Pioneer

The Old Market, Upper Market Street, Hove, Thursday, March 26, and Friday, March 27

PIONEER director Jack Lowe admits he is not too sanguine about the success of the first manned mission to Mars.

“We have got the technology to go to Mars,” he says as theatre company Curious Directive enter into tour rehearsals for their Fringe First-winning play.

“But we don’t know about the sociological and psychological stuff. There are a lot of things they can’t deal with until they go.

“There are flaws in the timelines – for example how long it is going to take to develop the technology for the life support systems on Mars.

“Solar flares could go into the space module on the way – they are carcinogenic.

“There’s a difference between the total of what’s needed and the reality of what is possible.”

It was happening across an early pitch for Mars 1 volunteers while visiting the Natural History Museum which first inspired the creation of Pioneer – a devised story set in 2029, after the first manned mission to Mars has failed. “Our narrative wasn’t meant to be pessimistic,” says Lowe. “The mission may have failed, but nonetheless they will try again.”

Following the 1986 Challenger disaster, and the destruction of the Columbia shuttle on re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere 17 years later, much of recent manned space travel has been overshadowed by the spectre of disaster. But Lowe feels there is more of an appetite to explore the great beyond once more.

“People who were part of the Moon missions have been asking why we aren’t going to Mars,” he says.

“Our company are all 25 to 35 year-olds who didn’t grow up with inspirational leaders saying we are going to go into space. Politicians turn around every four years, so there is no political will. The reason why the Moon landings happened was because of the space race with the Soviets.

“It feels like we are starting to generate enthusiasm for the possibility of space travel happening.

“There is this world of scientists who know the realities of it, and a popular science generation who have started to read about the early years of the space race.

“There is a general drive and desire to do something about it, to get some investors involved.”

Pioneer tells a range of stories based around this desire to get to Mars, including a reclusive Indian businesswoman using the profits from her architecture firm to help bankroll a second mission.

“Big companies are becoming part of the exploration of space,” says Lowe. “It is going to be led by business now, not the US or the Russians. We have got countries like India, Japan and China investing in space.

“The Indian Space Research Organisation got an Orbiter around Mars for less than it cost to make the Hollywood science fiction movie Gravity [a reported $71 million compared to Gravity’s $100 million budget].”

He sees Pioneer as theatre about our own world – as well as telling the story of the Indian investor the multimedia show also takes in stories from Russia, Mars itself and even the bottom of the sea.

“It’s an internationalist view of storytelling,” he says. “It was very important for us – that the stories should come from different places.

“To be a strong piece of theatre it has to be from our own world view. For this tour we’ve looked at the storylines again and looked at the other areas we wanted to push and explore. There has been a little bit of rewriting and reworking to refine the show. It’s not a carbon copy of what people will have seen before.”

Starts 8pm, tickets £12/£10. Call 01273 201801.