard as that is for us to believe sometimes). It has also allowed us to feature one of our amazing company members, Maya. Maya has grown so much as an immersive performer over these past few years and it has been such a joy to feature them as the heart and soul of this piece.

NP: What can fans who are coming to this, or thinking about coming to this, do to get into the mood of the experience?

KS:

• Read Marianna’s blog!
• Visit Outlandish’s instagram @outlandish.nyc
• Read ‘The Unlikely Thru-HIker’ by Derik Lugo
• Go on a long walk, look up at the sky, drink a cold beer on a hot day

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