TV Turn-off Week

The big Adbusters event this month is TV Turn-off Week. At the planning meet last week, we came up with the following:

TV HERD: A Street Theatre Action

The whole group (herd) will be decked out in TV-heads (cardboard boxes decorated to look like TV sets, probably with the "screen" part cut out for visibility. There will be one extra-big lead TV with a loudspeaker of some sort (probably a megaphone) that will be leading the herd through various obedience and assimilation exercises.

The emphasis will be on quick pieces.

E.g.: The Big TV will shout out something like "You are inadequate. But if you wear a scarf you will be cool." Then the herd will all rush to put on scarves. Once they all have one on, Big TV will shout out "Scarves are going out of fashion." Almost the whole herd will scramble to get rid of their scarves. One of the herd will leave their scarf on too long and the rest of the herd will crowd menacingly around them until they take it off.

Another example: Then Big TV might say "You are depressed. Our new patented drugs will give you the life you deserve." The herd rushes to open pill bottles and take the contents. Big TV quickly recites "Side effects may include dizziness, drowsiness, vomiting, suicidal tendencies, ..." all of which get acted out by the herd.

And so on. Finishing up with a Kool-aid ad - the herd all drink the Kool-aid and fall over dead.

Putting it together

We'll be doing up fabric squares with "TV obedience" messages printed/screened on them. The squares will be stitched/pinned onto your shirts/jackets for the event. Please wear a black shirt/jacket and black (or your darkest) pants.

We might also have printed messages to fill the "screen" of the lead TV, or maybe as "word balloons" to go beside.

We'll have a workshop a day or two before to put the cardboard TVs and other props together.

Some things you can do

• Contribute ideas for the TV Herd segments. (Some possible themes to get you started: Alcohol, body image, over-consumption, sex-related drugs, depression-related drugs, car culture, denial of environmental crisis, war mongering, etc.). We're aiming for short (under a minute) segments, but don't let that hold you back if you've got an idea that would take longer.
  
• Gather materials for the TV Herd props. We'll need paint, fabric, sticks, pill bottles, tape, string, glue, etc.
  
• Recruit! The bigger our herd, the better.
  
• Come to a meeting (or all of them) this month. We'll be continuing to plan every Tuesday, 7-9pm, @ Arusha Centre.