Photo: Alex Brenner Immersive Rumours: Hi Owen and Tom. Thanks for speaking to us today! Do you mind introducing yourselves and telling us what your roles are at Bridge Command? Owen Kingston: I'm Owen Kingston, I'm the Artistic Director of Parabolic Theatre and Bridge Command. Tom Black: I'm Tom Black. I'm the Executive Director of Bridge Command, working closely with Owen and the whole team to operate this wonderful ongoing sequential story that we're able to tell. IR: For those who have never been, what’s the Bridge Command experience like? Owen: It's like being in your own sci-fi series. That's what we're going for. To come to Bridge Command and be a punter is to step into your own sci-fi world, and you be the hero of your own sci-fi story. IR: The first time you both spoke to Immersive Rumours was ahead of the show opening back in March 2024. A lot of the site was still under construction, but we were able to get a hands-on demo of the experience ahead of the public opening. Looking back at that time, what are your overwhelming memories of building and opening the show? Owen: I think launching a new show is always, to some extent, quite a chaotic process, because it doesn't matter how well you plan it; no plan survives contact with the enemy. Unexpected things happen. When you've got something with as many moving parts and as complex as Bridge Command, it's nearly impossible for it to all go completely smoothly. This is by far and away the biggest thing we’ve ever done. Parabolic has always done quite small shows, and in the past, we've always been able to launch a new show softly and quietly to iron out the kinks without anybody really looking at it. We used to do a lot of stuff with the Croydonites Festival, and it was great because we had two or three weeks to perform to people who were either our hardcore fans, who were willing to come to Croydon to see us, or just the good people of Croydon who didn't really know who we were. You could try something new out of the public gaze and have a chance to fix it before that lens of publicity hit you. That's something that we didn't have with Bridge Command because it's that much more high-profile. The other thing that was memorable from that time is that we were not prepared for how different it would be to run this show for fourteen people than it is to run it for nine people. When we did the first version of Bridge Command back in 2019 on a shoestring budget in the basement of COLAB Factory, it was for six people. We ran that for months and months and months, and it worked really well. When we started planning this new version in January 2020, we thought we could expand it to nine people quite comfortably, and it would work similarly well. About six months before we were due to launch, we had a bit of a crisis with our investors when we were looking at the budgets and thinking, ‘Oh, crumbs, is this actually going to make enough money?’. The decision was taken, rather than to scrap the whole thing entirely, to up the audience capacity again. We did it to survive, really. If we didn’t find more capacity from somewhere, we weren’t going to be able to even open. We put work into that, but I think we didn’t have enough time left to put enough work into that. I think it's fair to say that when we opened, really full shows did not work as well as the shows that had eight to ten people. When we had an absolute maximum capacity audience of fourteen, there were problems because there were people who didn't have enough to do. I think we’ve fixed that problem now, but it took us longer than I would have liked to fix it. Making fixes just took longer than it has on any other show we've ever made in the past. I think it's the difference between - to use a naval analogy - trying to turn around a small boat as opposed to trying to turn around a supertanker. We really felt that with Bridge Command. It's so much more of a bigger proposition, so many more staff, so many more shows that we are running in a day, that to make a meaningful change just took way longer - four or five times longer. Tom: With Bridge Command, we could meet the next morning and go through it, but then that night, whatever we did, we would be running not one version of the show, but four or five. We'd get loads more data, and of course, not every single one of them would have responded to the change we've just made in the same way. I’d underestimated the scale of being reactive; it became much harder, and it became more of a supertanker. We also had a lot of focus on the onboarding process and the training process. There’s two distinctions there - welcoming people in, literally both off the street and then through the various stages to get into the show and into the world of the show and making clear what's going on, but also the process of training people how to use the ship, the software on the screens, the mechanical things on the ship, all those things. You need to be shown how to use those. It's fair to say that it took us longer than I would have liked, but because of the problems we've mentioned, we didn’t 100% get it right when we opened. I'm really thrilled with how training now works for the show, and we've seen a huge change in feedback. It's been months and months and months, and pretty much no one has raised any issues with it, but it just took time to handle that. Owen: Those first few months, I remember we used to try and teach people how to use the ships before we'd even put them on the ships. We used to have terminals in the bar and try to get people to play tutorials, but none of that stuck. It took us at least six to eight weeks to settle on what worked in terms of getting people to learn how to fly the ships quickly so that they could then do a meaningful mission afterwards. Photo: Alex Brenner IR: When you first conceived Bridge Command back in 2019, was it ever designed to be an experience that would appeal to absolutely everyone? You're trying to do one thing incredibly well, and that thing is obviously somewhat niche. Some people just don’t like sci-fi, right? Owen: Exactly. I think immersive works best when the product that you've made appeals very strongly to a particular audience. If I'm looking at the advertising, either it makes me go, ‘Yes, I want to do that immediately’, or it makes me go, ‘No, I'll never do that in a million years’. I think one of the problems that immersive theatre has had historically is that it's been all about massive spectacle. It's been about appealing to a very large audience. The economics of the industry have all been built around that. You can look at Punchdrunk or Secret Cinema, who’ve done great shows in the past, and that's been their business model. They want something that's going to attract loads and loads of people every night and justifies a colossal spend and an enormous set. That's one way of doing it, but I think the economics in the last few years have shown that that's not actually the sustainable, brilliant model that maybe it's been made out to be, or maybe even has been in the past. What we're looking at is something different. Parabolic's early work was all about taking much smaller-scale audiences, spending less on it, but making something that is really going to appeal to enough people to be able to see that. The beautiful thing about For King and Country was that you’d look at the advert for that, which said, ‘Can you win the war?’, and if you are in any way a World War II nerd, you're going to want to come and do that. If you're not, you're not. I think Bridge Command does the same thing. If you want to fly a starship, if you want to be like Captain Picard, Captain Kirk or Captain Janeway, then yes, that is going to be for you. If that doesn't float your boat, then maybe not so much. Building shows that are sustainable for a niche but large enough audience to sustain it - I think there’s an interesting business model there which can work. IR: Have audiences' reactions to the experience matched up with what you hoped it would be prior to opening? Owen: Broadly speaking, I’d say yes. Wouldn’t you say so, Tom? Tom: Yeah. I think so. I think in hindsight, we expected people to get really invested in their own naval careers, for want of a better term, and getting promotions. People earn medals and collect different patches. We've got a fan Discord now. It's run by us, but it is full of regular attendees, and we can see how much people are really interested in the ongoing stories of the main cast, so to speak. Everyone who works here, from front of house through to the people running your ship, they're all actors. Everyone has got a character with a named role and a backstory and everything like that. We sell bar tickets, and there are people who come a couple of times a week; they'll maybe do one mission, but they'll come two or three times to hang out in the bar and play a game, read a book, do some knitting, but also chat to people. They might say ‘I've got a theory as to what's going on in such and such part of space’. Then the character who's in the bar with them will maybe chat to them about that. People really care. I would actually say that is a bit of a surprise. They care even more than I thought they would about hanging out with the characters on an ongoing basis. People always like the characters in Parabolic shows; it was always about the story and about the audience themselves becoming the main characters in a story, but the fact that there is this recurring cast, of us being the people who are on the ship with you when you're doing your adventures, and you can see them over a much longer scale than just the two and a half hours of Crisis, What Crisis?, or For King and Country, I think that's something we didn't… Owen: We didn’t plan for that did we? Tom: Maybe unconsciously. We created these characters with it in mind, I suppose, without realising, but it's gone down way better than we thought it would be. Owen: It’s become a soap opera in space for the people that become really