"Society has so many rewards for achieving dreams ... but it doesn't have a very good process around giving up on a dream to make space for a new, more 'useful' dream."
Giving up on a flagging goal for something better is a theme reflected in the arcade setting.
While the heyday of the traditional shopping mall has been and gone, the piece shows how such spaces can be used for non-retail ventures, whether it be different types of business or creative pursuits.
"It's presenting these different options," Mr Howell said.
"We've found you don't necessarily need to build a new theatre when we already have so many of these disused spaces."
The on-the-move piece, a signature of Northland Youth Theatre, sees audience members assemble at a pop-up gallery on Rathbone St before traipsing across Cameron St mall and "breaking into" The Strand, where the action continues, including on the long-disused upper level.
"The only things up there are bird poo and bird poison," Mr Holwell said.
"The Strand seemed like a perfect place to have life and young people hanging out there ... [and] it's a caricature of what's happening in the rest of town," said Mr Holwell, whose co-directors are Thomas Gowing and Johanna Cosgrove.
The gaudy consumerist mall setting clashes with a mystically lit dream world inhabited by the actors, who stage a funeral for old dreams while ushering in new ones.
Mall Dreams shows at 7pm on July 28, 29 and 30 and August 4, 5 and 6 (Thursday to Saturday both weeks) at 14 Rathbone St.
- Tickets are $16 for adults and $8 for kids at the door or through NYT (nyt.org.nz) or (09) 438 4453.