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Photo: Unwired Dance Theatre Immersive Rumours: Hi Clemence! Thanks for speaking with us today. Do you mind introducing yourself and telling us a bit about our Unwired Dance Theatre? Clemence Debaig: My name is Clemence Debaig. I’m a bit of a weird mix between a dance artist, a technologist, and I also have a background as a UX designer. That leads me to making work at the intersection of dance and technology with a strong focus on immersive and participatory experiences, which is what I do with  Unwired Dance Theatre . The company was created in 2020, right in the middle of the pandemic, because I needed an umbrella for my work that was beyond me as a person. I do a lot of work with collaborators, and I wanted to celebrate that rather than having things under my own name. We work across all sorts of tech - from VR and motion capture to haptics and spatial audio - anything that goes bleep bloop will usually trigger our curiosity. A lot of the common themes in our work are around empathy, sense of control, and how those two things sometimes are related. We’re questioning how technology affects us as humans and as a way of connecting with each other. Sometimes we have this illusion that technology is everywhere and we can communicate very easily, but we tend to forget how to empathise and connect with other humans. IR: In 2020, when the company started, I imagine a lot of the work at that time was online? Clemence:  It was very remote in the work we were doing. Thankfully I have the technical skills to make work happen online - that was beyond just a Zoom performance. I’ve done quite a lot of work with telematics and having performers in different locations performing together. The first piece of work we did as Unwired as a company was called  Remote Intimacy , where I had a dancer in London and one in New York, and I made these capacitive, haptic jackets where the dancers could touch and feel each other in real time from a distance. I made a whole performance around that. That was taking place remotely for the audience, but also remotely for the performers. Remote Intimacy (2021) Photos: Unwired Dance Theatre IR: Your latest show, Where We Meet, is at The Cockpit in Marylebone later this month. Can you tell us a bit about the ideas behind that show and what audiences who are attending can expect? Clemence: Absolutely. The show started from this idea that we can never really know what's happening in someone's mind. Everyone's putting up a mask, and getting to the core of someone's inner world is very difficult. We wanted to use technology to give access to that and see if people could connect more easily when they had access to those inner thoughts.  For an audience, we like to say that we've invented telepathy. As people roam around the room, you have three dancers in the space, and the audience is invited to be part of the same space and wander around. It's very much a choose-your-own-adventure piece of work where you can decide to approach any of the three characters at any time. When you get close to them, you enter this sound bubble, and it gives you the feeling of entering their inner thoughts. As the work progresses, the dancers also have the ability to decide what they want to share through a device they're wearing on their arm. Through that, we then evolve the work to invite audiences into gentle moments of interaction, so that can be a little bit of gesture mirroring or meditation. We're not forcing anyone to dance! It's more about using your body as a human to interact, and that turns into this joyful, euphoric, communal experience. IR: Across 2024, Where We Met was staged in a few different spaces around London. How has the show changed over the past 12 months? Clemence:  I'm going to go back a little bit because the work started in 2021. The concept was born out of an event called the   Dansathon , which is a dance hackathon organised by   Sadler's Wells ,  Maison de la Danse de Lyon , and   Theatre de Liege  in Belgium. People with different backgrounds would come in, but it was really about the idea of technologists and dancers coming together. We won the Grand Prize of the event, which gave us a little grant to start. We wanted to figure out a couple of things, both what we could do from a tech point of view, but also where we wanted to go from a dramaturgy point of view, and what other stories we wanted to tell with this set-up. The original three-day prototype we had was very much to show the mechanics more than dramaturgy. We wanted to develop the dramaturgy through the exploration of the tech and what it is enabling us to do. We had several little R&Ds, then we got to present the first version at Maison de la Danse de Lyo in January 2023. That was only a two-character version of the show. We were using in-ear monitors to stream the audio from a central computer. We learnt a lot from that event and quickly realised that basically, we were never going to be able to tour the work if we carried on with that tech due to the cost of hiring equipment. In 2024, I injected a little bit of funding into this from our own savings, and we started to re-engineer the work completely. We really wanted to own as much of the tech as possible so we could work more easily in rehearsal spaces. We're now working with very cheap tech, like secondhand Android devices rather than really expensive Sennheiser in-ear monitor systems. Based on that, it really allowed us to go back into the studio and work more with the material and go much further. We started by reworking the two characters we had from a choreographic point of view, led by Livia Massarelli, our co-director and choreographer. The writing by Emma Nuttall and music by Christina Karpodini were already absolutely gorgeous, so we started from that, but choreographically we needed more time in the studio.  We had an R&D with   Rambert School of Dance , where we worked with an in-house psychologist, Kio Tomiyama, and we worked on the third character who focused a lot on perfectionism. Our third character is also male, so we needed to understand what the male perspective on perfectionism was too.  We first presented the three-character version of the show at Theatre Deli’s SHIFT+SPACE in June last year. We were particularly interested in revising our onboarding and outboarding of the work. Before that, we were onboarding people outside of the space, and it was very practical. It was very much like, ‘Do this, put this on your head.’. Now we've made it part of the work; it’s part of the audio, and there's a proper theatrical dramatic entrance with lights and all of that as you would expect. We also integrated a post-show section where we built a little decompression room where people can reflect after the show and come back to reality rather than being spat out of the space, and we're like, ‘Okay, go and take the tube again.’ Camden Fringe was the first time we had a seated observer version. So alongside the active participants, who can move around the space and get close to the dancers, the seated observers are given a tablet where they basically see a top-down view of the three dancers with circles. They can then virtually, with their fingers, move themselves around in the space. We were already very keen to explore and really just started scratching the surface of accessibility, especially from a mobility point of view. Could we offer an option for people who do not want or cannot stand in the space and move around the space for 30 minutes? After that, we did City Fringe  at Theatre Deli, Voila! Festival  at The Questors Theatre and the Digital Body Festival  that was in London as well, which is where we introduced a durational version of the work - which is an interesting one for festivals - especially in a more arts context where there might be other things happening in parallel and it's much harder to do small time slots. You need to have a lot of people coming through, so we’re experimenting with that, but we know it works.  