invested in it. That's been fuelled by some of the special events and other things that we've done. We've been able to expand that a bit for those who are keen on it. Photo: Alex Brenner IR: Previously, you’ve done one-off events like War Games, and you’ve had two Treaty events so far, right? Owen: Yup. We've had a couple of others since then as well. You know when there's the novelty episodes of Star Trek where the holodeck breaks or things like that? We did one that felt a bit like that, where all of the crew played by actors succumbed to a weird disease, and they had to be fixed by the audience. We've played with several different things now. We’re about to do one about ██████████. Although I don't think we're allowed to talk about that yet, so that's a big spoiler… Tom: Please don’t print that. Our staff has been very good at not dropping any hints about it, so we’re pretty sure the audience are going to have no idea what’s going to happen in that. It’ll be a nice surprise. For a while now, the special events have been selling out before we really release any details at all. We've ended up in the situation where we haven't needed to reveal the really juicy element of it to sell it, because people are keen and they trust us, I suppose. IR: Are all of these one-off events non-canon or do they feed back into the ongoing narrative? Owen: Oh, they're very much part of the story. What's happened with those, and it's happened organically rather than us specifically planning it this way, but each of those events has become a milestone moment in the ongoing story of the Adamas Belt and has actually shifted that story along a little bit. When we ran the treaty, that then affected the missions that we were running. All of the different factions that people were encountering suddenly all of them had signed some form of treaty with each other, and that affected the interactions people had, and it became part of the ongoing narrative. Similarly, in some of the other events we've run, we've had a political election cycle running alongside as part of the story content, so that's fed into some of the things that have happened. It's all part of creating that sense of a world that isn't just static, you know? It continues to build and change and thrive. We're currently shooting a whole load of new content to update the news channel that we run in the bar. When we opened, we had about an hour's worth of TV news that was all relevant to the world. Some of that is very out of date now, so we're in the process of updating it. The plan for the events going forward is to try and do them every couple of months and have that be a way of moving the story along. When you watch Star Trek of old, you'd get lots of monster-of-the-week episodes, lots of things that are very inconsequential are all contained within one episode, and then every now and again, you'd have a big milestone story moment, like Captain Picard becoming a Borg or something like that. That's what we've tried to do with those special events. IR: You’ve also introduced bespoke campaigns recently. Can you tell us a bit about that? Owen: Honestly, they’re peak Bridge Command. It's the best version of the show you can possibly create, I think. The first one that we did was with people who had met through playing Bridge Command. None of them were friends beforehand, but they had met just doing random pickup shows, and then they decided they got on well. They approached us and said, ‘Would you be willing to do this?’. We thought, ‘Absolutely, that sounds amazing’. So we crafted a story for them, which was over five shows. That story was a linked narrative, and their actions very much determined the outcome as well. We were able to be responsive to that specific group of people. It worked as a format, and it was terrific fun. It's like running a D&D campaign and has very much got that vibe to it. We assign a member of staff to be the campaign manager, and that member of staff coordinates what's going to happen for the campaign, makes sure they get the staff they need for it, and makes the necessary tweaks to the story. It's terrific fun. What’s nice about it is that it works for people who have never played Bridge Command before but love the concept in principle. If they're willing to trust us upfront with the big wodge of cash, then we can very much give them the time of their lives. It’s one of those things that in your wildest dreams, you hope one day you might be able to make happen. It was one of the bucket list things to do with Bridge Command, and it's incredible to have had a chance to do it and to see it really work as well. Tom: It was huge fun to make, and one of the players in the first outing described it as a ‘love letter to Season 1’, because the campaign itself pulled on various threads that regular participants were used to from all the missions in Season 1. Characters, factions, even a couple of ‘whatever happened to x’ kinds of things. Without giving anything more away I will say that this went down very well with that group, and we’ve now got half a dozen other groups playing through the same story - though it’s important to say that part of the luxury of a campaign is that the story and how it unfolds is tweaked to reflect your crew’s unique actions, even more so than a normal Bridge Command mission. And the original group have now booked again, so we need to do it all again! We’ll be continuing their adventure, but it’s a whole new story. So there’ll be a ‘second campaign’ set of 5 missions available to anyone in a few months’ time. Photo: Alex Brenner IR: There’s something really interesting about how more and more immersive shows are operating with ongoing, multi-year narratives nowadays. The Key of Dreams is moving into a new story chapter later this year, Phantom Peak is constantly evolving, and of course, you’ve recently debuted the new chapter of Bridge Command. I think that structure goes a long way to explaining how those kinds of shows have managed to build a loyal fanbase, who return often. Owen: It's just really important to balance it against that first-time experience. If you focus too heavily on fan service and pleasing the returners, you get the same problem that TV series have, which is, if I see a TV series that's run for ten seasons, I'm going to think twice about starting at the first season. It’s a huge investment of time. What we’re always trying to be careful to do with Bridge Command is not put off people who are coming for the first time. We're always trying to be aware of how we frame the experience to people who are encountering Bridge Command for the first time, and making sure that we don't put too high a barrier to entry. Tom: Yes, the overwhelming majority of people experiencing Bridge Command are still brand new to it, though to get statistical for a second, we have seen the number of returning regulars go up, not down, while our overall number of sales increases – so that’s felt really good for our momentum, as it means we aren’t just maintaining the same number of people wanting to come back again and again. We’re winning over more and more new people all the time. Our regulars are very, very welcoming to newcomers, too. There are many happy stories of people coming on their own or in a small group and being nervous, and then being ‘adopted’ by experienced hands on their crew, who afterwards encourage them to join our Discord server and become part of the community. IR: We're a couple of months into Season 2 of Bridge Command now. When you started to structure and work out the plans for these new missions, what were the big takeaways from the first year or so of running missions? [Owen laughs] Owen: I'm laughing because there was a massive one. When you look at any TV show, particularly sci-fi TV shows, you see the same plots recur over and over again, redressed. You see it a lot in sequels to movies, too, where essentially people are coming to see it because they loved the first movie, so you want to give them enough of the first movie that they liked, but you also need it to feel different so they don't feel like they're just watching the same thing again. Star Trek's a perfect example of something that does that all the time, and Stargate SG-1, which I love, does that really noticeably. I was having a bit of a thought experiment in the lead-up to beginning to write for this new season, and I was thinking, ‘What are the basic plots of Bridge Command?’ The process of analysing that brought me to the conclusion that every single episode we had up to that point was basically the same plot redressed - ‘Save the Guy’. We would send the crew out to go and do something, and they would save a character and bring them back. Every mission did that in some way or another. IR: And how many mission stories did you have in Season 1? Owen: I think 10 or 11 missions, and they all did that in some way. The thing was, we hadn't noticed! So we’d done a reasonably good job of making it different every time, but we said, ‘We have to do some different plots’. So we actively went into the new season saying ‘We're going to, at most, do one or two Save the Guy plots and everything else; we're going to really work hard to think of different things that the audience do’. IR: So what caused you to end up making so many ‘Save the Guy’ missions in Season 1? Owen: It had arisen, I think, because of how we staff the shows. We put three performers on each show. One of them will be the flight controller, who is the games master. They’re a performer, but they’re also making things happen behind the scenes. We have somebody who goes on with the crew at the beginning to train them in how to use the ship, and then we have an actor whose job it is to play whatever the prominent character is. One of the best ways to get a character onto the ship is to have them pick up or rescue somebody. That was one of our big takeaways - just spotting what we'd done by mistake. As Tom was saying earlier, we also underestimated how invested