Saturday, July 12, 2025. Annette’s Roundup for Democracy.
Theatre doesn’t sit quietly by.
Uncle Sam, played by Dana Watkins, welcomes players to “Fight for America,” an interactive tactical tabletop game staged in London that explores the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol using a 1:64 scale 3-D printed Capitol and more than 10,000 hand-painted figures. (Peter van Agtmael/Magnum Photos for The Washington Post)
In London, theatergoers reenact storming of the U.S. Capitol - The Washington Post
LONDON — In a city well-known for political theater, the show at Stone Nest, a performance venue in the heart of London’s West End, took the concept to a new level.
For the last month, audiences have been reenacting the events of Jan. 6, 2021, when a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol in one of the most violent and divisive days of modern American democracy.
But instead of sitting in stately silence, legs crammed into velvet chairs, attendees at “Fight for America” were active participants — singing, chanting, rolling dice, and maneuvering tiny figurines around a model of the Capitol.
The unusual project — part tabletop strategy game, part thought-provoking political experiment — was meant to debut in the United States. But after President Donald Trump’s election victory last fall, the team behind it pivoted to London.
“We thought maybe 3,000 miles away was the right way to start,” said Christopher McElroen, artistic director at the american vicarious, a Brooklyn-based arts nonprofit.
A Washington, D.C., run is still planned for January to coincide with the fifth anniversary of the riot.
Players search for Vice President Mike Pence. (Peter van Agtmael/Magnum Photos for The Washington Post)
A player moves figures during the “Fight for America” game. (Peter van Agtmael/Magnum Photos for The Washington Post)
“We wanted to create a metaphorical space where you have to participate,” he explained at the end of a recent show, as he packed away tiny figurines posed mid-charge on the Capitol steps. “If you don’t participate, the game doesn’t work. If you don’t participate in democracy, it doesn’t work.”
But while the goal may be high-minded, the game builds toward a particularly low moment, requiring audiences to vote on whether to “hang” former vice president Mike Pence. In the 24 London performances, which ran from June 8 until July 6, 18 audiences voted to “hang” Pence while six voted to “save” him.
At one of those shows on a recent night, about 15 players showed up. They included American tourists, tabletop gamers and politically curious Brits.
The scene they confronted was drenched in Americana: a boisterous Uncle Sam game master; red, white and blue bunting; large American flags; staff in red baseball caps.
In the center of the room — dominating the space — stood a striking 14-foot-wide model of the Capitol, surrounded by grounds that were meticulously re-created with police cars, ambulances, barricades and more than 10,000 hand-painted figurines, including tiny riot police with shields and red-capped figures with “Stop the Steal” and “Overturn Biden win” signs.
Friends and family members of the organizers helped paint the pieces, which were shipped to London in a 40-foot container weighing 12,000 pounds.
Neal Wilkinson, one of the game’s creators, pored over hours of Jan. 6 footage to get the details right — down to the placement of the vehicles. “It’s a little thing, but then you think, if we’re going to go there, let’s go there,” Wilkinson said.
A few of the 10,000 hand painted miniatures. (Peter van Agtmael/Magnum Photos for The Washington Post)
A 14-foot-wide model of the U.S. Capitol is at the center of the game. (Peter van Agtmael/Magnum Photos for The Washington Post)
The audience was divided into “Team Blue,” defending the Capitol, and “Team Red,” trying to breach it. The tone was playful — with singing and chanting and staff interaction — but the competition was fierce. Reflection would come later.
Attending to report this article, I was on “Team Blue,” and assigned the character of Eugene Goodman, a police officer who diverted the mob, buying senators time to evacuate. My opponent played Dominic Pezzola, a member of the Proud Boys who was sentenced to 10 years on felony charges — a sentence later commuted by Trump, who pardoned all of Jan. 6 rioters, including those found guilty of seditious conspiracy.
We faced off on a giant tabletop, armed with dice, rulers and action cards. Team Blue could deploy “tear gas” (cotton wool); Team Red had the option to discharge firearms.
Various figurines were whisked away as battles ensued. Occasionally, Trump’s social media posts flashed on a screen: “If Vice President @Mike_Pence comes through for us, we will win the Presidency.” At one point, I played an “empathy card,” an appeal for de-escalation. My opponent, an experienced gamer, laughed awkwardly, and then quickly dispatched my figurines.
Designer Alessio Cavatore, known for games like Warhammer 40K, initially declined to work on the Jan. 6 project, wary of controversy and stirring up real-life trauma. There is also an unofficial rule barring the creation of a war game if people involved in the conflict are still alive,
Cavatore said. But Cavatore said he changed his mind after organizers “genuinely convinced me that their intent is to encourage dialogue between the red and the blue.”
The game is tilted slightly in favor of Team Red — a deliberate echo of reality.
Team Blue begins by taking an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.”
Team Red is told that their country has been “stolen by elites. Corruption, betrayal and lies have pushed you to the brink.” They sing “Proud of Your Boy” from the Broadway musical Aladdin.
A player celebrates his team fighting back police and breaching the Capitol. (Peter van Agtmael/Magnum Photos for The Washington Post)
Players watch extensive footage of Jan. 6 at the conclusion of “Fight for America.” (Peter van Agtmael/Magnum Photos for The Washington Post
After two hours of competitive play — interspersed with boisterous updates from the game master to change the dynamics — Team Red breached the Capitol and found Mike Pence. An audience member from Chicago persuaded Team Red to spare the vice president, arguing that “the better way” was to grant him salvation and then “convince him to do what we want.”
(The merciful audience member requested anonymity, citing the political climate in the United States.)
But that wasn’t the end. The finale halts the game and the audience watches nearly 10 minutes of real footage from Jan. 6 — including crowds chanting “hang Mike Pence.” It’s a gut-punch moment that shifts the atmosphere. What minutes earlier felt like an absurdist twist on Dungeons & Dragons was suddenly solemn and serious. This really happened.
“It’s the footage at the end that got me,” said Susanna Stevenson, 36, a festival director from Canterbury who voted to save Pence. “You forget that it’s a real thing.”
Primary schoolteacher Ian Nicholson had a similar reaction: “I got swept up trying to win. Then suddenly you remember — these were real people,” Nicholson said. “This actually happened — not generations ago, but four years ago.”
There is no official debrief at the end. But McElroen often lingers after the show, speaking with players as they trickle out. He recalled one man on Team Red who removed his tie and held it like a noose. “I’ve never thought myself somebody susceptible to mob mentality,” McElroen recalled the man telling him. “And I now know that I’m wrong.”
The organizers hope that their Washington run next January will provoke further dialogue.
The production, two years in the making, has cost over $300,000. McElroen acknowledged that so far “the math doesn’t work” financially. But, he added, success isn’t measured solely in profit: “Knowing that you’ve reached somebody and that they understood and were moved by the experience and have thought about their actions,” he said, “that’s success.” (Washington Post)
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