The lure of endurance

Forced Entertainment Quizoola!

A live webcast of two performers sitting side by side, asking and answering a series of questions, proved to be compulsive viewing over the weekend. I was watching Forced Entertainment's 24-hour performance Quizoola!  Spanning comedy double-act, trivia quiz, psychoanalytic exchange, philosophical investigation and much more besides, this bizarre Q&A shifted mood minute-by-minute from friendly, flirty teasing to hostile, sinister interrogation - with moments of sadness, exhaustion and vagueness in between.

It was brilliant stuff but it made me wonder what is it about endurance that we find so attractive in a work? Epic durational events seem more and more common in the arts, especially in live art (see Marina Abramovich for one extreme example), but are also evident in other cultural spheres (from telethons to ultra marathons).

Are they a reaction against the increasing short attention span we seem prepared to offer any activity? A reflection of the relentlessness we feel in our own everyday lives? Perhaps they're a sign of a decadent society, so pampered we demand pain and exhaustion as entertainment? Or do they grow from the often misguided notion that if something's worth doing it's worth doing even more of? 

I don't know the answers, but it seems only appropriate that Quizoola! should raise so many questions.

Quizoola! took place in The Pit, Barbican as part of SPILL Festival of Performance, 11.59pm 12 April - 11.59pm 13 April 2013.