returning audiences would get in not just the world of the show and the stories we're telling, but the characters on the Warspite that our actors played on the regular. We purposefully built in more plot points and story points that allowed for character developments and interesting things to happen to them. That was part of it as well. Photo: Alex Brenner IR: When we first spoke 18 months ago, you mentioned that you had ideas for the next four or five years’ worth of Bridge Command. Is that still the plan now that you’re some way down the road from opening? Owen: Absolutely, yeah. What we found actually is that it's going to stretch further than we thought. We'd come up with quite a lot of ideas, and what we found, again, is part of that supertanker analogy of it taking a long time to steer Bridge Command in a particular direction. It's taken us longer to get some of that content out there because, actually, if we make new content, it doesn't just sit there for a couple of weeks or even a month. In order to get it through our whole fan base, it takes several months for people to play through all of those things. I think that elongates that timeline a little bit. We're anticipating at least being there until the end of next year. We'll see beyond that. I think how we're doing financially will dictate whether we extend. We have a 10-year lease on our site with a three- and five-year break. We'll make a decision at some point before the end of next year as to whether we want to go on past the end of that three-year break and into the five-year break. That will be purely a financial decision at that point. Is it still making enough money to cover its cost and also making money for our investors? I think that's the critical thing. They won't want to take the risk of us being there another two years and then dipping down into being loss-making. That's for the future to see, but we're pretty committed to being there throughout most, if not all, of next year. IR: Outside of Bridge Command, are there any new Parabolic shows on the way in the not-too-distant future? Owen: There’s not much to say there, apart from there being some huge opportunities that have opened up, which we would love to take advantage of. Currently, we're not on any kind of ticking clock time scale to take advantage of those, which is great, so we can keep ploughing a lot of effort and attention into Bridge Command for as long as it needs it, but I think we're looking at least one more, really high-profile show in the next few years. I can't really say anything about what that will be. There's also the back catalogue of things. It's now been maybe six years since we did the last performance of For King and Country. I think that is still probably my favourite Parabolic show. There's been some talk of late about trying to bring that back again. I know certainly all the original cast feel as fond about it as I do, and it's been absent from the world for a while. There's a whole generation of new immersive theatre fans who've never seen it. I think it would be worth doing that again for people at some point if we can. IR: I think it’s fair to say you’ve got your hands full with Bridge Command at the moment. Owen: Yeah. Any new Parabolic show will largely depend on Bridge Command. If we get to the end of next year and we're like ‘Okay, we've had a good time doing Bridge Command, but we think it's time to close’, then that would create space for us to work on something new. If Bridge Command goes on beyond the end of next year, then we may be looking at another couple of years before we make something new. It's a win-win as far as I'm concerned, because Bridge Command is a wonderful privilege to work on. There's nothing else out there that's quite like it, and as long as it can go on, I'd be very happy to be working on it. Photo: Alex Brenner Bridge Command is currently booking until 31st January 2026 in Vauxhall. For more information about the show, and to book tickets, visit bridgecommand.space

Image: FAME*FACTORY We all see mega-celebrities living their best lives, flashing on our screens and socials every day, and let’s face it… we all dream of what living that sort of life would be like. Well, people don’t have to dream anymore because now they can live life as an A-Lister at FAME*FACTORY. FAME*FACTORY, which launches this October 2025 at Immerse LDN, is a brand new immersive theatre show that offers guests the ultimate taste of superstardom. Fly on your own private jet, perform in front of your adoring fans, star in a photo shoot and a movie, walk the red carpet and maybe even give a winner’s speech. How will you play it? Are you staying humble or serving diva? Produced by Done + Dusted, the creative producers behind some of the world’s most iconic live moments including The Oscars, MTV’s Video Music Awards and The BRIT Awards, FAME*FACTORY is a bold, high-octane journey through the highs and headlines of the A-list life, complete with stylists, paparazzi, green rooms, gossip, and tabloid-worthy twists. This is no solo ride either - every A-lister needs their entourage. A full cast of actors, from agents and bodyguards to photographers and publicists, guides guests through a show designed to blur the lines between reality and celebrity fantasy. Video: FAME*FACTORY Hamish Hamilton, creator of FAME*FACTORY, double BAFTA-winning Director and  Co-Founder of Done + Dusted, says:  I've been around fame and celebrity my entire professional life. Directing events like The Oscars, The BRITs, and MTV’s VMAs has given me a red-carpet view of the crazy world around the famous. So, one day, I decided to create a show that allowed everyone to experience the celebrity lifestyle. With cinematic production, playful satire and unforgettable photo-ready moments, FAME*FACTORY explores both the fantasy and frenzy of fame and what it really means to be in the limelight. FAME*FACTORY opens at Immerse LDN near Customs House on 2nd October 2025. Tickets are priced from £28.50. To sign up for the waitlist, visit fame-factory.com

We sit down with Secret Cinema's Senior Creative Director, Matt Costain, to discuss their much-anticipated return to London with Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical. Image: Secret Cinema It's been nearly three years since a large-scale Secret Cinema show opened in London. This summer, the company, which are known for creating immersive adaptations of popular films such as Star Wars, Guardians of the Galaxy and Back to the Future, makes its return to the capital with Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical, which will see the debut of a new format for the company. With a cast of 30, a live band, and recreations of many of the film's locations, including Frosty's Palace, The Autoshop, and Rydell High, this version of Grease is a radical departure from previous Secret Cinema productions of the film, with the action taking place alongside the film's screening. Ahead of the show's launch, we were invited down to Battersea for a sneak peek at what to expect from Secret Cinema's return and spoke to the show's Creative Director, Matt Costain. In our frank conversation, Matt discusses what Secret Cinema has been working on since their latest production, how their previous business model presented some unique challenges, and how the company is adapting to fit into the rapidly evolving immersive landscape. Immersive Rumours: Hi Matt, thanks for speaking with us today. Do you mind introducing yourself and telling us a bit about your role within Secret Cinema? Matt Costain: I'm Matt Costain. I'm the Senior Creator Director for Secret Cinema, and I've been with the company on and off since the very, very early days when Fabien Riggall first started it. He was about two or three shows in and asked me to come and work with the actors and the creation of the performance. Back in the day, when we were doing one-nighters, we didn't really ask anyone's permission for anything. We ran in, did a thing, and by the time anyone was worried about it, we'd gone. I stayed with Secret Cinema through the first couple phases of it growing up, and we did a lot of growing up in public back then. I ended up doing about ten shows up until The Empire Strikes Back, which was, I suppose, the pinnacle of the sort of thing we did in found spaces. After that, I needed a rest and a change. Secret Cinema grew a lot over the next few years while I wasn't around, but I then came back, refreshed and excited for Stranger Things, and have been with the company full-time ever since. Image: Dale Croft IR: Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical is the first large-scale Secret Cinema in London since 2022, and it’s been two years since the previous iteration of Grease at the NEC in Birmingham. What has the last couple of years looked like for the business? From the outside, it’s looked pretty quiet, but I'm sure there's been a lot going on behind the scenes. Matt: We’ve been extremely busy trying to make the next thing happen. This is the smallest violin in the world playing for the producers, but it turns out that putting on immersive shows is hard. IR: Who knew!? Matt: Who knew! All immersive companies will tell you the same thing. At Secret Cinema, we’re at the mercy of the studios, and sometimes we'll be quite a long way down developing a project, then, for some reason outside of our control, it stops. Also, the world has changed. The nature of immersive has changed. The word immersive has changed. Immersive means so many things now to so many people. We’ve been trying to work out what our place in that space is and create a sustainable business. So that's been happening behind the scenes - a bit of existential soul searching, along with some business modelling. With the best love in the world, the early Secret Cinemas were unsustainable. We've always wanted it to be accessible to people; it can't just be a playground and a hobby for rich kids. It needs to be able to support the industry on which it