We're always trying to figure out what's the best format/business model/conversation we can have with a potential venue or potential festival because touring very tech-enabled work is very difficult, so it’s a lot of learnings. Photo: Unwired Dance Theatre IR: I'd love to dig a little bit more into the three characters in the show. Do you mind telling us a bit about what's going on beneath the surface in all three of them, and the commonality between them? Clemence: All three characters have a big duality of what is affecting them and the journey they're on to cope with it. They’re all sharing what they're struggling with, but also they're sharing how they're coping with it. Faith is someone who is struggling with body image and has had issues with seeing herself in the mirror for years, looking at what genetics has brought in terms of the shape of her nose and the shape of her body. It's something she adores in her family, so she’d be looking at her Mum and adore her Mum’s nose but hate it on her. She has that kind of weird relationship with her body. In that journey of healing, she really takes the time to thank the body for allowing her to breathe and live to experience the world. A lot of the interactions that Faith offers to the audience are grounded meditation with a lot of visualisation exercises. There's one where you visualise yourself as a tree to retake ownership of the body, but not necessarily with an image of a body needing to have those properties. It's a way to experience the world around you and feel the air around your skin and so on. Then we have Becki… Becki is seemingly a social butterfly. Very much someone who's going to suffer from FOMO. She appears to be a party girl, but inside suffers a lot from loneliness and really struggles to connect deeply with people. To fight that, she keeps surrounding herself with a lot of people and being the life of the party but is struggling a lot with a sense of loneliness, even when surrounded by others. The interactions she offers are about reconnecting with others and then taking time to really see each other. Finally, we have Adam, who is kind of an executive machine. He comes from a family environment that expects a lot from him and for things to be done a certain way. He’s very much in this work-sleep-work-sleep pattern of trying to be the best and pushing boundaries but really is working towards letting go. There's a lot of interactions with Adam that are brushing off shoulders, shedding all that stress and anxiety, and then relearning to be present. Even though those descriptions sound dark and intense, a lot of the characters are really on a journey of taking those struggles and coping, turning them into a positive outcome. The whole experience is actually really joyful and looks at how those challenges are just the vulnerabilities that are going to help us connect and turning it into a big celebration of each other. IR: What have the audience reactions to the work been like in the previous outings of the show? I can imagine these topics being quite close to home for a lot of people. Clemence:  People are usually really touched in a joyful way, which sounds like a bit of a weird description, but people leave the space saying that they almost feel a bit hopeful for humanity and excited to then connect. We had people telling us that they were then on the tube afterwards and started talking to strangers. We had people coming back as well, wanting to do the next show straight away because they’d related so much to one of the characters; they realised they hadn't given enough attention to the others, so they wanted to then spend a bit more time there. People who have resonated a lot with one specific character on a personal level say, ‘This is literally my story,’ but also say that while the other two might not be exactly what they're going through, they still empathised with them because they might know someone who is similar. There are always those points of connection.  A lot of the time people just stay afterwards to talk to the people who are in the room, which I think is quite beautiful. There's a lot of strangers in the space, and they're like, ‘I've done this interaction with you. I've been waving my hand in front of your face, so let's have a quick chat.’ It's quite nice. Photo: Unwired Dance Theatre IR: As you mentioned, the addition of the seated observer tickets is a recent change. Would you say that the audience takeaways from the experience are the same regardless of which ticket type you get or is it going to be a different experience if you were to go from the seated observer role over the active participant role? Clemence:  As a seated observer, you have a view on everything that's happening on stage. Sometimes you can see the three dancers dancing at the same time, which you might not see once you're in the action, so it's a different experience. We've had people be a bit nervous about participating and select seated observer first, and then once they see how much fun everyone is having, they’re like, ‘Oh, I wish I was in there,’ and then come back to be an active participant.  While the active participants might feel like they’ve got people observing them because they’ve got an audience, that's not what happens in reality because, thanks to our interactive projections, you're always in the dark. As you get closer to the dancers, the light comes into the dancer. You are always kept in the dark, and you're never stepping in the spotlight. As an active participant, you never become the point of attention for people who are observing. That's a nice way of protecting that level of intimacy and making sure that no one feels like they’ve become the show. IR: That actually segues quite nicely into what I was about to ask, which is about the technology that is used in the show. Originally the lighting was very different and the audience would be more in the spotlight, right? Clemence:  Our original intention was to surround the group with the light. We have this squiggly line that's being projected onto the floor, and we wanted it to represent that level of intimacy and embracing people through the visuals. We realised that people, as soon as they noticed they were in the light, then thought they were doing something wrong. They thought they were getting too close to the dancers, and there was this feeling of, ‘Oh no, dancer, I'm not getting in the way. I'm not the show.’ So people were not getting close enough, and they were not hearing the monologues. There's a lot of happy mistakes in the work, which I love. We were in a space that was a bit too small, and our projections were not as big as usual because we didn't have the ceiling height to get an image big enough. We ended up having that line landing between the audience and the performer and suddenly it worked so much better. We realised, talking to the audience afterwards, that for them, it was very natural that it becomes this flexible boundary.  The second happy mistake, we were in a space that was too small, but originally we had the performers really quite far from each other. You had to exit one thought and then enter the other one. When we were in that space that was too small, we had to put those sound zones a little bit closer to each other with a little bit of overlap. That's the thing that everyone absolutely adores - being able to stand in the middle of two characters. Because the sound is directional, you can hear one character in one ear and another character in another ear. I can see them from a distance when I'm managing the show; people are just standing in the middle and then listening to two monologues. There's something quite magical about that. Photo: Unwired Dance Theatre IR: Do you mind telling us a bit more about how audiences are tracked as they move around the space and how that impacts what they hear? Clemence:  So basically, we’re using a very similar system to what a VR system would use. We have a virtual scene with sound zones. Imagine in a game, let's say there's a little radio playing, and then you're hearing it very faintly from a distance, but as you approach, it gets louder. We can actually track that data; we can track people in that space as every audience member is wearing a tracker on their head, and we're feeding that back into the central system and into a virtual scene that goes back out to the phones hidden into the pouches audiences wear around their neck. It's like you are virtually moving into that scene and getting closer to those positions. So we're leveraging a lot of the game engine and XR technologies. The whole product is running in Unity, and everything is kept in real time through this massive spaghetti of network messages, pretty much. As well as affecting the audio, it also affects the lighting and projection. That data is going to be grabbed as it comes through the stage management system so that if you are getting closer to a dancer, the light will be affected. The dancers are also using phones - that's the device they have on their arms - and their decision is coming back to the stage management system and being broadcast to all the other devices. If they make a change, then everyone is affected in real time. [Read more about the technology used in Where We Meet here .] IR: What do you think the main takeaway is that you would want audiences to have from the show? Clemence:  I want them to remember that connecting with others is a proactive kind of activity. We're going to connect more through vulnerabilities than through whatever superstar mask we're putting on and through pretending that we are pretty awesome. Basically the opposite of what we're doing on social media.  