The Compass, a powerful Steppenwolf for Young Adult premiere, concerns an Entrepreneur (Tim Hopper) who has launched the Compass app, a seemingly harmless and fanciful social media tool aimed at saving users the nuisance of worrying over minor decisions, like which shirt to wear today. 

Trouble ensues, however, when Marjan, a high school senior (played by Ariana Burks) follows the guidance of the Compass app in committing a crime: She calls in a false bomb threat at her school. This is a felony - albeit perpetrated in this case to avert likely violence. 

The action of The Compass turns on a subsequent trial. And it is here that The Compass rises to a very engaging two hours. If theater is society's way of holding a live debate with itself, the impact of social media is high on the list of topics. And The Compass does that with an inventive theatricality - one that will appeal audiences of all ages. Through it's multiple levels, we get a kind of Minority Report meets 12 Angry Men - and an encounter for all of us with ideas that matter.

Two years in development, The Compass was not "scripted" but instead "devised" by director Michael Rohd. Over the past two seasons, Steppenwolf for Young Adults hosted a series of "Project Compass" events aimed at engaging multi-generational theater audiences in a dialog about what goes into making a decision, and how we are each guided by our own moral compass. 

The team even researched with Google, which affirmed the feasibility of an app like Compass - which scans a user's total online behavior to predict choices for him or her going forward. From that arises another the crux of the play's topicality: What is our obligation to make sure we are guided by our own sense of right and wrong, and not to be driven by the prevailing winds frequently expressed through social media? 

Steppenwolf can benefit as well, through all this, using this as a focus group, helping it to devise a type of theater that could appeal to the next generation of ticket buyers. 

The feedback from the pre-show events played a major role in the structure of the play - which is decidedly multi-media and driven by audience participation. Big screens display the feeds from the characters' social media feeds, and far from distracting, seem naturally to advance the actio of the performance. The play also jumps back and forth in time; and 

actors play multiple characters, variously from perches above the stage, on jumbo video screens, and even in the aisles. All the shape and time shifting flows pretty seamlessly.

In another departure from a standard staging, ten Facilitators are cast within the audience. Each one also plays a juror in the trial on stage, while periodically stepping off the boards to lead a section of the seating in a discussion on topics being discussed on stage. Actor Sean Parris did this winningly for our group.

Leading the conversation, and taking notes, these Facilitators return to the stage to argue their audience sections' viewpoints from the jury box, then vote guilty or not based on each group's feelings - adding to the investment ticket buyers have in the action. 

After jury deliberations reach a third day (a real-time time-lapse gets the idea across very well), Marjan is found guilty by the 10 jurors. The vote for  the 210 ticket holders is also rolled across the stage on a white board. We the audience at the Steppenwolf downstairs theater voted Marjan guilty, 126 to 94. So the action changes, based on the audience sentiment at each performance. 

The play is set in the near future (Elizabeth Warren is Vice President, the Compass app, widely adopted,  now offers 99 cent filters that turn it into a Beyonce-based advisor.) All of it is very believable - including a falling out between Hopper's Entrepreneur and his programmer Ada - played by Cruz Gonzalez-Cadel. The branding for the Compass app has been professionally developed - and rows of theater seats are emblazoned with it - further fostering the impression that we are in a real-world exercise.

The cast of The Compass also features Bryan Bosque, Cheryl Lynn Bruce,Jasmin Cardenas, Melissa DuPrey, Krystel McNeil, Johnathan Nieves, Abby Pajakowski, Sean Parris, Emilio G. Robles, Alejandro Tey and Lindsey Barlag Thornton.

The production team includes Courtney O'Neill (scenic design), Sully Ratke (costume design), JR Lederle (lighting design), Rick Sims(sound design), Joseph A. Burke (projection design) and David Masnato (content creator). Additional credits include Cassie Calderone (stage manager) and Jessamyn Fuller (casting).