depends, and the audience on which it also depends. We’ve been trying to find a new way of delivering the stories, but also, post-COVID, people were booking tickets in a different way. IR: How so? Matt: When we were looking at it, people were only really booking one big thing a year, far in advance. They would book Glastonbury, or Wimbledon, or get World Cup tickets, or insert favourite theatre show/ event here, and then book other things, like Secret Cinema, later. They wanted to see how their bank balances looked, or they would want to make sure it wasn't going to get cancelled, and that's a precarious model. Bearing all that in mind, and the expectation of these huge shows, means that if you're not careful, you get to the stage, which we nearly did, where the only thing you can consider doing is giant blockbusters. Everything else crumbles under the weight of the expected ticket sales and the costs. We had a lot of conversations with studios about how we could deliver films in a way that wouldn't be to their existing expectations, which was, to quote another company, creating Sleep No More for everything. It took a while for them to come around to that idea, but now we’re at a point where there are 5 or 6 projects stacked, waiting for the right combination of things to fall into place. If they do fall into place, we’ve got material for 3-4 years, and a number of shows a year, but it has taken two years of apparent inertia for that to happen. I know it’s frustrating looking in from the outside, going ‘When are you ever going to do something again?’ or if you read through the comments, it’s ‘When are you going to do a brand news show?’, with the next comment being ‘When are you going to bring back Star Wars?!’. Everyone has an opinion on how to be doing Secret Cinema, but we’ve been working hard, and it’s hard to communicate that. We thought it was best to keep quiet until we can put our money where our mouth is and come out with the three-year deal at Evolution, and Grease as the first step on this idea to a new way of producing work, with hopefully many more to come. Image: Dale Croft IR: The new format you’re adopting for Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical, is this going to largely be what Secret Cinema shows look like going forward? Are we done with the days of tight corridors and secret rooms that you've got to earn entry into? Matt: There will always be secrets. IR: It’s in the name, isn’t it… Matt: It's on the tin. There will always be things to find. Back in the day, we didn't even tell you what you were going to go and see. Our secrets - the way that we do things, and the way you can find something - have changed, but haven't stopped. One thing we are looking at is being flexible to the different titles that deserve different formats. There are some titles that you think, ‘Yeah, I get that. I'm on a mission. There’s a time pressure. It's important. I can do that.’ Other ones feel like you want to sit in the world. Grease represents the beginning of an idea for how to look at those titles. The film is unfolding around you, but the exploration takes place in and around the film showing. IR: As opposed to being two distinct halves.. Matt: Yeah. We've sort of been calling it the ‘one world model’. We have to be quite disciplined with ourselves because, as you said, we started with going, ‘Let's show this film in a place that's appropriate, so let's find a hospital that has 50 rooms'. The problem there was always, where do you find the big room to do the screening, or the finale, or what we call the hero moment? The next idea was to get a warehouse with a big space for the screening and the finale, but we're going to have to build those 50 rooms. Anybody who's involved in theatre or construction will tell you that building 50 rooms is an unsustainable business model. We then said to ourselves, ‘Okay, what if you're not building so many rooms but you're looking at one large space?'. We've all done the show where we've been in one large space and we've pretended there are separate rooms, which is just a lot of shouting. It's not satisfying, so then we started saying, ‘Okay, if we're going to be in one big room largely, we'll own up to it’. Let's help direct the main body of attention in the audience, so it follows a more theatrical path. Around that, we offer pauses, gaps and areas where you can go off and explore. That's where you have to be careful, because if you're not careful, you'll go, ‘Oh, just put a one-on-one there. Oh, just put a little room there', and before you know it, you've gone back to building 50 rooms. Image: Dale Croft IR: For Grease, you've got some new ticket types, including the VIP Immersive ticket, which allows guests to arrive 75 minutes before, learn a routine and be on stage at points as well. Is that a reflection of the understanding that different audience members are looking for different levels of engagement? Matt: Absolutely. We've always allowed that to happen organically. We've always had super fans, people like PPSC (Positive People of Secret Cinema), who are wonderful and want to find every secret, get involved, do all that homework, and learn all the songs. We want to facilitate that type of stuff. There are also people who are fans of this particular title, whatever it may be, who want to see the iconic thing for that title, and then there are, broadly, people who go, ‘I don't know why I'm here. My partner has bought me a ticket. I saw that it looked fun. I saw a poster and heard it's cool.’ For those people, we offer spectacle and gradual invitations to join. While we've tried to keep it accessible to people in lots of different ways, not everybody wants to do those things. We've found that some of that is a barrier to entry. Not everybody wants to dress up, and some people will find it off-putting. However, it's helpful for the world if it feels like the right world, so we encourage you to, and we offer people a light touch these days on how you might gently join in, rather than being as we were in the beginning, which was, ‘You must! You have to! There is no excuse for not dressing in one of nine elaborate costume types and entering carrying a cabbage!'. We're trying to be lighter, but we know that people want to do these things, so there will always be the opportunity for anybody who’s got a general admission ticket to join in anyhow. I would hate for Secret Cinema to become exclusive to the extent where it’s ‘Sorry you can't do that.’ It should always be the case that you can. For those people who know they really want to, it offers an inside, backstage track. You can get a VIP ticket, which means coming down early, learning some things so that you can join in, so that you can be in the front row and maybe be a choreography ambassador almost, where you can be passing on what you do, and being like team leaders, if that interests you. At the other end of the scale, there are some people who just want to sit and watch, so we've got this Roam and Return seated ticket. You've got your table, you've got your seat, you can go back to it - it's yours - but you can get up at any time and wander off and join a bit that you feel like. Image: Dale Croft IR: Finally, what advice would you give for someone who has never been to a Secret Cinema show before, maybe has never done any immersive stuff, but is looking to come to Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical this summer? Matt: You know what? The first thing I'd say is relax. You get out what you put in, but that doesn't mean that you have to go crazy. If you want a relaxed time, you can relax. We're not going to make you do anything you don't want to do. We're not going to embarrass or humiliate you. If you want to dress up, however gently, you will probably feel more at home when you are there, rather than going 'Oh, I wish I had’. Be a little bit brave, take a little bit of a risk. There's something really, really pleasing and really rewarding about getting on the tube wherever it is that you live, as the only person in a black leather jacket and sunglasses. Gradually, as you get nearer the venue, you’ll get other high school students and teachers and people in other outfits getting on. You think, ‘Oh, you're going where I'm going’, and by the time you get to the destination station, there are throngs of people walking up the drive to Evolution in outfits. That's a really powerful feeling that sets you up really well. Image: Dale Croft Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical will run from 1st August to 7th September 2025 at Evolution London in Battersea Park. For more info and to get tickets, visit greasetheimmersivemoviemusical.com