I want them to feel a bit hopeful about humanity and others. I think we are living in a complex, international, media-infused world at the moment, and having this little bubble of time where we can reconnect with others and have a bit of faith in reconnecting with other humans and the beauty of our differences. I know it sounds a bit cheesy when I describe it this way, but this is really what we're trying to do. Photo: Unwired Dance Theatre IR: Finally, what does the future hold for both Where We Meet, and Unwired Dance Theatre? Clemence:  We just got a bit of Arts Council funding, which has never happened before. The phase of the project is dedicated to accessibility. Due to the format of the show, there are a lot of traditional theatre guidelines that just don't apply. We want to really take the next six months as a big R&D to figure out how we do accessibility right for new immersive and XR formats.  We’re working with several accessibility consultants and also involving disabled participants in co-creation sessions where we'll be setting up the show and then doing some rapid prototyping in the space. I'm quite excited to maybe explore, I don't know, AR glasses for live captioning, which we've been talking to our Deaf consultant about the other day. Beyond just the minimum of sharing the words, how do you share the feeling of the beautiful composition, maybe through haptic vests? There's a lot of additional visuals we can imagine. That's going to be really interesting. As part of that, we also want to collect our findings and then publish a white paper at the end of the process so we can expand this to the wider community. To give you a quick example, we were trying to follow a relaxed performance format just to cater to people who might have sensorial needs. In our work, the darkness is what protects the audience, so we had put the lights a little bit up - as per traditional theatre approach for relaxed performances - and then suddenly everyone was super self-conscious and everyone hated it. It was just weird. Everyone was like, ‘I'm not going to move,’ and then no one was participating. We were like, ‘OK, we can't just take those guidelines. We're going to have to reinvent those a little bit and then see how it works’.  The Cockpit is our first milestone of research. We're going to have one performance that’ll be fully BSL interpreted. Because it's a choose-your-own-adventure, we're going to have one BSL interpreter per dancer so the participants can really switch around and then decide which character they want to engage with. This has already been really interesting because the interpreters need to sign in 360. They're in close proximity with the dancers, so suddenly the BSL best practices don’t work, and we have to go into the rehearsal space and try to figure this out together because it’s all new.  We’re also inviting participants into the space to then have a discussion with them afterwards to see if they've experienced it in a certain way and what are the new modalities we can imagine, and that will lead to a bit more prototyping. We have a partnership with the University of Kent in Chatham and then PROTO in Gateshead, who will host our upcoming workshops and sessions, so that's quite exciting. That's what we’ll be embarking on for the next few months. Photos: Unwired Dance Theatre Where We Meet runs at The Cockpit in Marylebone from 28th February to 2nd March 2025. Tickets are priced at £21.60 for active participants and £16.45 for seated observers. Accessibility information for Where We Meet is available here . To find out more, and book tickets visit thecockpit.org.uk

The Shop for Mortals and Fools, a site-responsive and immersive production from multidisciplinary artist Vinicius Salles, is set to open its door next month at Stanley Arts in South London. Audiences will be immersed in a carefully designed world, where every corner of the shop holds a fragment of a larger story. Old relics, unique finds, hidden trinkets, and heirlooms await discovery – treasures that whisper forgotten stories and hold secrets to be unearthed. Photo: Stanley Arts/Vinicius Salles From physical performance to detailed set design, the production creates a multisensory journey that invites participants to question their perceptions of reality, memory, and the human condition. Audiences of up to 10 people per performance are invited to explore the shop's collection, in which every object has a tale to tell. One audience member may unlock a hidden mystery by participating in a game woven into the experience, with the winner getting the chance to play a special scene, reveal the mystery, and if successful, receive a gift from the gods to take home. The production reimagines The Bacchae by Euripides, weaving an original narrative that explores power, revenge, and the fragility of the human spirit. Salles’ vision invites audiences to delve into a narrative as captivating as it is deeply human, where ancient myths collide with contemporary themes. As an artist known for his interdisciplinary approach and immersive storytelling, Vinicius Salles continues to push the boundaries of theatre and performance. Drawing from a 35-year career collaborating with companies such as Punchdrunk , Gecko , and Jasmin Vardimon Company , Salles combines his expertise in physical theatre, narrative, and multimedia to create unique experiences. With The Shop for Mortals and Fools, he explores the power of environment and interactivity, crafting a performance that is as much an exploration as it is an experience. Blurring the boundaries of immersion, the experience will also feature an exhibition of artworks by artists such as Anita Wadsworth, Alberto Pavan, Leah German, and Daisy Young, with these works available for purchase. The Shop for Mortals and Fools runs at Stanley Arts in South Norwood from 14th February to 1st March 2025. Tickets are priced at £20.00, with VIP tickets available for shows on the 28th February and 1st March. To find out more and book tickets, visit stanleyarts.org

Hush Collective's ethereal performances offer up an alternative way to engage with live music for a blindfolded audience in the dark. Photo: Ian Olsson Seeing live music in London is an experience often made up of small annoyances. Your sightline of the stage will be interrupted by phones being raised into the air. People will constantly squeeze past you, trying to find their friends or get to the bar. The music may be drowned out by people talking nearby. It's a dice roll every time you go to a gig, and the behaviour of the audience around you can have a big impact, ultimately distracting you from what's on stage and pulling you out of the experience. We accept all of this to connect with music in a live environment. There is, however, an alternative where none of that are an issue... In The Dark by Hush Collective is a tightly controlled 'immersive' experience that's been designed to ensure there are no barriers or distractions between the audience and what's most important - the music. Performed in dimly-lit venues, with the audience wearing sleep masks throughout, anything that could pull you out of the experience has been removed, and everything else - from what you're going to hear to who exactly is performing - remains a secret until the performance. Photo: Ian Olsson During our visit, a collection of 11 tracks was performed by the 26-person-strong Hush Collective, who roam the venue barefoot during the performance at St. Bartholomew the Great near Farringdon . Bookended by Sigur Rós' Festival, every song performed had