Fight Night begins with a sinister host emerging from the shadows of a set resembling a boxing ring. “Friends, voters, audience, lend me your ear,” he intones, evoking a much older play about the perils of picking leaders.

Five actors materialize. Or rather, candidates. One is a young Black woman with stylish, scarlet hair that matches her turtleneck sweater. One is a middle-aged white man, short and grumpy. Another white man is Kennedy-handsome, tailored and lean. A white woman wears a surprisingly short skirt and a semi-transparent blouse. A Black man with long dreads smiles cheerfully. Over the course of the next 90 minutes, they appeal to audience members to choose them.

Each audience member is given a small device that allows them to anonymously vote for the candidates in different rounds and answer questions that range from age, to income, to qualities most valued in a leader.

Fight Night premiered to great acclaim at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 2013. It’s toured the world since then, with performances in the Netherlands, Switzerland, Russia, Australia and Hong Kong. The current U.S. tour includes upcoming stops in Durham, N.C., Minneapolis and Santa Barbara, Calif.

Angelo Tijssens plays the sinister emcee and is part of the Belgian theater group Ontroerend Goed. The group created this show, under the direction of Alexander Devriendt, after a real-life political crisis that paralyzed the country.

“We spent 541 days without a federal government in Belgium,” Tijssens told NPR. In 2007, a right-wing Flemish politician named Bart De Wever won a popular TV quiz show called The Smartest Person in the World and became unexpectedly powerful. Forming coalitions turned out to be nearly impossible for a period during De Wever’s rise.

Tijssens and Devriendt became fascinated by entertainment’s influence on democracy. “And as humans always do, thinking that this was very specific to this point in history, we started reading and found out it wasn’t,” Tijssens said. “The Greeks had already written about the dangers of politicians being too popular.”

They decided to create an ambitious show about democracy in general, rather than about specific issues, such as housing, or social reform, “or climate, or abortion rights, or everything else I’d really like to talk or even shout about,” Tijssens said. “But just about – how does the system work, and how easy it is to be influenced.”

Like theater, he pointed out, democracy needs people to show up in person.

In Fight Night, there’s a frisson to being manipulated by the actors, whose speeches are purposefully vague. “I certainly hope daredevils vote for me,” says one earnestly. “Those who dare to dream big. Because that’s what we need in this society.”

“I think of all voters equally,” announces another. “You may disagree with me but that’s okay, because I want to talk to all of you. Tonight, it’s the majority that determines how this evening goes.”

At one recent performance in Ann Arbor, Mich., the rowdy crowd was primarily made up of students (61% between the ages of 18 and 24, according to the data supplied by the devices.) The audience cheered and groaned and whistled as candidates gave their speeches.

Outside the theater, tables were set up, encouraging people to register to vote in the upcoming, real-life election. The program noted that the performance had been updated “to correspond to the changing political climate,” but Tijssens said the themes of the show are as old as western theater traditions and democracy, dating back to the ancient Greeks.

“It’s been there all the time,” he noted. “So it didn’t really have to change a lot. I think the show can still go on for another – but I’m being very modest now – 20 centuries.”

Edited for radio and the web by Jennifer Vanasco. Produced for the web by Beth Novey. Produced for radio by Chloee Weiner.

Here’s a shortlist of American cities Sasheer Zamata has called home: Brooklyn, N.Y.; Charlottesville, Va.; Indianapolis; Lexington, Ky.; San Antonio; and Riverside.

The actor, comedian and former “Saturday Night Live” star was a self-described military brat, born in Okinawa, Japan, and never staying in one place for more than two years throughout her childhood. The experience gave her a great sense of perspective, but now, after living in Los Angeles for the last six years, she says, “This is the most rooted and grounded I’ve felt.”

In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.

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Zamata settled in East Los Angeles because “when I moved to L.A., I was told by all my friends, ‘If you want to see us, you have to be on the Eastside, otherwise you won’t,’” she said.

This month, she’ll appear in Disney+’s hotly anticipated “Agatha All Along,” a spinoff of the streamer’s acclaimed “WandaVision” series. She plays a witch named Jennifer Kale who finds a kindred spirit in Kathryn Hahn’s titular Agatha Harkness. “All of the characters are coven-less witches so we are all loners, misfits and bandits who come together for this common goal of achieving our dreams,” said Zamata. “My character Jen is pretty dry and sarcastic, like me, and she’s fun to play.”

When she’s not working, Zamata enjoys secondhand shopping and taking in the best of the Eastside’s culinary offerings. “Sundays feel nice and sleepy for me, but I do like making it a social time as well with brunch or a gathering of some sort,” she said. Here’s how she’d spend a perfect day in L.A.

This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for length and clarity.

9 a.m.: Start the day with early-morning Pilates

I go to bed late, but my body is waking up earlier. Around 7 or 8 a.m. is when I’m waking up. I used to love sleeping in until 11 or 12 but my body can’t do that anymore. It’s not by choice, it’s not because I want to.