Image: Secret Cinema With rehearsals now underway, further casting has been confirmed for Secret Cinema's Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical, which opens on 1st August at Evolution London in Battersea Park. Returning to London after an extended absence, this latest Secret Cinema production is the debut of a brand-new format for the company and promises to bring the beloved movie musical from Paramount Pictures to life like never before. The newly announced cast joins previously announced Pink Ladies and T Bird, Stephanie Costi as Sandy, Liam Buckland as Kenickie and Lucy Penrose as Rizzo. Liam Morris leads the T Birds as Danny, alongside Andilé Mabhena as Putsie, Darragh Rochford as Doody and Myles Thomas as Sonny. Donning Pink Ladies jackets alongside Sandy and Lucy are Toni Pais as Marty, Brooke Ramsay as Jan and Gerardine Sacdalan as Frenchie, who all appear alongside schoolmates Imogen Kingsley-Smith as Patty Simcox and Jacob Stebbings as Eugene Felsnic. Photo: Liam Morris as Danny/Stephanie Costi as Sandy/Lucy Penrose as Rizzo/Liam Buckland as Kenickie At a launch event for Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical last month, Immersive Rumours caught up with the previously announced cast members ahead of them starting rehearsals for the show. Stephanie Costi, who's playing Sandy, reflected on the significance of the role: "Sandy is such an iconic role to step into and has always been a dream role of mine. She goes on such a huge journey in the show, and it’ll be incredible to recreate that." Liam Buckland, who is playing Kenickie, shared the same enthusiasm for their role in the experience: "Kenickie has been a dream role for me ever since I was a kid. I think it’ll be really nice to explore different sides of him and see what our takes on these characters will be." For Lucy Penrose, who played Rizzo in Secret Cinema's 2023 production of Grease in Birmingham, it's a return to a role that she loved playing previously. "It was one of my favourite jobs I've ever worked on. I think the Secret Cinema fans are the best. They are so engaged, and they give so much, so I’m very excited to see everybody in the world again." The cast of Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical in rehearsals Photos: Secret Cinema Also confirmed for Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical, Colleen Daley as Principal McGee, Julie Cloke as her secretary, Blanche and Rhys Owen as Coach Calhoun. David Fearn will appear as Teen Angel/Choir Master, and Waylon Jacobs will play television teen-dance show host, Vince Fontaine. The company is completed by the ensemble cast, which is made up of Morgan Baulch, Dylan Blake-Colbet, Ziki Buswell, Erin Corfield, Leah Dane, Bella Donald, CJ Driver, David Heal, Reece Kerridge, Sunny Lee, Kelly Mbarga, Rose Mary O’Reilly and Aaron Shales. Each performance of Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical will be a two-and-a-half-hour spectacular which blurs the line between screen and reality, and for the very first time, the entire film is brought to life all around the audience with actors and immersive elements seamlessly blending with the on-screen action. Render of Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical Image: Dale Croft With a 30-strong cast and live band bring to life all of the songs from the film’s hit soundtrack including ‘You’re The One That I Want’, ‘Beauty School Dropout’, ‘Greased Lightnin’, ‘Look At Me I’m Sandra Dee’, ‘Summer Nights’, and ‘We Go Together,’ Secret Cinema's production fuses the film and its iconic moments with a modern live action experience. Secret Cinema's return to London with Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical sees the introduction of a new ticketing structure. General Admission (Free Roam) tickets start at £49, offering general access. VIP Seated (Roam and Return) tickets will, for the first time, allow attendees to join the world of Rydell High with the option to return to designated seating throughout the event and start at £79. Premium Immersive (Join the Cast) tickets begin at £149 and offer a new level of interaction, with ticket holders learning choreographed routines in advance of the performance, before joining the company during the experience. This 2025 production marks the first of three consecutive summer events from Secret Cinema, at Evolution London, their most central London venue to date. Future productions based on other iconic titles for 2026 & 2027 will be announced later in the year. Renders of Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical Images: Dale Croft Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical will run from 1st August to 7th September 2025 at Evolution London in Battersea Park. For more info and to get tickets, visit greasetheimmersivemoviemusical.com

Punchdrunk have today announced their latest production, which is set to open at their Woolwich headquarters in May 2024. Titled 'Viola's Room' - this new show is described as “an intimate, sensory, labyrinthine journey guided by light and sound”. With no white masks, and no live cast, audience members of up to six people at a time will be guided barefoot through a maze-like set while wearing headphones, guided by an unseen narrator. It's based on The Moon-Slave, a short gothic mystery first written in 1901 by Barry Pain. The Moon-Slave follows a discontented Princess who sells her soul to the moon in exchange for music while at the centre of an overgrown maze in the middle of the night. Punchdrunk have previously adapted The Moon-Slave, but it was staged for an audience of just four people back in November 2000. Punchdrunk's The Burnt City - which ran in Woolwich, London. This latest version of the show has been written by Booker Prize shortlisted author Daisy Johnson (Everything Under) along Punchdrunk's artistic director Felix Barrett - who conceived, directed and designed the show, with co-direction from associate director Hector Harkness (One Night, Long Ago; The Third Day). Lighting design comes from Simon Wilkinson (Bedknobs and Broomsticks), and sound design Gareth Fry (The Encounter). Felix Barrett had this to say about the new show... When The Burnt City closed, our laboratory opened, and Woolwich became Punchdrunk’s home to experiment, play and develop – allowing us to prototype long held dreams and new ideas. Our ambition over the coming years is to open our doors as never before, offering audiences a chance to experience the evolution of these ideas from limited runs to larger-scale works. It’s with great excitement that we prepare to welcome audiences to the first project in a new era of Punchdrunk shows, Viola’s Room – an uncharted landscape – a moonlit fever dream. Viola's Room will begin previews on 14th May, and will run until 18th August in Woolwich Works. Tickets are on sale from 20th March via punchdrunk.com, priced at £28.50 per person.

Photo: The Legend of the Titanic: The Immersive Experience This summer, The Legend of the Titanic: The Immersive Exhibition will open at London’s Dock X, Canada Water, on 25th July 2025, offering a rare, all-encompassing journey into the story of the world’s most iconic ship. Following highly successful openings in Madrid and Munich, Madrid Artes Digitales, the team behind Tutankhamun: The Immersive Exhibition, and FKP Scorpio Entertainment bring this groundbreaking exhibition and timeless story to London. With breathtaking projections, interactive installations, and detailed recreations, this 120-minute experience will offer visitors the chance to step back in time to 1912 and experience the building of the ship at Belfast’s Harland & Wolff shipyard, then journey across the Atlantic whilst exploring the ship’s grand cabins and elegant corridors in a multi-sensory experience that captures the grandeur and enduring legacy of Britain’s most famous ocean liner. Photo: The Legend of the Titanic: The Immersive Experience Upon arrival at the Dock X venue, visitors will enter Dockside Boarding, a state-of-the-art Augmented Reality reconstruction of Southampton Harbour, receive their boarding passes and gather for a virtual greeting from Captain Smith himself (available in 5 languages), who acts as a guide throughout the exhibition. As visitors walk along the pier, the sounds of seagulls and steam engines fill the room, setting the tone as guests prepare to board the iconic ship. This initial Augmented Reality experience offers a deeper dive into the untold stories behind the voyage and selected artefacts, bringing history to life through dynamic and interactive storytelling. As the exhibition progresses, visitors will walk through the humble third-class corridors before entering the main hall, where information panels provide essential historical social context curated by exhibition experts and historians. From there, guests step into a first-class lounge, which highlights the opulence and extravagance that made first-class travel aboard the Titanic such an unparalleled experience. On display are a fantastic selection of original artefacts (including china, silverware and personal items as well as props from the Titanic movie) alongside replicas of costumes and much more. Following that, visitors enter the iceberg projection mapping room, which brings the towering mass of ice to life and showcases the chilling iceberg that changed history. Next, guests will arrive at one of the exhibition’s standout features: the breathtaking Virtual Reality (VR) Room “Until the Orchestra fell silent!”, where visitors will experience a special tribute to Titanic’s famous orchestra. In an emotionally charged sequence, guests will be immersed in a newly composed piece by René Merkelbach, inspired by "Nearer, My God, to Thee," believed to have been the final song played aboard the ship. Through VR, this intimate moment reimagines the classical pieces once heard aboard the Titanic in a powerful, moving performance. Photo: The Legend of the Titanic: The Immersive Experience Thereafter, visitors will enter a huge immersive showroom with 360° floor-to-ceiling projections that will submerge them in the depths of the Titanic. Using state-of-the-art technology, the projections and deeply emotional storytelling provide an unprecedented perspective on the ship’s journey, from its construction and voyage to its tragic sinking on the night of 14th-15th April 1912. The 360° projections, featuring stunning visual quality and emotional narration, focus particularly on bringing the story of the Callaghan family to life - a fictional father and daughter who were passengers on board. As guests leave the immersive showroom, they will come across information panels with meticulously prepared background information about the ship, its passengers, the myths, legends and details on survivors and deceased, all of which are written by the exhibition curators and historians to provide the educational part of the experience. Photo: The Legend of the Titanic: The Immersive Experience Taking the experience even further, the exhibition introduces an interactive Metaverse journey developed with VR Coaster, which incorporates interactive elements and 5D sensory experiences, such as simulated smells and a realistic reconstruction of the different classes and areas of the ship. Visitors will dive into the depths of the ocean to discover the Titanic in its current state on the ocean floor, until, as if on a journey through time, the ship comes to life and allows the visitor to visit all of its rooms one by one. Every deck, cabin, and lounge is open for exploration, offering guests the chance to interact with life on board across all three classes. Designed for all ages, families can enjoy a child-friendly activity room where kids can draw their own Titanic illustrations at a creative station and play an interactive puzzle quiz based on the events leading to the ship’s fate. Completed drawings are digitally projected onto a large screen, becoming part of the exhibition. Visitors can also use advanced AI and facial recognition technology to transform into 1912-era passengers, virtually dressed in historically accurate attire for a memorable, personal connection to the experience. Photos: The Legend of the Titanic: The Immersive Experience The Legend of the Titanic: The Immersive Exhibition will open at Dock X in Canada Water from 25th July 2025. Tickets are priced from £24.00 for adults and £16.00 for children. For more information, and to book tickets, visit feverup.com

