The Kelly-Strayhorn
Black Box Theater
Project Duration
October 2020 - December 2020
My Role
UX Researcher
Project Manager
The Team
Lily Shan
Raajat Gupta
Will Kuhlke
UX Researcher
Project Manager
The Team
Lily Shan
Raajat Gupta
Will Kuhlke
Skills and Tools
Figma
Think Aloud Protocol
Directed Storytelling
Artifact Analysis
Affinity Diagrams
Storyboards
Figma
Think Aloud Protocol
Directed Storytelling
Artifact Analysis
Affinity Diagrams
Storyboards
Contextual Inquiry
Speed Dating
Crazy 8s
Reversing Assumptions
Screening Surveys
The Problem
How might KST (The Kelly-Strayhorn Theater) create an enhanced sense of togetherness within the limitations of a virtual environment to drive funding during the covid-19 pandemic?
- KST’s financial and operational viability has been severely disrupted by COVID-19, forcing the theater to close down and driving problems in attendance and funding
- Virtual theater is also now operating in the hyper-competitive world of online content, meaning that without stage presence and uniqueness of experience, it will be difficult to capture users’ attention with content alone
- What made KST successful before was building a tightly-knit community that was loyal to the theater’s content. This needed to be the focal point in reviving the theater
our proposal
What if we captured all the memorabilia, food, drinks, and discussion that turned theater into a fun night out... and put it in a little black box?
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our proposal
What if we captured all the memorabilia, food, drinks, and discussion that turned theater into a fun night out... and put it in a little black box?
Black Box Theater brings a unique opportunity fo KST fans to spend time with their friends and the theater.
- Fans let KST know what they want in their box, and share event box discount codes with friends to make things social.
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The Black Box arrives, packed with drink ingredients, snacks, desserts, trivia cards, and memorabilia.
- Box owners tune into the Instagram live stream of pre-show cocktail tutorials, performance, intermission trivia, and then chat about their eventful evening together
The Solution
How We Got Here
Understanding Context
Pittsburgh’s Kelly Strayhorn Theater prides themselves on the diversity of thought and artistry present on their stage, as well as their willingness to experiment and bolster the East Liberty area of Pittsburgh.
Following shutdown due to COVID, KST experienced a loss of revenue and difficulty maintaining sales and attendance in an online format. Our team consistently returned to the social aspect of theater as being the missing link in creating a satisfying virtual theater environment that attendees would return to and donors would invest in.
Identifying the Problem
The shift to virtual theater means a theater’s audience isn’t limited to who is local. This puts smaller, local theaters on the same playing field as larger production houses.
Much of the power of theater comes from communitas, the shared social experience, which has been lacking in virtual spaces. Increasing audience-to-audience engagement is critical.
Digital formats increase accessibility to audiences that previously may not have been able to experience theater due to physical or monetary limitations. Diversity is more important than ever as shows open to a wider audience that wants to see themselves impactfully represented on stage.
Stakeholder and Customer Journey Maps
To place myself within the context of the theater, I created a stakeholder map - for a behind the scenes look at the major players in KST’s business model, and a customer journey map - for a look at the overall start-to-finish experience of the theatergoers I would be designing for.
Think Aloud Protocol
I chose an adjacent platform, twitch.tv, to conduct a think aloud activity. Twitch.tv was ideal because it provided a livestreaming platform along with an active chat feature that mimicked the state of virtual theater. Users were asked to complete a couple simple tasks - access a stream, leave a comment, and find more information about the content creator. A few key difficulties were related directly to the chat function.
1
A lack of in-depth engagement with users
Users found that they did not like interacting with the chat because it felt like their comment was sent “into the void” without a response from other people in the chat, or the streamer.
2
No non-committal way of interacting publicly
Users were uncomfortable with the engagement, even when not using their own account because of the large audience and transparency of their commentary. This led to more generic comments being left as a whole.
3
Activity levels in the chat inform how users add to the chat
Busier chats influence some user to interact with the audience while slower chats promote communication with the streamers.
