‘GHOST RIDE or the play that blows away’ is an immersive performance that puts the audience on bicycles, following a food delivery worker on the day they are killed by vehicular violence, and continues into the afterlife with them. The piece is a love song to the bicycle that addresses issues of bicycle safety and transportation justice, as well as being a meditation on life and loss. The play will be staged on a 3 mile ride along a protected bike lane on MLK Drive in Philadelphia. Audiences will pedal alongside the protagonist as the narrative unfolds on bike and at stops along the path.
We sat down with Dara Silverman, artistic director of Agile Rascal Bike Theater, and writer, director, and producer of GHOST RIDE to talk about her upcoming imaginative and immersive performance that puts the audience on bikes.
“I’ve been running Agile Rascal as a theater company that intersects arts and bikes for about a decade now but bicycles were always tangential to the creative process. We used bikes to create pedal powered sound, and used bikes as props – horses, cars, etc. But we’d never done a play where the subject was bicycles,” said Silverman.
The company began as an ambitious dream to bike a play across the country. Since 2014, they’ve performed in libraries, parks, parking lots, and bike shops from Florida to Montana and tons of places in between.
In previous tours they had been biking in rural places but when Silverman moved to Philly she was struck by the unique biking lifestyle in the city. Silverman “started thinking about how people bike in cities and wanted to make a play that addresses biking in a more urban setting.” Silverman continues, “and then really, I drew inspiration from the ghost bikes that people have placed in the landscape. That was really the jumping off point for the project.”
Translating the idea into the play was an emergent process. “You can always start with a concept, but there are many discoveries, creative events, and also complications and challenges along the way that shape the project. You start with this vague idea of a play on bicycles, following a character into the afterlife, addressing issues of bike safety, but then you have to hone in and get more specific. What is the landscape? Who is this character? What is their life story? What are they thinking about and feeling? How do they die? Who are the people they’re interacting with? It keeps honing and honing and honing.”
This story in part, resembles the life of Pablo Avendano, a bike messenger, who died after being struck by a vehicle in 2018. “I’d like to make it clear, He’s a person that I didn’t know. I had the idea for the play before knowing anything about him. I thought about writing about a bike messenger because I thought it made for an interesting character that would touch on a lot of relevant and entangled issues. But when I started doing research and speaking to bike messengers, I quickly learned about Pablo. I specifically reached out to his girlfriend, family, friends, to say that I was writing this play. It was not about him, but it felt negligent to not tell them about the project because there were so many similarities. After meeting his family and becoming close to his brother…” Silverman pauses for a moment. “Pablo was less than a year younger than me and his character reminded me of someone I would’ve been friends with. His brother has become a friend. The play shifted when it became apparent when his family expressed they wanted this project to be more about him. It didn’t occur to me that this would happen, but it was very moving to be asked. So it was a slow integration of his life into the story with bits and pieces his family told me. It was maybe about a year ago that I decided to really go in on it. It’s still not about him, I take various creative licenses in the show that are not about the moment that he was in in his life at the time, and parts of his life are omitted. Especially as someone who didn’t know him, I don’t want to say ‘this is a show about Pablo,’ but he’s definitely woven into the play.”
There were also other considerations around the bike messenger character. “I was looking for a lead actor who could act, fit within our budget, wanted to be in unconventional theater, knew how to bike which was already hard to find and then adding the demographic of finding a Latinx rider and artist was another consideration. I tried to find an artist in Philadelphia but I ended up hiring this beautiful lead actor who is in my wider theater world who is a Venezuelan-born physical theater artist. And it’s been beautiful. He met with Pablo’s brother the other day and got to know each other and so while parts of Pablo are woven into the main character, he is also informed by this actor and his character as well.”
This play’s mode of storytelling will be an almost unprecedented technical feat. The audience will be riding on bikes alongside the actors, but also the lighting technicians and sound operators who will be live mixing the score with actors audio that will be heard through the audience’s earpieces. This aspect, though a challenge, was decidedly important for the storytelling. “When you do outdoor performances, oftentimes some stuff gets lost in the sound because you need to project, but if you’re working for something more intimate, or smaller, you have to figure out how to get the sound into the audience’s ears another way.” Silverman worked with sound designer Natali Merrill – to figure out a system especially for this project.
The choice to incorporate bicycles into the performance isn’t merely a stylistic decision; it underscores the play’s themes of mobility, vulnerability, and community. By situating the audience in the context of a bike ride, Silverman and her team aim to create a visceral connection between the audience and the protagonist’s journey. “The audience’s role is to bear witness to the story, be the holder of it. What’s interesting about this project is to bear witness more than with their eyes and ears but in their bodies on bicycle. Hold the experience of the performer and of being a bicycle rider in its beauties and also its peril simultaneously. And that creates a lot more of an immersive interactive experience. The audience’s role is to bear witness to one person’s story which really represents many people’s stories. And to be the holders of those people’s hearts, memories, and lives.”
The play’s setting and narrative structure emphasize the importance of creating safe, accessible spaces for cyclists and bring attention to the broader issues facing urban cyclists. That being said, Silverman states, “I’m trying to create a play that is first and foremost for the bicycle community. To feel held and understood and create a place of care and feeling. Separately and simultaneously, I will have a program that points towards where to make change, points to the Bicycle Coalition, where stuff can be done in this world. This is less a place of activation and more a place of care.”
For those interested in experiencing this unique intersection of art and activism, tickets are still available for GHOST RIDE, but they’re selling fast. The play will run from September 6, 2024, to September 22, 2024, as part of the Fringe Festival. For more information on tickets and showtimes, visit the Fringe Fest website or check out Agile Rascal Bike Theater’s social media channels. Get your tickets today and join the ride—both literally and metaphorically—as GHOST RIDE takes you on a journey through the streets of Philadelphia and into the beyond.