The final performance of The Burnt City - the large-scale immersive production depicting the fall of Troy, has been confirmed to be Sunday 24th September 2023 by Punchdrunk. The show originally opened in March 2022, and has had over 200,000 visitors since opening. It was the first large-scale Punchdrunk show to be staged in London since 2013's The Drowned Man. Felix Barrett, the Creative Director on Punchdrunk said: Creating The Burnt City in the midst of a pandemic was one of the most incredible feats our team has achieved. We couldn’t be prouder of this show and everyone who brought our world of gods and mortals to life. The Burnt City has propelled us forward, and we want to keep that momentum, making the most of our new home in Woolwich. It’s the first time we have had a long-term space to call our own, so these extraordinary buildings are the perfect place to showcase our ideas quickly without needing to wait years for the right venue to come along. We’re fairly sure that The Burnt City will be the last new mask show the company makes, and what comes next will be different and unlike anything we have done before. We cannot wait to unleash these new ideas, and in the meantime, we hope that everyone will make the most of our precious last months of The Burnt City! Tickets are on sale now for all dates, including the final performance, at punchdrunk.com

Immersive theatre company Punchdrunk have today confirmed the date of their final 'party' event prior to the closure of The Burnt City in Woolwich on the 24th September 2023. The Last Rite, the last 'Divine Rites' party, will act as a final send-off to the groundbreaking immersive production. Taking place on Sunday 17th September, The Last Rite has been billed as including pop-up performances by the cast and extended performing family, guest DJs, and a return of The Walk of Terror - the house band from Punchdrunk's 2013 show The Drowned Man, who will be performing in Peep, the speakeasy bar within the set of The Burnt City. Punchdrunk released the following, confirming The Last Rite... All good things must come to a glorious end. But with all endings come new beginnings. Join us for one night only as we party into eternity as the city burns around us. Dance amongst the shades and celebrate all that was and all that will be with pop-up performances, DJs, bars and debauchery. Send The Burnt City once more into oblivion and set your souls on fire. See you at the end of the world. Opening in March 2022, the production has sold over 200,000 tickets. By the time it closes, the show will be the longest-running mask show that the company has presented in London. Over 600 people have worked on the show, making it the largest project in Punchdrunk’s history. The epic retelling of the end of the Trojan War, set between the neon-drenched backstreets of downtown Troy and the menacing but opulent shadow of Greece, is played out across two vast warehouse buildings. Part of the old Woolwich Arsenal, these buildings provide Punchdrunk with its first permanent home in London. Punchdrunk is keen to keep pushing the boundaries of the company’s craft and make use of the unique space the buildings provide in different ways. News of future projects will follow later this year. Tickets are available via www.theburntcity.com/tickets

Punchdrunk have today confirmed plans for a series of masterclasses and workshops themed around the companies approach to creating site-specific experiences, as well as intimate walking tours of The Burnt City's set for those eager to revisit the venue after its closure in September 2023. These experiences will be open to anyone who wants a deeper insight into the process and approach our creative team takes to unlock the possibilities of a space, create intricate design, build different environments with lighting and sound, and translate source texts into a language of physical performance. For those eager to visit and learn more about the world of Troy, our extensive set tours with knowledgeable guides are also available. You could be an artist looking to develop your own practice or are just eager to explore the world we created within The Burnt City. Details of the tours, masterclasses and workshops are below, as well as booking links: The Burnt City Set Tour Explore the world of Troy with these intimate walking tours. Our knowledgeable guides will lead you through the space, including 1:1 spaces, and reveal stories behind how this unique world was brought to life. Here you can ask questions about the building process and, if you wish, share your own experiences of The Burnt City. When: Various dates & times, 27 Nov-15 Dec. (90 minutes) Where: Punchdrunk Labs Tickets: £45, local residents £25 (includes a post tour beverage). Access patron tickets include a complimentary companion ticket. Book here. Who: Ages 11+ (under 16s accompanied by an adult). Anyone with an interest in The Burnt City, Punchdrunk, Greek mythology or immersive world-building. Performance Workshop Delve into the work and performance practice of Punchdrunk, the ‘world’s leading immersive theatre company’ (GQ Magazine). Join a member of The Burnt City’s company as they explore the unique process for performers, developed by Felix Barrett and Maxine Doyle, which has inspired and crafted Punchdrunk’s immersive work. Learn how to create genre-defying experiences through the blending of classical texts, contemporary dance and physical performance. When: Thursday 14 December, 10am-4pm (6 hours, including breaks) Where: Punchdrunk Labs Tickets: £150, local residents £85. Book here. Who: Ages 16+ with an interest in performance. No experience necessary. Design Workshop Step behind the scenes in this interactive design workshop where we demonstrate how we bring this multi-sensory world to life. Led by a member of The Burnt City’s design team, you’ll experience the evolution process involved in prop-making through building your own keepsake, inspired by the world of The Burnt City. When: Wednesday 6 December, 10am-1pm or 2-5pm (three hours) Where: Punchdrunk Labs Tickets: £75, local residents £45. Book here. Who: Ages 16+ with an interest in immersive design and prop-making. No experience necessary. Production Management Workshop Learn how to transform abandoned spaces into the fantastic worlds Punchdrunk plunges its audience into. This Production Management workshop provides you with insight into the Production department’s role in building an immersive, site-specific experience at Punchdrunk. Through dynamic activities and exercises on the set of The Burnt City, our team will give you the tools to think and problem solve creatively, as well as give an overview of how to deliver a project that breaks the mould of theatrical experience. When: Wednesday 29 November, 10am-1pm (three hours) Where: Punchdrunk Labs Tickets: £75, local residents £45. Book here. Who: Ages 16+ with an interest in production management, lighting and sound. No experience necessary. Immersive Storytelling Masterclass with Felix Barrett An Immersive Storytelling Masterclass with Felix Barrett MBE. Punchdrunk is the spark that ignited the immersive genre, introducing mainstream audiences to this now hugely successful form. In this masterclass, the company’s BAFTA-nominated founder, Felix Barrett, offers an introduction into the techniques behind his creative process. From learning how to analyse a text, translating it into the physical space and breaking from traditional models of storytelling, this is an opportunity to understand the foundations to creating immersive shows – giving you the tools to push the boundaries in your own creative work. When: Tuesday 28 November, 10am-2pm (four hours) Where: Punchdrunk Labs Tickets: £350, local residents £195. Book here. Who: Creatives and mid-career professionals who wish to apply the insight gained through this masterclass to their own professional career. Immersive World-Building Masterclass with Stephen Dobbie An Immersive World-Building Masterclass with Stephen Dobbie. The Burnt City’s Sound Designer Stephen Dobbie shares his creative process, and explores the highly collaborative role sound plays within building the world and evoking feeling in Punchdrunk’s work. In this masterclass, you will learn to appreciate the particular details and textures of sound design, and how it is used as a mode of storytelling through a unique exploration of The Burnt City. This is an opportunity to both deepen your understanding of collaborative process and sound design, and unlock how the key tool of listening can elevate your own creative practice. When: Friday 8 December, 10am-2pm (four hours) Where: Punchdrunk Labs Tickets: £350, £195 for local residents. Book here. Who: Creatives and mid-career professionals who wish to apply the insight gained through this masterclass to their own professional career.

