Virtual Futures’ Near-Future Fictions Salon on Tuesday 12 February in London saw my first ever short science fiction performance. I’ve wanted to create a piece like this for ages, because I can see an opportunity to explore both key SF issues and also the genre itself in a new way. We’re all familiar with SF on TV and film, but I’ve long believed our genre works just as well, if not better in some ways, on stage.

This piece is just over eight minutes long and was written specially for the night following my coverage of last year’s events for the British Science Fiction Association in their critical magazine, Vector. It helps to know your audience when submitting anything, especially if you’re going to perform it.

I learned long ago from stand-up comedy how to make the most of a few minutes’ stage time by working directly with the audience, even if that just means looking at them and talking to them as if they’re a friend or, in this case, a desperate bunch of suckers looking for a cheap gene sequencer to impress potential partners…

Watch the piece here.

I’ll be performing my next Virtual Futures piece, The Minus-Four Sequence on 12 March.

Details here.

Virtual Futures website.