an ethereal, other-worldly feeling. Lesser-known songs from the likes of Colplay and Mumford and Sons sit alongside hauntingly beautiful renditions of songs by Mree, Garth Stevenson and Ane Brun to create the kind of soundscape fitting for within the walls of the 900-year-old building. Over the course of the 60-minute performance, it gently moves you into a zen-like meditative state, with no external stimuli besides the music to hold your attention. With no central stage for the members of Hush Collective to be situated on, the performance takes place with the musicians and vocalists spread around the venue, creating an analogue 360° listening experience. Depending on where in the room you're sitting, you'll likely pick up on different details, with some voices and instruments standing out from the rest as they all echo through the space. The sound of certain instrumentals will become louder as the performers approach you, then recede into the background as they pass by. Everyone's experience of the performance will differ, purely based on where they're seated. Photo: Ian Olsson Being blindfolded for the duration allows your other senses to become heightened. Those seated on the aisles likely picked up on the movement of air as the performers walked up and down, the rustling of coats and squeak of chairs was more pronounced, and the familiar smell of the building became more noticeable as the evening progressed. We're capable of picking up on all of these things in our day-to-day lives, but how often are we allowed to sit and notice them without distraction? It's an eerily beautiful and emotional experience for those who attend. In The Dark is unlike any performance we've ever attended, and if it encourages people to focus on the music when at gigs in the future without distracting those around them, it'll have changed live music for the better. We'll certainly be keeping our phones in our pockets going forward... Photos: Ian Olsson ★★★★ In The Dark is playing at St Bartholomew the Great near Farringdon and Trinity Buoy Wharf near Canning Town on various dates across March 2025. Tickets are priced from £35. To find out more visit in-the-dark.com

You Me Bum Bum Train, The legendary immersive theatre show, returned to London's west end in November after an eight-year absence Photo: Kirk Newmann Update: This article has been amended to reflect the new, extended closing date of the ballot, which is now 9th February 2025. You Me Bum Bum Train (YMBBT), the legendary, boundary-pushing immersive show which returned to London's West End in November 2024, has opened its ticket ballot for 2025 shows. The show was founded by Kate Bond and Morgan Lloyd. You Me Bum Bum Train was previously named as one of The Times' 25 best plays of the century, won the Milton Shulman Award for Outstanding Newcomer at The Evening Standard Awards in 2010, was nominated for Outstanding Achievement in Affiliate Theatre at the Olivier Awards in 2013 and was the Barbican's fastest ever selling show. The show is a surreal, exhilarating, euphoric and mind-bending participatory experience that sends its audience, or ‘Passengers’, through a dream-like carousel of scenes, fantasies, and, in some cases, life-altering experiences. Loved by hundreds of thousands, yet shrouded in near-total secrecy, since 2004, YMBBT   has redefined what it means to be part of an audience. For the last show in 2015, there were over 120,000 people applying for tickets in the first minute of release. Photo: Kirk Newmann The show’s impact depends largely on Passengers having no idea what they are about to experience so they react authentically. Secrecy is therefore an integral aspect of You Me Bum Bum Train, with no details about the production released whatsoever. This ensures the show is experienced at its best, with the proven power to change lives and perspectives. All passengers sign NDAs, which prevents them from sharing what they have experienced. The ballot will close on 9th February at midnight .  Each ballot entry will allow passengers to book a maximum of two tickets which are priced at £99.99 + booking fee. Successful participants will receive an email or SMS from 11th February with a link to purchase their tickets. There is a concessionary ballot ticket price for those on job seeker’s allowance. Photo: Kirk Newmann In addition to experiencing the show as a Passenger, You Me Bum Bum Train relies on a community of volunteers who come together and contribute their time, resources and skills to make a special, meaningful experience for audience members. Without this community, the project would not be affordable and would simply not exist. YMBBT offers free training and certification across production, stage management and performance. Many of the volunteers have gained newfound confidence and skills, and more come on board with each show, many of them ex-passengers who want to contribute to the next show themselves. The ticket ballot for You Me Bum Bum Train is open now via bumbumtrain.com , and closes at midnight on 9th February. Successful applicants will be informed from the 11th February.

Photo: DARKFIELD Acclaimed immersive theatre producers DARKFIELD will take up residency in Shoreditch Town Hall basement The Ditch this April, bringing their latest critically acclaimed experience ARCADE to the venue alongside three additional experiences. ARCADE first premiered at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2024 and later enjoyed a sell-out run at BFI London Film Festival. For the first time, DARKFIELD will present one of their experiences outside their trademark shipping container, with ARCADE transposed into the untouched basement of iconic Grade II listed Shoreditch Town Hall. Photo: Kate Edwards Using the nostalgic 8-bit aesthetic of 1980’s video games, ARCADE’s interactive narrative explores the evolving relationship between players and avatars. Over 30 minutes, audiences will choose their own path through the story whilst experiencing DARKFIELD’s signature 360-degree binaural sound and sensory effects for a fully immersive experience.  Each at their own individual arcade machine, players will guide their avatar through a world ravaged by endless war: you can choose a side, win or lose the war, search for a peaceful route, or join a cult promising a better version of reality. Players will ask themselves difficult questions, as they navigate a world where some will win and others will lose. No two journeys through the experience will be the same. Photos: Kate Edwards As part of the residency, audiences can expect a purpose-built bar, and also experience a trio of additional shows - DOUBLE, VISITORS and ETERNAL - all of which were originally part of the online-only DARKFIELD Radio Season One in 2020, and are being presented as physical installations for the first time. Speaking on their upcoming residency, DARKFIELD said: We are so excited to be coming to Shoreditch Town Hall for a residency this April, especially bringing ARCADE - our most ambitious show to date - into such a unique space as The Ditch. This will be the first time that we have transposed one of our shipping container shows into a new environment and it just feels like the perfect fit. We can’t wait to see DARKFIELD AT THE DITCH fully realised and really hope our audiences enjoy exploring the world they are immersed in. Ellie Browning, Head of Cultural Programme at Shoreditch Town Hall, commented: Our atmospheric basement space The Ditch is perfect for populating with pioneering immersive experiences, and so we are thrilled to host a DARKFIELD takeover this Spring. Their seriously clever use of tech, coupled with interactive narratives transports players to other worlds and promises experiences that our audiences won't forget. DARKFIELD at The Ditch runs at Shoreditch Town Hall from 1st April to 12th April 2025. Tickets to ARCADE are priced from £14.00, with DOUBLES, VISITORS and ETERNALS all priced at £8.00, or £6.00 when booked alongside ARCADE. For more information, and to book visit shoreditchtownhall.com