Image: Secret Cinema Ahead of Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical opening at Battersea’s Evolution, London on 1st August 2025, double Tony Award-nominated choreographer Jennifer Weber has been in the UK workshopping the all-important movement of the show, blending iconic steps with hip-hop and a fresh flair for Secret Cinema’s newest production, which is presented in partnership with TodayTix. Jennifer received both ‘Best Choreography’ Tony Award nominations in the 2022-2023 Broadway season for her work on & Juliet and KPOP, both of which opened within a week of each other. With Jennifer's roots in hip-hop, the choreography for Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical blends the iconic with the contemporary. Each performance of Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical will be a two-and-a-half-hour spectacular which blurs the line between screen and reality, and for the very first time, the entire film is brought to life all around you with actors and immersive elements seamlessly blending with the on-screen action. Step into the ultimate director’s cut and live at the very heart of Grease as screens play the fan-favourite film whilst a 30-strong cast and live band bring to life all of the songs from the film’s hit soundtrack including ‘You’re The One That I Want’, ‘Beauty School Dropout’, ‘Greased Lightnin’, ‘Look At Me I’m Sandra Dee’, ‘Summer Nights’, and ‘We Go Together,’ fusing the film and its iconic moments with a modern live-action experience. From the moment you enter Rydell High, you are invited to join all the action – follow your favourite characters, cheer on the T-Birds, share secrets with the Pink Ladies, learn to hand jive, join choir practice, get a taste of 1950s American diner-inspired delights and visit the fun fair as dazzling live performances and sensational dance numbers enthrall ahead of the sensational collective finale. The production will also feature iconic locations from Grease, including Frosty’s Palace, The Beauty School, The Carnival, The Gym, The Autoshop and La Cafury Beauty School. Image: Secret Cinema Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical is being produced by a multi-award-winning creative team with both West End and Broadway credits, including Matthew Costain (Director); Tom Rogers (Set Designer); Jennifer Weber (Choreographer); Howard Hudson (Lighting Designer); Gareth Fry (Sound Designer) and Ian William Galloway (Video Designer). The 2025 production marks the first of three consecutive summer events from Secret Cinema, at Evolution London, their most central London venue to date. Future productions based on other iconic titles for 2026 & 2027 will be announced later in the year. Secret Cinema last staged an immersive version of Grease in Summer 2023 at Birmingham NEC with Grease: The Live Experience. You can read our review of that show below. Grease: The Immersive Movie Musical will run from 1st August to 7th September 2025 at Evolution London in Battersea Park. For more info and to get tickets, visit greasetheimmersivemoviemusical.com

Ahead of Pure Expression's site-specific staging of 1984 returning to Hackney Town Hall next month, Immersive Rumours sat down with director Jack Reardon to discuss his plans for the show and how this iteration of the show drastically differs from the 2023 version. Immersive Rumours: Hi Jack. Thanks for speaking with us today. Do you mind telling us a bit about your history of directing and how that led you to becoming involved in 1984: A Unique Theatre Experience? Jack Reardon: So I'm originally from a very small town in Ireland called Clonmel in Tipperary. I trained and did a Master's at The Lir Academy, and then spent the next eight years there in Dublin. I was really fortunate with the companies I got to work with and had an amazing experience immediately working at scale. One of my first jobs was on Let the Right One In, which John Tiffany originally directed. It was the West End production that came over to Dublin, which immediately showed me what theatre was capable of doing. I feel very fortunate for that because I think particularly young artists come into the industry, and they have to go through the fringe scene. Great credit to it, but I was very lucky to get to work in those big houses and see what working at scale looked like. I tried to bring that experience into my own work, and while I still did fringe theatre in tandem with it, I found a cohort of people in Ireland with whom I got to create work at scale over a couple of different summers at home in Tipperary. What started out as all of us having maybe €3,000 to pay a bit to people, with Mam cooking for us for a few weeks in the summer led to us getting one of the biggest awards in Ireland, which is called the Open Call award. That resulted in a cast of 100 people where we were outside doing site-specific, huge spectacle theatre. That then brought me to London about 2 and a half years ago. I've been very lucky and fortunate here with the people I've gotten to meet and the advice I've been given. I think London is incredible at saying 'Come in, have a cup of tea, have a chat, and we'll point you in the right direction' which brought me to 1984. It was the Young Vic who suggested me to Maddie [Wilson, Producer] and Adam [Taub, Executive Producer] to touch base with because of a conversation I had with them where I talked about my experience. I think that's what's amazing about this city, people are afraid of it, and rightfully so sometimes, but when London's good to you, it's very good. IR: You’ve had experience devising immersive/site specific work before with Overlook - a show that was set to explore military life inside a former army barracks. Can you tell us a bit about the experience of working on that show and how ultimately the COVID-19 pandemic cut it short? JR: Overlook still breaks my heart today... we were due to create this immersive show with the Irish Defence Forces. We were a week away from going to the barracks in Kilkenny to train with the Defence Forces for a few days, then we got an email that said 'Hi everybody. We're a little bit nervous about this virus thing, so we're going to delay by a week.' Fast forward a couple of months; the world's locked down and the show was pulled. So much of the pre-production that went into that was incredible for both the work I'm doing in 1984 and indeed a lot of other shows I've done. The term site-specific is great, but I became more interested in the idea of site-responsive. How do you go into a space and allow it to be comparative to production, rather than just going in and slapping any old show up and onto it? You have to let that space tell its own story. So I think for 1984, when audiences step into that world, just the architecture alone of Hackney Town Hall, you walk in those doors and everyone goes, 'Oh, OK, yeah' and you feel it. That's design that you couldn't buy; you couldn't design it. The aura of that space is tangible. When I did Overlook, that in part became From Out the Land with a lot of the research that we did over the next few years, which was also in the barracks but now outside, end-on theatre. The biggest thing was, how does the ground literally speak to the production, and how does it feed into it? How does it make an audience exist much more lively and freely in that world? IR: Hackney Town Hall would be an impressive venue for any show, but for something like 1984 it feels like a perfect fit for the Ministry of Truth with its striking architecture and period feel. How much of the decision making of what's going on in the show is in response to the venue, and how much is trying to get the venue to fit around the show? JR: There's always a bit of a give-and-take. I think where Hackney Town Hall gives, it gives limitlessly. The upstairs council chamber room, for example, every time we brought creatives into it, everyone has just gone, 'Well, we're just leaving this alone. You don't need to do anything to it'. Its regalness, authority, and purpose are so tangible. Ruth [Badila], our incredible designer, said 'We would spend a fortune and come nowhere close to designing this.' It's a gift to a designer and to a production. On the flip side of that, when you're downstairs in the atrium, our production still has to tell a story. How do we make this space into an observation centre that can be inside, outside, in a secret bedroom? How can it also be a torture room? How can it be Room 101? Hackney Town Hall atrium is a beautiful space. Thankfully, it's not a torture chamber. So how do you use it when it gives, and then how do you be creative with making that work? Thankfully, the incredible design team that are on board with this show, I'm so fortunate that we got them all to join us. The ideas that we have, the innovation - I don't think I've seen it personally in an immersive setting before. There are a whole lot of tricks and twists from a design perspective to make that building into what we need it to be. It's a show that's definitely for all the senses; it's going to spark some interesting responses. IR: This iteration of 1984 Immersive has been reworked from the 2023 version of the show. Can you tell us a bit about how it’s different and how those changes came about? JR: Full respect to the previous iterations of Adam's script, but I think there was almost too much respect