A group of strangers are given clown costumes and placed in a room containing only a box and a TV relaying their own image. In the box they find the ingredients to make custard pies. They have two minutes. Psychological experiment, performance, social intervention and comic turn.

In an attempt to design an experience that demonstrates the social rules that govern our lives and the mechanisms that dictate the way we behave, “The Future is Not a Noun; It’s a Verb” presents a challenge, a predetermined performance and a piece of entertainment. Participants are transformed into tragi-comic buffoons by being placed in a scenario that draws from the psychological experiments of Philip Zimbardo, Stanley Milgrim, and Leon Festinger in which individuals are found to behave differently when placed in uniforms, in groups, and when instructed to perform particular tasks.