Sleep No More

This winter, a British theater group changed american theater forever. If you were on the east coast you probably heard of the collaborative production of Sleep No More between the American Repertory Theater and Punchdrunk. The performance showcased the first modern attempt to introduce the American audience to immersive theater, and the show hit its mark. The power of Punchdrunk comes not from lofty Avant-garde theory designed to challenge us in vague abstractions, but from its remarkable ability to translate the underlying emotion or charge of a work into a visceral gut feeling.
The worlds created by Punchdrunk rely heavily on atmospheric elements to create that childhood sense of excitement, apprehensiveness, and wonder. The worlds resemble a dreamscape, where objects, actors and installations both are and are not at the same time. This recreation is supported by an elaborate and elegant technical backbone infrastructure. What makes many of Punchdrunk's technical challenges unique is their location. Sleep No More was performed in a converted 4 story schoolhouse in Brookline, MA lacking many of the amenities lighting and sound designers are used to, such as rigging, cabling, or large-load power distribution mechanisms. It is for these exact reasons that Punchdrunk represents the cutting edge of technical theater and a revolution within the performance industry.