With a return to Thebes and a final season at Phantom Peak's Canada Water venue, to an immersive version of The Traitors, there's already a host of London-based shows to be excited about in 2025... Bacchanalia (Sleepwalk Immersive) Photo: Ivy Corbin Bacchanalia is an immersive adaptation of The Bacchae by Euripides. Set in a psychedelic 1960s rendition of the city of Thebes, the show is a free-roam performance in which audience members are able to follow a range of characters as Thebes falls from order into madness and debauchery. According to Sleepwalk Immersive, the new staging of the show will expand upon previous performances with new content. Bacchanalia was previously staged at Crypt in Bethnal Green in November 2023 and enjoyed a sold-out run. The show later returned to the same venue in February and March 2024 after receiving overwhelmingly positive word-of-mouth from audiences. Critical praise for the show was equally strong, with The Stage  highlighting it as one of the Top 50 Shows of 2023 and Broadway World  describing Bacchanalia as a "fascinating piece of immersive theatre". In our review  of the show, we called it "one of the best new immersive shows of the year”. Past performances saw a cast of performers renowned in the immersive world, as well as exciting newcomers. This upcoming run at Hoxton Hall promises to build on the well-received core of the show’s past runs while further expanding the company’s vision for Bacchanalia. 📍 Hoxton Hall 💰 From £54.00 🕒 11th - 23rd March 2025 🎟️ Book via sleepwalkimmersive.com Deathcell: Magenta (R Space Productions) Photo: R Space Productions R Space Production's Deathcell: Magenta has been a long time coming. The much-anticipated prequel to their 2018 immersive horror production, which won Best Out of Season Attraction at the 2019 ScareCON Awards, the show promises to be a mix of immersive theatre, theatrical cinema, time-pressured puzzle-solving, and impossible decisions. The R Space Productions team has over 30 years of combined experience in the live entertainment industry, and its founder, Steph Ricketts, has played an important part in bringing a lot of Thorpe Park's most well-known scare attractions to life. Expect big scares and tough decisions when Deathcell: Magenta opens at an undisclosed location in Hackney Wick this February. 📍 Hackney Wick 💰 From £30.00 🕒 21st February 2024 - 1st March 2025 🎟️ Book via deathcell.co.uk Phantom Peak: The Final Season Photo: Alistair Veryard With 11 seasons of Phantom Peak having run since first opening in August 2022, it's been confirmed that the next season of Phantom Peak - currently titled 'The Final Season' - will be the last at their Canada Water venue. Over the last 24 months, Phantom Peak has gone from strength to strength, with consistently high-quality trails, an ever-expanding list of technology on offer, and an ongoing narrative that's rich and rewarding for long-time visitors while still engaging for first-timers. Details of exactly where the show is relocating to are still under wraps, but we know that this venue change will usher in a new era for the show. Recent seasons of Phantom Peak have had increasing mentions of 'The Great Undoing' - an event that looks set to rock the foundations of the platypus-loving town to its Diamant-filled core. 📍 Canada Water 💰 From £42.00 🕒 From 14th February 2025 🎟️ Book via phantompeak.com Elvis Evolution Photo: Elvis Presley Enterprises LLC Layered Reality, the producers of Elvis Evolution, have become a powerhouse of immersive experience over the last few years. Their best-known show, Jeff Wayne's The War of the Worlds: The Immersive Experience, holds the title of London's longest-running immersive show, and The Gunpowder Plot - which tells the story of Guy Fawkes's attempt to blow up parliament - has been running next to the Tower of London since 2022. In 2025, their new production will debut at Immerse LDN near ExCel London. While the real-life Elvis never performed on stage in the UK, the show will feature a concert experience where a life-sized digital Elvis will perform some of his biggest hits. It'll be preceded by a journey through his life - from Graceland to New York and Los Angeles before heading to Las Vegas - where he took up a seven-year residency between 1969 and 1976. Elvis will be brought back through AI and holographic projection, as well as augmented reality, live theatre, and multi-sensory effects. To aid the creation of the show, the company has been given access to thousands of Elvis’s personal photos and hours of his home video archive to create these new AI Elvis performances. 📍 ExCel London 💰 From £75.00 🕒 From 10th May 2025 🎟️ Book via elvisevolution.com The Traitors: Live Experience Photo: Hugo Glendinning The Traitors: Live Experience, which is set to open in the West End this Spring, is a first-of-its-kind adaptation of the hit BBC series. Produced by Immersive Everywhere, the experience will invite guests to step into the world of the TV series and sit at the Round Table for a high-stakes game of deception, strategy, and teamwork. It'll feature recognisable gameplay elements such as a blindfolded Traitors selection, several missions that will test both physical and mental endurance, and ample opportunities for the Traitors to strategise whether to murder or recruit from the rest of the group.  Leading the creative vision for the project is Neil Connolly, Creative Director at Immersive Everywhere, whose track record includes The Crystal Maze Live Experience, The Tomb Raider Live Experience, and other ground-breaking immersive experiences. Immersive Everywhere has previously mounted immersive adaptations of Peaky Blinders and Doctor Who. 📍 West End 💰 From £29.50 🕒 Spring 2025 🎟️ Sign up for pre-sale via thetraitorslive.co.uk For the latest news and updates on all of 2025's immersive shows in London, follow us on Instagram , X and BlueSky

We recently appeared on the No Proscenium podcast to discuss the current state of immersive theatre in London and look back at the big moments of 2024. The episode was hosted by No Proscenium 's Noah Nelson, and also featured Katy Naylor ( Voidspace ), Franco Milazzo ( BroadwayWorld UK ), and Shelley Snyder ( No Proscenium ). Listen here:

We recap our picks of the five best immersive shows of 2024 as part of our Year In Review series. #1 - The Manikins: a work in progress (Deadweight Theatre) Photo: Rebecca J. Windsor With a cast of two performing for just a single audience member, The Manikins: a work in progress is as intimate a show as you can get. A mind-bending experience that had us questioning our own reality for weeks afterwards, Deadweight Theatre's production was the stand-out show of 2024 and has redefined what small-scale immersive theatre can achieve. #2  - Phantom Peak (The League of Adventure) Photo: Alistair Veryard Phantom Peak's ongoing narrative reached new heights in 2024 with an exception run of seasonal updates. Engaging and accessible for first-time visitors, while being deeply rewarding for long-time tourists, the show's ever-changing line-up of genre-bending trails forms the backbone of this one-of-a-kind experience that isn't being replicated anywhere else. #3 - Rhythm&Ruse (Immergence/Clio Creative) Photo: Rhythm&Ruse Rhythm&Ruse's mix of cocktails, cabaret and close-up magic was one of the best nights out we've had in London this year. While expectations were high for the show as soon as it was first announced, with Punchdrunk alumni including Fania Grigoriou, Sam Booth, Mallory Gracenin and Naomi Banks all involved, the show surpassed them to create an unforgettable evening at The Starling, night after night. #4  - Bridge Command (Parabolic Theatre) Photo: Alex Brenner A show over five years in the making, Bridge Command delivered on the promise of allowing guests to pilot a starship into the deepest corners of space. Teamwork is the name of the game aboard the UCN Takanami and UCN Havock, both of which offer an exhilarating experience for guests that responds to their choices on the fly, creating a unique playthrough every visit. #5  - Viola's Room (Punchdrunk) Photo: Julian Abrams Punchdrunk's follow-up to The Burnt City rejected the format fans had waited so long for before their long-awaited return to London with Viola's Room. With no white masks, no loops and no actors, the show instead invited guests into a linear walk-through fairy tale that required no shoes and socks. It's the kind of show only Punchdrunk could pull off, and continues to cement them as one of the world's premiere immersive producers. For coverage of all the latest immersive experiences coming to London in 2025, follow us on Instagram , X and BlueSky . To hear what over 15 immersive creators think the best immersive shows of 2024 were, check out the rest of our end-of-year coverage here .

