Image by Jorge Serra
VIRAL
WINNER BEST INDEPENDENT PRODUCTION – 2016 MATILDA AWARDS
You are sitting on the bus on the way home from a hard days work, quietly minding your own business when an argument breaks out. You overhear that the disagreement is racially motivated. The argument heats up and the threat of violence increases. A young girl takes out a mobile phone and starts to film the event. What do you do? Do you continue to sit quietly? Do you speak up and risk becoming the victim of a violent attack? When you get home that evening you get online to realise the footage from the event has gone Viral.
Viral explores the role of social media and technology and how it impacts the way we record, communicate and think about events of racism, abuse, violence and abuse in the community.
It explores the line between disassociation and raising awareness about such events, asking the question “is it better to record these activities and post it on the Internet or step in and stop it from occurring in the first place”?
Viral was inspired by a number of true events and broader societal changes facing Gold Coasters and the wider community and was created by company founders Hayden Jones and Sam Foster. The show has been developed through a series of community consultation workshops aimed at gathering true accounts of acts of discrimination against a variety of marginalised groups.
Starring/Written by: SAM FOSTER & HAYDEN JONES. Please contact us for more information.
