Performing
I am an interactive, immersive, movement, and physical performer. My background is in immersive-interactive theater, circus, street performing, physical theater, and tabletop roleplaying games.Past credits include co-founding and devising with Yes Ma’am Circus, devising and performing with Theater Unspeakable and Séance Media, performing and designing for Thickett, and work with Alterra Productions (Formerly Cirque du Nuit), Pseudonym Productions, Stefan Boublil, Acrobatica Infiniti, and more. I trained under Marie Andreé Robitaille at Circus Sessions, an artistic workshop in Toronto, Ontario, and completed The Actor’s Gymnasium Professional Training Program in Evanston, IL.I am also an Actual Play performer in streamed tabletop RPG games.
Thickett
Question Reality & Dark Passage
The Windy Statue
Making Experiences
I work collaboratively to create whimsical, fantastical, and weird experiences. Inspired by the adventures and stories of my childhood, I craft memorable and magical experiences by drawing from myths, urban legends, and my love of puzzles and adventure.I write and run intimate tabletop roleplaying campaigns. I design puzzles and ARGs. And I am part of the team that created and produced the digital transmedia immersive game-theater experience Thickett, from Alterra Productions.My work is informed by my background in the indie video game industry, tabletop roleplaying games, and interactive immersive productions both large and small.
Thickett
By Alterra Productions
Thickett is a virtual immersive quest, where players are "hired" by a long-standing megalith of a corporation, called Thickett, to assist their departments in re-framing fairy tales in their own images. It's an online experience that blends standard online platforms and innovative digital spaces to encourage personal interaction and open-world exploration.It ran from October 2020 through July of 2022 over three seasons, and a fourth season is planned. Thickett allows players to connect with and influence the world, creating a dynamic space where the audience has a lasting impact.As a founding creator and performer for Thickett, I helped build, run, and perform in the experience in the following ways:
World Builder
Narrative and Story Designer
Lead Puzzle Designer
Art Director
Level Designer
Artist
World Building - Creating the world of Thickett and the Story Realm, we built the rules, laws, mysteries, and wonders of the world of Thickett, determining how best to blend fairy tales and corporate culture into an enticing universe for audience to explore.Narrative and Story Design - Working closely with a dedicated team, we crafted both the small and large picture of the stories of Thickett. We worked from existing fairy tales to build multi-path quests for audiences to interact with, solve, and put their own mark on by writing the final version. We also wrote and maintained larger, arching narratives that built up over the course of separate quests to tell character-driven tales that culminated at the end of each season. We carefully balanced pacing, consistency, lore, and audience input to create a satisfying and immersive story for audiences to delve into.Puzzle Design - With a small team, I oversaw the creation and implementation of a range of puzzles. Using a variety of techniques drawn from the world of puzzle ARGs, we developed casual puzzles meant to be solved within a single session to larger puzzle arcs that spanned the length of the season. These longer puzzles, the heart of the ARG, were solved between shows to deliver additional story and information about the world of Thickett. We delivered these puzzles through multiple platforms including email, discord, Topia, websites, and physical mail.Level Design - Built multiple maps for each Quest, leveraging my knowledge of user experience and pathing to make the maps intuitive to navigate. These maps gave audience members a whimsical world to explore while supporting the story and missions of each Quest.Art - As Lead Artist and Art Director of Thickett, I developed the whimsical, pencil-drawn style used for the story realm, that both emphasized the playful tone of the game and evoked storybook illustrations. I also created a cohesive visual identity and direction for the experience, including branding, logos, and promotional materials. Over the course of three seasons, I oversaw and created both art and assets for more than 80 worlds, 17 stories, and multiple outside events.
Design & Objects
Thickett
The Nose
Puckish
D&D Puzzle
Thickett
A riotous and all-too-plausible fusion of fairytale and corporate skulduggery, Thickett was a digital immersive experience that ran from 2020 to 2022, encompassing three seasons and seventeen unique “quests.” Each week, players from Thickett Corporation’s three departments compete to solve riddles, collect rewards, and recruit characters from that week’s story, then use these advantages to “revise” the ending of a classic tale in order to meet their corporate masters’ shadowy goals. With every reclaimed story, the Story Realm falls a little further under Thickett’s control—or does it?Thickett’s branding was designed with old woodcut storybook illustrations in mind, conveying the sense of an old, almost out of time company with an old world, tactile charm. This played in contrast to the ephemera players encountered through the experience, which was often scrappy, hand-written, and had clearly seen better days. The ephemera often served a dual purpose of building the world, and providing clues and information necessary to solve puzzles.Thickett was developed and produced by Alterra Productions.
The Nose
An absurdist immersive experience, The Nose adapts Nikolai Gogol’s eponymous satire. This time, though, the protagonist’s proboscis escapes his face to seek fortune in the grime and gilt of 1980s-era New York City. The design enhanced the setting through over-photocopied posters, xeroxed passports, gritty spy photos and other 80’s leaning ephemera.The Nose was developed and produced by Escape Character.
Puckish
Puckish is a mixed-reality game that combines Regency-era etiquette with pool-hall billiards. The branding echoes realia from nineteenth-century British teas and formal balls, but transposes the era's social maneuvering onto a pool table.Puckish was developed and produced by Escape Character.
D&D Puzzle
A custom-designed, multi-piece puzzle designed to be spread amonst 8 players for a game of Dungeons and Dragons.The puzzle features two hand-drawn, hand-stained maps, two hand-written riddles, two mysterious ribbons, and two black lights for finding the secrets hidden on the rest of the pieces.
About Me
Myr Bloom
I am a Performer and experience designer with a focus on collaborating to design worlds, narrative, characters, and puzzles.I create the whimsical, fantastical, and weird to bring magic into people’s lives. Inspired by the adventures and stories of my childhood, I look to myths, urban legends, and my love of puzzles and adventure to craft memorable and magical experiences.I have performed in and draw from devised work, street performing, circus shows, and immersive works. I also draw on my experience in the video game industry, tabletop role playing games, and interactive immersive productions.If you ask nicely, you can get me on a tear about the importance of contrast in experiences and narratives.
Contact
Have a question?Want to work with me on a project?Just want to tell me a secret?Drop me a line!