to reflect on the variety of immersive and interactive shows we've seen in 2024, we spoke to immersive creators, performers and writers from companies including COLAB Theatre, Phantom Peak , Deadweight Theatre and Sleepwalk Immersive to find out their favourite pieces of work from the year. The Manikins: A Work In Progress By Jack Aldisert, Deadweight Theatre June-November 2024 at CRYPT, Kingswood Arts and Studio 55 Photo: Marc Tsang When I first read the prototype script for The Manikins around this time last year, I was bowled over. It took several months and some revisions before it was possible to put it on at CRYPT, but it remains one of my favourite pieces of new immersive work ever. Owen Kingston, Artistic Director, Parabolic Theatre and Bridge Command Manikins is a shining example of how much small-scale immersive theatre can achieve. This show has more inventive ideas and novel approaches to immersing audiences than most shows with 6-8 figure budgets. The unique blurring of lines between the world of the play and the audience's reality makes the show gripping and inescapable, and the emerging gameplay offers a unique form of control that audiences can't experience in larger-scale productions. The Manikins uses its intimate nature as its greatest asset, focusing all of the production's attention on a singular audience member, firmly casting them as the driving force behind the narrative. Where bigger productions lean on a more anonymized approach to audience engagement (such as the masks in Punchdrunk productions, or casting audiences within a role like Phantom Peak or Bridge Command), Manikins examines each audience member's pre-existing identity and personality as a core focus of the experience. It allows the show a sense of focus and personalization that can't be found anywhere else. While it's hard to see how these techniques can be applied to a wider audience base, given time I'm sure that Jack Aldisert and Deadweight Theatre will find a solution that's just as inventive and original as their solo concept. I fully expect big things will be coming from this company in the future, especially as they expand into larger spaces and audience capacities. Danny Romeo , Experience Director, Phantom Peak A mind-blowing weird theatre experience, completely unlike anything else out there. Unparalleled emotional impact, all delivered by two actors and a stage manager in a simply furnished room. Cleverly constructed, thoughtfully delivered and quite literally mind-blowing. I can't wait to see what Deadweight get up to next. Katy Naylor, Voidspace So much of Jack's show was a knockout, but it's the repetition that really got me. I love repetition in art, particularly in music. The Manikins manipulated repetition so boldly that it gloriously fucked up everyone lucky enough to go. Nathan Ess, Muddled Marauders Very rarely do you find a show which successfully breaks your perception of what’s real and what is not. However, Jack and his team at Deadweight seemed to manage to do so with ease. I thought the performers were excellent and the simplicity of the set and tech allowed the fantastic writing to shine. From concept to execution, ‘The Manikins’ is one of the strongest pieces I’ve seen in recent memory and I look forward to seeing more creations from Deadweight. Sebastian Huang, Sleepwalk Immersive Bridge Command By Parabolic Theatre March 2024 - Present in Vauxhall Photo: Alex Brenner Bridge Command is an absolute delight. While it's amazing to see Parabolic's years of hard work pay off, the show itself is more than the sum of its parts and is a powerhouse production within the London industry. The set is gorgeous, the tech is impressive, and the premise of flying a spaceship excites my inner child to no end. But what stands out most to me is the effortless collaboration between players that the show inspires. Whether you've known everyone on your team for years or met for the first time minutes ago, Bridge Command's gameplay demands fluid teamwork. I've played the experience twice, each with different groups, and both times our teams started out as individuals trying to be the hero. But the game quickly sets you on the right track, requiring fluid communication between job roles and rewarding groups who support each other. Both of my teams bonded quickly over the course of the show, and we celebrated our wins and losses as a singular unit, which is an impressive achievement for any immersive production. The scope of the show, which boasts an expansive catalogue of unique missions and a progression system, also seems exciting, but I've yet to experience it myself. Parabolic surely have plenty more surprises in store. Here's hoping that their tenure in Vauxhall is a long one, because Bridge Command is an excellent entry point for new audience members into the immersive industry and could prove to be one of the most important productions in the London immersive scene. Danny Romeo , Experience Director, Phantom Peak The big-budget remake of 2019's magical string and sticky tape predecessor delivers a complete storytelling experience. As you operate stations in a spaceship and interact with performers, every word and every pixel work together to create an experience where your actions matter - but also receive a satisfying narrative - without seeing the joins. Absolutely thrilled to see this show back, with the budget it deserves and as strong as ever. Katy Naylor, Voidspace I think what was achieved in terms of not only tech, but world-building and audience agency allowed me to fall into the role of a comms officer with complete immersion. I found the show to be a good balance of theatre and gaming and with multiple spacecrafts and missions, the draw to return is definitely strong. Sebastian Huang, Sleepwalk Immersive Parabolic being the classic, brilliant Parabolic. A well-designed game given a slab of cash just made it feel so immersive. There was a moment in the med bay (which I don't think we were supposed to be using - sorry gang!) but the scanner just made me giggle with glee. Bertie Watkins, Founder/Director, COLAB Theatre The Key of Dreams By Lemon Difficult April 2024 - Present in Treowen, Wales. Photo: Lemon Difficult This 24-hour horror adventure delivers on every front with a deep storyline that develops hour by hour to a satisfying finale, intense acting from a committed cast and a highly immersive environment. Franco Milazzo, Critic, BroadwayWorld UK Almost overwhelmingly dense world-building and lore to be uncovered in this 24-hour immersive/puzzle/sleuth/weird experience set in a 17c Welsh country house While hardcore clue hunters will love whipping around the place in a frenzy of discovery, what I loved was the opportunity to really get to know characters, absorb the uncanny atmosphere in the bones of the house and throw myself into the action as darkness fell and things grew stranger. Katy Naylor, Voidspace This is what free-roaming immersive theatre should be. A long, carefully crafted, deep-worlded performance that is impressively easy to slip into. The piece is scaffolded by precise, complex, and apparently adaptive dramaturgy that keeps the experience manageable despite the often overwhelming amount of content