I’m trying to make Pilates a weekly tradition. It also helps doing it in the morning because it’s like, “I left my house, I can start the day, things are happening.” I’m always trying to strengthen my core. I have a really small waist that causes back problems and if you can strengthen your core, it does help your back and everything else. I’ve been recommended by so many chiropractors and masseuses like, “You should probably do Pilates.” So now I’m doing it and trying to be serious about it.

I like Wundabar Pilates. They have a jumpboard [reformer apparatus] and they make it very fun. The teachers are very accommodating and help you adjust and figure it out and it doesn’t feel too intimidating to me.

11:30 a.m.: Meet friends for brunch

After Pilates, I will probably go to brunch and meet up with some friends. If no one has anything to do, we’ll be there for a couple of hours.

I love HomeState so much. I don’t even remember who introduced me to HomeState, but I learned about it pretty early on when I moved to L.A. I was like, “Oh my God, I have to come here every day.”

I have a couple of go-tos: I like their Tijuana Panther taco. Their Emo’s taco is a simple bean and cheese. And I like their Frito pie dish. It’s a Frito bag that they put brisket and onions and all this other stuff in and it’s very tasty. Something about eating out of a potato chip bag feels really satisfying. But all of their stuff is good.

2 p.m.: Go secondhand shopping

If the friends are down to hang, we’ll probably do shopping of some sort. I love doing estate sales. I’m always on Estatesales.net to look up what’s in the area, what’s happening that weekend.

The Frogtown Flea Crawl actually happens on Saturday, but sometimes there are still sales going on Sunday. I love being able to bop from multiple different parking lots and multiple different venues on a stroll and shop for hours and hours and hours. It’s very fun.

Currently I’m on a hunt for matching sets, like a top and a bottom, a suit, a jumpsuit or a romper. Those are very fun if they’re vintage-looking and old school. I think what draws me in is patterns. If there’s a really fun pattern or a really bright color, I just bull’s-eye right to it.

And I’m always, always looking at chairs. I certainly don’t need any furniture, but I love looking at it. I love chairs as a functional piece of furniture but also as decoration. Or sometimes I’ll find fun wall art. There’s actually a really great furniture place called Vintage Junktion and it’s huge. They have everything: armoires, dressers, tables, whatever you could possibly want. I got this great bench from there. [Another time] I found an armoire that I was so sad about because I had just bought an armoire that was much more expensive than this one. I have spent hours and hours there, because you can. I like an older piece of furniture because they’re also just built better, which is unfortunate. Thankfully there are people who save that stuff and want it to be reused, and I will happily reuse it.

6 p.m.: Refuel at Little Dom’s

Shopping always make me hungry so I probably will have built up an appetite. And I love eating at Little Dom’s. It’s such a cute vibe and also all their food and drinks are delicious.

Sometimes I’ll just get a traditional spaghetti and meatballs. Most of the time I’ll get the salmon. I do like their salmon a lot. And they have a side of spinach that I’ll get to pretend to be healthy, or an arugula salad. And their Penicillin [cocktails] are really good.

8 p.m.: Home for some comfort TV

Once I get home, I might watch some TV or a movie or something. I just finished that K-pop reality competition, “The Debut: Dream Academy.” It was really intense … they were training these 14- to 18-year-old girls for two years. They’re away from their families and risking it all to become a K-pop group. And then they did it and were actually a really good, talented group.

I [also] love cartoons. I’m watching “Solar Opposites” right now, which is really fun. I finished all of “Rick and Morty” before that and I’m waiting [eagerly] for the next season because I love that show so much.

After TV it’s bedtime. I would like to be the type of person that’s like, “Wow, it’s 9 p.m. I’m going to read a book, stretch, meditate, wind down.” But my brain always just stays busy, I’m sure from being on the phone all the time. I’m up until like 11 p.m. and then my body just crashes and it’s like, “All right, well now we’re sleeping on the couch.”

On-air challenge: I’m going to give you some words and phrases. Rearrange the letters in each one to get the brand name of a product that you might buy at a drugstore or pharmacy.

Ex, ASCOT (soap)  –>  COAST

1. LAID (soap)

2. RADON (drain cleaner)

3. VALID (pain relief)

4. PECOS (mouthwash)

5. CERTS (toothpaste)

6. LABOR (toothbrush)

7. SCARES (soap)

8. IRON AGE (treatment of hair loss)

9. HER FAULT (cold medicine)

10. THICK CAPS (lip balm)

11. MALE BYLINE (makeup)

Last week’s challenge: Take the phrase NEW TOWELS. Rearrange its nine letters to get the brand name of a product that you might buy at a supermarket.

Challenge answer: Sweet’N Low

Winner: Midge Komenda of Lacey. Washington

This week’s challenge:  This week’s challenge comes from listener Curtis Guy, of Buffalo, N.Y. Name a certain breakfast cereal character. Remove the third, fifth, and sixth letters and read the result backward. You’ll get a word that describes this breakfast cereal character. What is it?

Submit Your Answer

If you know the answer to the challenge, submit it here by Thursday, October 3rdth, 2024 at 3 p.m. ET. Listeners whose answers are selected win a chance to play the on-air puzzle. Important: include a phone number where we can reach you.