Contextual Inquiry
Directed Storytelling & Artifact Analysis
I had five users take me through the day of their favorite performance, including their pre-performance feelings and routine, and their thoughts following the performance. They were asked to prepare an artifact (photograph, merch, playbill, etc.) that reminded them of their favorite performance. This was then synthesized these findings into an affinity diagram developing four larger “buckets” to summarize user needs. These buckets were as follows:
- Community investment shapes theater experience
- Theater provides an escape from reality
- Theater is used to build social connections
- Theater is used to build personal identity
A recurrent theme was “using theater to build social connections.” This built off of past findings to become our area of focus.
"I kept the souvenir even though the play was terrible because I still loved the experience.. It’s one of my favorite memories with [best friend]"
Identifying the Solution
Crazy Eights
Having a better grasp on user needs, my team began looking at areas of opportunity. In a crazy eights exercise, we each came up with eight quick sketches of potential ideas to solve major problems that had surfaced. We categorized them by the user need they addressed and then voted on the needs we found most pressing and interesting to test in a speed dating session.
Unsurprisingly, every need we identified tied in interpersonal connection, social experiences, and sharing with audience members and others.
Building off of our identification of four user needs, we created twelve storyboards with three storyboards addressing each need at varying levels of socially acceptable to outlandish solutions.
I ran our twelve storyboards past four users to receive rapid feedback and immediate thoughts and then marked their general affinity to the idea with colored dots. The ones with the most green dots were well-received, with each dot indicating one participant. The red dots indicated that a participant stated that they were not interested or open to the idea.
A recurrent theme was the “extraordinary“ experience created by a box that you could share with friends. It was a way to tie in the physical aspects of theater and experience them with other people.
Another important takeaway was that socializing with strangers wasn’t a draw for users. They seemed to be looking for new ways to socialize with the people they already knew.
"Sometimes I wish I could see a performance outside my home town, but that would mean I’m not with the people I’m close to, so it would lose something special"
We reran the session using eight storyboards, some that were successful from the previous round of testing along with a few new options based on the information we had garnered. The dessert & cocktail kit was one of the most popular storyboards among users and would be the basis for our final experience prototype.
Prototyping
Our experience prototype was intended to emulate viral “unboxing” videos. We created low-fidelity paper prototypes of the items we envisioned being included in the box, including snacks, cocktail intructions and ingredients, a program, and novelty items related to the show. We also included a loyalty card which we hoped would encourage returned engagement.
We used a combination of digital and physical prototyping along with bodystorming to take users through the process of making their dessert and drink choices, unboxing their items, and watching the performance.
key takeaways
1. The box itself need to feel more like a “collectible” and the items need to pertain directly to the performance and performers to make the experience feel like an event.
Improvement: We decided to give more attention to the design of the box itself. We branded our idea “black box theater,” hailing from the idea of small, intimate performance spaces. Users mentioned that they would often keep these boxes for storage after using the items and in a way the box itself becomes part of the novelty. We opted to get rid of the loyalty card and sticker, items that users found extraneous, and focus on delivering more content directly related to who was performing in the form of a playbill.
2. During COVID, the hygiene, packaging, and care of the box is paramount to user comfort.
Improvement: Our next iteration of prototypes featured items that were individually packaged to indicate safe consumption.3. Additional content should be scheduled before the event, with clear positioning that it is optional.
Improvement: The adapted program outlined that the happy hour was before the performance so attendees could decide whether or not they wanted to attend. This also gave participants the chance to enjoy their food and drink during the performance rather than after, which all participants said they preferred.
4. The Zoom platform in general, and breakout rooms in particular, is not preferred by users for leisure events and socialization.
Improvement: We focused the event on instagram live, a platform that lacked the “work” connotations of Zoom. We found that participants already had their preferred method of communicating with their friends. Our way to focus on the social connection was to provide the event circumstances and the box itself as a conversation-starter. We also included a trivia card to motivate interaction during intermission and encourage users to post on social media.
Final Iteration
Presenting Black Box Theater
The final poster below along with a 2-minute pitch was shared with peers and representatives from the Kelly-Strayhorn Theater.
what next
- Develop tiered box subscriptions to suit different price points
- Develop partnerships with local vendors to create mutually beneficial relationships
- Offer group bundles and discounts to encourage purchasing boxes with friends
- Get the word out - market the box and gauge interest and financial viability