and the difficulty of portraying Lovecraftian elements in live performance. The actors, though, are the centerpiece of this production. The impressively durational and flexible performances by actors who clearly care deeply about their characters and their relationships with the audience make this show special, and they will stick with us for a long time. Jack Aldisert and Dominika Uçar, Directors, Deadweight Theatre Viola's Room By Punchdrunk May - December 2024 at One Cartridge Place I know it's a cop-out choosing the biggest immersive company (and I think it probably is more of an indication of how little, in my limited opinion, shows came out this year) but I just loved the bit when there was a miniature city with mini moving lights. It was a stand-out moment for me this year when I literally couldn't help but shout - 'wow'. It was a special moment and showed you don't need big epic sets to make an impact (even though that moment probably cost more than an entire fringe show...) Bertie Watkins, Founder/Director, COLAB Theatre The lighting, sound, and set design were all stunning! This show was a wonderful reminder that you can create theatre and art just by creating an environment that feels truthful and grounded. Having no shoes brought me into the experience even more - it was a sensory masterpiece. Serena Lehman , Actor (The Manikins: a work in progress) The whole show felt like you were stepping into another world, the story, the soundtrack, the sensory element, everything was just perfect. Puck , Magician and Actor (Rhythm&Ruse) Phantom peak By The League of Adventure March - December 2024 in Canada Water Photo: Alistair Veryard Consistently the best immersive show in London with continuous bursts of invention and ideas throughout the year. Franco Milazzo, Critic, BroadwayWorld UK Phantom Peak is incredible! An open-world video game mixed with immersive theatre, the perfect recipe for a fun time. Each time I’ve been has been so fun and different, and the characters you meet and learn stories from are all a delight. Puck , Magician and Actor (Rhythm&Ruse) Horizon of Khufu By Excurio October 2023 - December 2024 at Westfield Stratford Photo: Excurio There's a long list of new shows I haven't yet made it to this year yet, but this free-roaming VR experience I did in New York (also in London) left an impression. It takes you on a dreamlike journey into an Egyptian tomb late at night, blending digital historical recreation with interactive storytelling. Simple in design and narrative, but expansive in a way I’ve rarely seen in location-based VR. By the end, you feel like you’ve truly walked/travelled on a real expedition, rather than just crossing a room or two, heightening immersion. And it oozes atmosphere—exactly how my inner child (and adult self) dreams of experiencing and understanding history. Jack Pirie, Director/Creative Director, Elvis Evolution , The War of the Worlds Immersive , Jetpack Odyssey The Great Murder Mystery By The Lost Estate March - September 2024 in West Kensington An incredible retelling of a much loved story, The Hound of the Baskervilles in a theatre dining experience that is best-in-class. The food was an experience in itself and blew my socks off. Honestly, every dish I was excited about before it even arrived at the table. The theatre is brilliantly written, directed & performed. Tom Shannon’s set design is first class and kept the surprises coming. Really was the best night at the theatre I had this year. Neil Connolly, Creative Director, Immersive Everywhere Fight Night By Ontroerend Goes October 2024 at Watford Palace Theatre Photo: Ontoerend Goes Exposing the flaws and hypocrisies of the democratic process through an audience-driven voting-based competition. While political statements were kept out of the picture, OG nevertheless exposed the flaws at the heart of the process that provided an unsettling lesson in the madness of crowds and what it means to 'take back control' Katy Naylor, Voidspace La Boh è me By Bread and Bus Stop November - December 2024 at Safehouse 1, Peckham Photo: Bread and Bus Stop The immersive elements landed the story successfully even for audiences that normally don't connect with opera. Temperature, dynamic movement, spatial elements, and proximity with the performers all brought the audience into the story and created connections with the characters that were more intimate than in typical operatic performance practice. Hannah Gintberg-Dees, Director, Deadweight Theatre This Time (Travel) Will Be Different By Chloe Mashiter June 2024 at Theatre Deli Photo: James Lawson This was an enchanting hour of lo-fi high-concept interactive theatre. One performer (also the creator, the immensely talented Chloe Mashiter) ably led a tightly-packed room through a clever exploration of the logic of timeloops, with lots of time travel jokes (better ones than the clichés you may be tired of by now!). I came away with warm feelings and buzzy thoughts about time travel, and the emotional connections we make in the real world where we (usually) only get to do things once. Tom Black, Co-founder, Bridge Command  and Jury Games Where We Meet By Unwired Dance Theatre June 2024 at Theatre Deli Photo: Romain Tissot Using headphones, which allows performers to curate the soundtrack that they send to their free-roaming audience, Where We Meet allows us to understand the inner thoughts and be truly close to the characters. Katy Naylor, Voidspace Unfurl By Bubble Club Photo: Bubble Club Unfurl takes place in Room 2 of Bubble Club , an accessible club night in East London. Hosted by Tilley, Del and Isaac, it mixes art installation, Puffing and Wooling, improv, interactive performance, and open mic. It's immersive, interactive, and utterly unique - consistently the most joyous experience in London. Nathan Ess, Muddled Marauders A Quest For Rest By Ariella Stoian & Mushmoss Collective June 2024 at Theatre Deli Part-game, part-exhibit, part-theatre (my descriptors, not the creators), this was a lovingly-crafted and detailed exploration of energy management and chronic fatigue. It's the most effective example that I have yet encountered of the form of interactive theatre being used to explain concepts that are difficult to comprehend simply through reading or listening. It did all this while remaining charmingly light in tone, and gave me that feeling that immersive work is uniquely-placed to provide: empathy. Tom Black, Co-founder, Bridge Command and Jury Games Uwolnienie By Zenon Fajfer  and Kuba Kowalski Numerous dates throughout 2024 at Wrocławski Teatr Współczesny, Wrocław, Poland Photo: Filip Wierzbicki This was an immersive performance inside a proscenium theatre that turned the proscenium space into an immersive, non-traditional performance environment in a clever post-modern deconstruction of the theatre. A boundary-pushing, political challenge to the audience that never lost its sense of humour and delight. I'd never seen anything quite like it before. Dominika Uçar, Director, Deadweight Theatre A huge thank you to everyone who took the time to contribute to this article. For coverage of all the latest immersive experiences coming to London in 2025, follow us on Instagram , X  and BlueSky .