given to what a perceived production of 1984 might be and might look like. Maybe it was too faithful to the novel. When I came on board, the thing that I was most interested in was, Why now? Why do 1984 today? I think my production of 1984 is a production for today's audience. It speaks to us now as much as it does honour Orwell's 1940s novel. I think the biggest change among many other things is that it's a completely different production. It's not blue boiler suits. It's not strictly coming in and just watching a couple of scenes play out. It's much more intricate in bringing design into it and bringing audiences on this journey where I think, frighteningly, we can see ourselves in it, or at least we can see our countries and governments in it. I think people will be able to find a lot of touchstones to this production that feel much more now than it did previously. We could have just done what happened last year, but I think credit goes to Adam and Maddie, who wanted to evolve because they know what it can be. It will feel very different from previous iterations, but hopefully in a much more exciting way. It's a show that's definitely for all the senses; it's going to spark some interesting responses. At all times in our production, even when characters believe they have found a nest of solitude and a private corner, they are constantly being filmed and broadcast to the audience. IR: What aspects of Orwell's original novel were you most excited to explore when you first came on board? JR: I think that one of the biggest aspects that really appealed to me was making an audience feel complicit and how easy it is to be complicit in these things. You look on social media or regular media and find yourself going, 'What am I doing to fix that?' I think 1984 is great at showing a society in which you can't do anything. Your literal thoughts are policed to prevent you from acting out. I think so often we see so much happening in our world, but we find it hard to get involved. Don't get me wrong, people are doing incredible things the world over in contrast to that, but I think it's petrifying to see how these regimes get into power. In our world today, the rise of the far right is quite scary. 1984, as a novel and as a play says, yes, it is, but this is how it happens and this is how they do it. That's really interesting, exciting, and terrifying, but also insightful within our production to see how that happens and maybe how much you play a part in that as an audience member. IR: There's also an increased amount of AV elements being used in your version of the show. Can you tell us more about the impact that'll have on the show? JR: So the big thing for me, both from the original novel and from Adam's script, is this idea of surveillance. The phrase Orwellian has become part of our vernacular, but when you actually think about what that means... right now I'm in this room and there's a CCTV camera in the corner. There's a webcam looking back at me. There are three cameras on my phone. We're constantly surrounded by them. The more and more research I did into current political systems, everything we see is because someone has a camera in your face at all times. I became really interested in this idea of surveillance and live cameras. Alongside Dan Light, our incredible AV designer, we're working out how that comes into it. At all times in our production, even when characters believe they have found a nest of solitude and a private corner, they are constantly being filmed and broadcast to the audience. We've got an incredible statement wall that we're going to use in a very exciting way with our live AV, but it all comes back to that idea of surveillance from the novel, from this script, and from our world today. How do you feel when even your most intimate conversations are being picked up on and broadcast to the world? IR: As we're speaking today you're midway through rehearsals for the show. How has that process been so far? Once you're working alongside the cast, how much of what you had planned changes once everyone is in the same room? JR: Our first two weeks were with our three principal actors, playing Winston, Julia, and O'Brien. They're the major voices in many of the scenes, so we figured out what the play was, and when Adam the writer came to see a run-through of that, I can't remember what his comment was, but he said, 'Maybe think about something else happening at that moment' and I went, 'Oh, Adam, there's another play on top of this play once we bring in the ensemble and cameras and equipment into it'. I think he was very excitedly blown away by the scale of what we were trying to create. This week has been bringing ensemble into that, and in short, a week ago we had this amazing torture scene. Now we have an amazing torture scene with three live cameras and five additional bodies. I'm not giving anything away, but we're doing some interesting things. Everything gets enhanced in these two weeks. In terms of what we plan versus what happens in the room, the greatest thing for me in working with actors is the creativity. Actors are incredible creatures in how they can make something work. If there's a line that's sticking for you, an actor comes in with their own interpretation, and you go, 'That's exactly what it is.' It's been their input into it, both the three principles and our incredible ensemble, of not how we've changed things, but how we've evolved things, we've made it better. To my creative team, I always say, 'Your genius is better than my genius'. I believe that if we share ideas, they will grow and become better, and everyone is there for a reason. Everyone has been incredible in bringing their own ideas, innovation, creativity, and genius into the room to enhance the production further. Immersive 1984: A Unique Theatre Experience runs from 1 October 2024 to 22 December 2024 at Hackney Town Hall. Tickets are priced from £24.50. To find out more and buy tickets, visit immersive1984.com

1984: A Unique Theatre Experience returns to London later this year for a strictly limited 12-week run at Hackney Town Hall. George Orwell’s iconic dystopian novel is being reimagined by director Jack Reardon (Artistic Director of Stagecraft, one of Ireland’s largest and leading youth theatres), with a script adapted from George Orwell’s novel by Adam Taub. The show is being produced by Pure Expression, a site-specific theatre company that reimagines classic stories in unique environments. They've previously worked with institutions such as the Grant Museum of Zoology, the Jewish Museum London and Manchester City Library. 1984: A Unique Theatre Experience last ran at Hackney Town Hall in 2023 between October and December. This updated version of the experience will expand upon the 2023 version of the show, with new AV elements and a new cast. The roles of O'Brien, Julia and Winston were previously played by Jude Akuwudike, Kit Reeve and Declan Rodgers. Adam Taub, the Executive Producer of Pure Expression had this to say about the shows return: This is a new iteration of the show and far more ambitious. We have a brand new cast and creative team that have created a bold new vision for the show. There will be innovative digital mapping, video projection and AV work from creators who have recently worked in the West End, including the Haymarket’s The Picture of Dorian Gray. This production of 1984 is more visceral and more challenging for the audience. Why do we continually return to 1984? Because it has never lost its relevance. Because its warning of a dystopian future is one that we can all too easily imagine today. Jack Reardon, the director of 1984: A Unique Theatre Experience said the following: Open your computer, search the news, scroll through Instagram, post on Twitter - what has the algorithm decided is best for you today? Is it real? Does it matter? Once you believe it to be true, isn't that what counts? It doesn't take much to equate Orwell's 1984 to our own 2024. Whether it's news coverage, the constant awareness of phone, web or surveillance cameras or the increasing volatility of global politics.1984 remains as iconic today as when it was first published, only now we don't have to look far to imagine Orwell's dystopian world. But it's not all doom and gloom. When Adam invited me to be the director for the return, I immediately looked forward to inviting audiences into Hackney Town Hall and into a new world of ‘vigilance, eternal vigilance’. This production aims to give audiences an insight into what surveillance truly means, using the latest techniques in AV technology in an entirely original and innovative way. This is a site-specific, multimedia approach to the text, colliding Orwell’s world with our very own. The creative team that Adam and I have put together want to take the text to extraordinary new dimensions. The show will be lit by Ben Jacobs, winner of the 2022 Offie award for Best Lighting Designer with Salome, with Video and AV from Dan Light, whose video design was lauded in Sarah Snook’s West End performance of The Picture of Dorian Gray. Munotida Chinyanga, sound designer and Ruth Badila, set and props designer, complete the creative team. 1984: A Unique Theatre Experience runs from 1 October 2024 to 22 December 2024 at Hackney Town Hall. Tickets are priced from £24.50. To find out more and buy tickets, visit immersive1984.com