VIRAL

Hawthorne

When

Apr. 5–19, 2025

Days Vary, Times vary

Cost: See Details

Where

Fuse Theatre Ensemble – The Back Door Theater

4319 SE Hawthorne Blvd
Portland, OR 97215

In an era when social currency is stronger than the dollar, VIRAL explores the interconnected infections that affect everyone. A young woman desperate for attention meets a stranger who promises her fame. But as her popularity spreads, so does an increasingly disturbing series of accidents and events, and soon her following us body count. Investigating addiction to attention, contagious fear and despair, and malicious ideas spreading like wildfire, VIRAL delves into the broken psyche of the deeply alienated denizens of our world. Drawing on inspiration from classic texts like The Bacchae, Faustus, and Paradise Lost, historical events like the 1518 dancing plague, and contemporary social media horrors, VIRAL is a journey into social psychosis and its individual manifestations.