Yippee Theatre's hilarious immersive drag panto 'Dead Hard' sees Nakablowmi Tower taken over by Hands Grubber and his team of butch henchmen. Photo: Yippee Theatre Dead Hard, the debut production from Yippee Theatre, mixes adult panto, drag, parody, and immersive theatre. Written by Lowell Belfield and Helena Raeburn, alongside the show's director, Bertie Watkins, the show is chock full of double-ended dildos, double entendre, and is easily one of the funniest shows we've seen in years. Photo: Yippee Theatre The opening 20 minutes of Dead Hard see the audience split in half, with them either ushered to the 32nd floor of Nakablowmi Towers to take part in a series of X-rated party games or being enlisted to help with Hands Grubber's imminent storming of the building on the ground floor. During our visit, we were escorted up to the 32nd floor and welcomed by Joe Capitalism (Jacqui Bardelang), whose invitation to "watch them do a massive line of blow" immediately sets the tone for the office party gone wrong. With kilos of cocaine both laid out on a boardroom table and filling up a paddling pool, as well as dildos suction-cupped onto the glass partition dividing the space. It's an audacious opening to a show, which is made all the more outrageous by a party game in which an audience member needs to keep a huge dildo balanced upright in their hand for as long as possible, and a game involving champagne bottles and string that required some very precise hip movements to win. If it wasn't already clear, Dead Hard has a wonderfully chaotic energy to it. The campness is turned up to 11 right from the start, and every moment that references John McTiernan's original film has been injected with a huge amount of innuendo and humour. Photo: Yippee Theatre For those on the building's top floor, there are fleeting visits from gym-bro John McClean (Alex Dowding), fresh off a flight from New York City, and their disgruntled ex-wife Holly (Calum Robshaw) in the opening act, which sees Holly burst in as John is being stripped down to his vest and without socks and shoes, soundtracked by Magic Mike staple 'Pony' by Ginuwine. We can't speak to what those recruited by Grubber many floors below have been up to, but our paths soon intercept in suitably dramatic fashion. CEO Joe's plans for everyone to gather around for a company photo are interrupted as the doors to the party burst open and the show's villain, Hands Grubber (Toby Osmond), decked out in a sequin outfit and high heels, enters flanked by the other half of the audience, who usher everyone into the show's main performance space. "You will witness the greatest corporate spanking in history" decrees Grubber as we take our seats. Once inside this main performance space, Dead Hard becomes a more traditional panto, with the audience sat on either side of the central stage for the remainder of the show. The scenes that follow include everything you'd expect from a Christmas pantomime - from screams of 'He's behind you!' to regular booing from the audience and a heap of costume changes. The show's mature tone allows the cast to fully lean into the adult nature of the show's script. Guns have been replaced with dildos that vibrate instead of fire; a sex doll substitutes for the film's many dead terrorists, and Hands' name is mined for every joke you could probably ever think up about handjobs. There are numerous references to RuPaul's Drag Race, Grindr, and even the recent assassination of the UnitedHealthcare CEO is incorporated into the show's script, which is both a non-stop barrage of jokes and a celebration of queer culture. Photo: Yippee Theatre By design, pantos are interactive, and the audience plays an important role in the proceedings. You can expect regular questions asked to the crowd, and every emotional moment is played for a reaction - whether it be a sympathetic aww, a boo or a cheer. Toby Osmond's Hands, in particular, will play up to the crowd at every given opportunity, lapping up their booing with delight while goading them to continue. While some of Die Hard's most iconic moments, including John crawling through the vents of Nakatomi Plaza, are recreated throughout the show with ingenious creativity, and scenes later on in which the cast chase each other on go-karts take the absurdity of the show to ever greater heights, there's real heart at the centre of Dead Hard. The personal journey that John McClean goes on throughout the show, in which they grapple with their own sexuality, adds emotional weight to the show's climax and recontextualises the original film's bromance between McClane and Powell to be an out-and-out love story. Without a doubt, Dead Hard is one of the funniest shows we've seen in years. You'd struggle to find a more entertaining night out in London this Christmas season, even if it's light on proper immersive elements outside of the first act. It's a Yippee-Ki-Yaas from us. ★★★★ Dead Hard: A Drag Die Hard Parody Panto runs at COLAB Tower from 10th December 2024 to 12th January 2025. Tickets are priced from £32 and can be booked via colabtheatre.co.uk

Brand new immersive theatre company, Yippee Theatre , has announced the cast for the world premiere of Dead Hard, an immersive drag Die Hard parody pantomime which will turn the iconic Christmas film on its head. The show will run at COLAB Tower, the first fully DDA-compliant immersive venue in London, which will also open this Winter. Photo: Yippee Theatre Audiences will become part of the action as they follow this high-energy immersive parody that transforms the classic 80's action film into a hilarious, camp spectacle. The show has been created by Bertie Watkins, who has been the artistic director of COLAB Theatre for a decade. Bertie has written the show alongside Helena Raeburn and Lowell Bellfield. Audiences will follow drag queen Hands Grubber and the daring John McClean as they journey from their gym bro origins to exploring their sexuality through a series of explosive encounters and comedic twists, all set against the backdrop of a Christmas party gone wrong. The production promises to push the boundaries of traditional pantomime through a completely immersive environment. Photos: Yippee Theatre Taking on the role of the antagonist, Hands Grubber, is Toby Osmond (Game of Thrones, Summerland) who will perform alongside their counterpart, Alex Dowding (NewsRevue, Jack and the Beanstalk) as John McClean. Calum Robshaw (East 15 Acting School, Boomtown Festival) is multi-rolling as Theo/Neo when siding with Grubber and as Holly, McClean’s wife. Jacqui Bardelang (The Nevers, BATSU!) appears as Towel. Fans of drag, saucy humour and immersive experiences will be treated to a unique and lively night out, in which audiences can look forward to everything from lip-sync battles, thrilling heist scenes and unexpected romantic moments, all set to a soundtrack that will have you singing along. The show's Director and Creator, Bertie Watkins comments: The show is a first in so many ways. An 80s action movie pantomime, an adult pantomime, a new completely DDA venue – bring it on – I cannot wait! Photos: Yippee Theatre Dead Hard: A Drag Die Hard Parody Panto will run at COLAB Tower from 10th December 2024 to 12th January 2025. Tickets are priced from £32 and can be booked via colabtheatre.co.uk

This article was originally published in September 2023 A former theatre that dates as far back as 1937 in the centre of Camden might soon return to hosting performances after it became public that Secret Cinema has expressed interest in taking over the space to host immersive experiences. The Camden New Journal confirmed earlier this month that the current owners of the site on Arlington Road - The Rank Group, who own Mecca Bingo and Grosvenor Casino, were ‘looking into alternative options for the site’ following a slow return of visitors attributed to COVID and the cost of living crisis. The venue has been operating as a Mecca Bingo for over 60 years and was previously home to a theatre that had upwards of 2,500 seats. The site was split into two separate venues in 1961, with the bingo hall being created in the space formally used by the stall seating. The rest of the venue became an Odeon, and half of the site is still being used as a cinema today following a closure between 1993 and 1997. Secret Cinema was reportedly looking for a permanent space in London after being acquired by TodayTix in 2022 for $100 million. They would be following in the footsteps of fellow immersive theatre company Punchdrunk, who moved into a permanent venue in Woolwich back in 2019. Secret Cinema will be launching Wishmas - an immersive Christmas experience later this year in Waterloo. This is believed to be their only remaining show for 2023, so those eager to be a part of the next Secret Cinema world may be waiting a while. Camden Council will consider the company's licensing application at the end of September. Update as of January 2024: Camden Council have approved Secret Cinema's application to take over the site in Camden Town and the company appear to be gearing up to launch their first production of 2024 within the venue in the not-too-distant future. Update as of July 2024: Secret Cinema has decided not to proceed with the development of the Camden venue. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram for all the latest updates and rumours about Secret Cinema in 2025.