Audiences are encouraged to rifle through drawers, open cabinets, and fully immerse themselves in the reality of the show-and to follow the performers, who act out themes and scenes from the play in balletic, intensely physical style. It’s a site-specific interpretation of Macbeth (with some Hitchcock Rebecca thrown in for good measure) that fills every nook and cranny of the hotel’s six stories with evocative, intricately detailed sets-a mental ward, a cemetery, a ’30s-style hotel, that fateful banquet hall. Sleep No More, a production of the Emursive and Punchdrunk theater companies, is a dramatic experience unlike any other in the city. The McKittrick is a beautiful, haunting space and it’s perfect for the project that’s reopened it, 72 years later. Completed in 1939 and designed to be the most luxurious hotel in New York, it was condemned and shuttered two days after the beginning of World War II. Tucked deep into an unremarkable block on West 27th Street sits the McKittrick Hotel. Sleep No More is definitely one play not to miss.A SCENE FROM SLEEP NO MORE (THOSE IN MASKS ARE THE AUDIENCE MEMBERS). The entire play becomes part of your own sensorial experience and you are an actor in it, it changes the typical theater experience completely. This level of intimacy with the actors improves the experience as a whole since it really creates an organic connection between spectator and performer. As explained above the actors may reach for you to touch them, talk to you, grab you, and in one scene even dress them. This is really fascinating because it creates an experience that wont be repeated twice, one can go back on another time and be sure to see different scenes and different momentum.Īnother part about this play that makes it so entertaining to see is how interactive it is. The scenes are for you to encounter on your own, and depends on where you are at a specific time. So many different feelings by the scent, sounds or lack thereof, and objects present in each room that you can feel anything from happiness and comfort to scare and depression. The scenery is spooky, creepy, dark, oaky, grimy. The play is intended to recreate Macbeth, by Shakespeare, but definitely draws influence from so many contemporary and 20 th century artists and filmmakers. Through every floor you will also encounter the actors, doing a scene in random spaces and you are just a couple of feet away, can follow them through their scene, and sometimes can even interact with them. All floors are open for one to explore, search through, read and look for things, which makes the experience super interactive and inclusive. As an attendee, you are usually separated from your group in order for you to experience the play on your own. However, this is not your regular hotel, there are cemeteries, insane asylums, orphanages, doctor and chemical offices, in addition to, what seems to be the only typical part of a hotel, the lobby and hotel bar and café. The space is a 5-story warehouse that has been designed to represent a hotel of the early 20 th century, the McKittrick Hotel, as it is called in the play. In the neighborhood of Chelsea, in what seems to be an abandoned warehouse space, lays the site-specific stage for this play that takes you traveling back to the early 20 th century. I had the opportunity of attending the play “Sleep No More”, a recent addition to works of theater in New York City.
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