The City Museum of Washington is quite small compared to some of the better-known museums in the city. And as it is not publicly funded, it needs something special to draw a crowd.
In order to pull visitors away from some of the city’s more popular attractions, the City Museum chose to tell the story of Washington in a funny, entertaining, high-impact multimedia show that is in keeping with the museum’s theme of “Real people live here!”
As conceived by Yves Mayrand and directed by Robert Awad, the multimedia show created by gsmprjctº média combines computer-controlled mechanized sets, lighting, digital sound, and high definition video to present Washington’s history and its inhabitants in a witty and unconventional manner.
The show skips from one unexpected event and character to another, as a retired tour guide who volunteered to be a presenter mysteriously disappears, leaving behind a poor audio-visual technician to narrate the unfinished show while historical characters in paintings and engravings come to life and intervene.
By straying from what the Smithsonian would typically do, the multimedia show manages to put a contemporary spin on historical figures, while also introducing visitors to the real people who make up present-day Washington.