Overview
Inundated is an acclaimed interactive performance that grapples with themes of climate resilience and collective responsibility.
Staged in intimate surroundings, Inundated invites its audience to role-play as businesspeople. You, the audience, are gathered at a meeting of the Business Improvement Network. Perhaps you’re hoping to trade contacts, or seek advice. But the guest speaker at today’s meeting has a troubling story to tell, and an unusual proposal to pitch. So how will you and other network members choose to respond?
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Origins and Ambition
Inundated is a central pillar of Finding the Story Arc's engagement work. Developed using the LEAF method, the show is founded on a series of reflective interviews with business representatives in Leeds - building outwards from these discussions to produce a performance that has resonated with audiences across the UK.
Inundated is thus both a product of Finding the Story Arc's engagement activities, and a way to engage more people with its ideas. Drawing on the project's wide range of exploratory conversations, Inundated weaves their emergent ideas into a single story. ​Whilst the show is a fiction, therefore, it tries to be truthful about the uncertain times we all live in. It tells the stories of real people, invites real conversation, and offers a real chance for participants to network with each other. With warmth and humour, Inundated asks how we can build resilience to future challenges, and help to keep each other afloat.
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Reception
Inundated has been warmly received at a range of venues across the north of England – described by audiences as "a real highlight" and "proper good fun".
The show has also been acclaimed as a "bright spot" by the international sustainability organisation Forum for the Future, who reflect: “By bringing participants into the story of one community taking natural flood mitigation action to protect their homes and livelihoods, the experience builds their understanding of the economic, social, environmental and personal incentives needed to unlock action on resilience”.
