Spectators’ Experiences of Online Theatre Performance: From Necessity to “Digital-Site-Specific” Audiences

During the pandemic, the internet and social media became the sole conduits between theater and its audiences, thrusting the mediatization of performing arts into the spotlight for a broad, non-specialist public. Screen-based digital performances transitioned from niche to mainstream, prompting debates among scholars and artists about whether this shift would redefine digital technology’s role in theater or prove a fleeting interruption. These experiments fostered new knowledge and connections among artists and spurred best practices for integrating digital tools into theater. Yet, post-pandemic, most theater entities abandoned these digital ventures, and audience interest in such performances waned, though not entirely vanished, raising questions about the conditions under which it might endure. This study investigates what spectatorial practices and positions did audiences adopt for digital performances during and after the pandemic. Our case study is Residenze Digitali (RD), launched in April 2020 and now in its fifth edition – a rare Italian case of a digital performance program born during COVID and persisting today. RD annually funds about six online projects by contemporary theater artists, though audience engagement has declined since its peak. Analyzing 2021 (amid lingering theater restrictions), 2022, 2023, and 2024, we observed organizational meetings, artist tutoring sessions, and audience interactions, supplementing this with 24 interviews and five focus groups. Findings indicate that shrinking audience numbers align with a reduced tendency to carve out dedicated space/time for digital performances—a practice that once segmented the digital flow during the pandemic. While RD struggles to retain a broad audience, it has evolved into a “laboratory-like” space. Post-pandemic, digital performance emerges as a digital site-specific form, requiring organizers to build trust networks that guide audiences across transmedial screens, transmateral stages, and transtemporal frameworks.