There were little bundles of rock salt, wrapped with sheet music and scripture and tied with red string. Once we got off on the fourth floor, we meticulously opened every drawer and cupboard, every suitcase, rifled through papers and books (always returning things, respectfully, to the state in which we’d found them). Before we even made it to the elevator, I was hooked.
Sleep no more scenes windows#
The ability to touch and explore everything satisfied a long standing desire of mine to be able to go and live in and on theater sets or the beautifully art directed holiday windows of Bergdorf Goodman. The mood was electric, anticipatory, and very, very curious.
Sleep no more scenes full#
We were then led into the plush, red Manderley Bar by Maximillian, the host of the night, and waited impatiently and full of wonder among a handful of other theater and press people. Immediately, we started opening drawers, finding yellowed black and white photos of spooky, dour looking people and hand written letters.
We walked through that dark, flocked-wall hallway into a drawing room with a dresser, a lady’s desk, a couch or two.
That first night at Sleep No More, Kevin and I didn’t know what we were getting into. But after last night, I believe that the brilliance of their business accumen, specifically the ability to make money on this show by packing the place out, is undermining what made it breathtaking in the first place.Īnd now the spoilers. Featured on the CW’s Gossip Girl this week, the description on Hulu says “Attending a performance of Punchdrunk’s provocative theatre experience Sleep No More…” Do you see that? A THEATER COMPANY is getting name checked as if they were a recognizable brand (and I guess, now, they are) in a national network television setting. Last night was my third and final time going to Manderley, and, in many ways, perhaps the most inspiring, but not, as the first and second time, because of what was so right but rather what was so very, very wrong.įirst of all, before I go on with this, please understand that I have absolutely nothing but the utmost admiration for Punchdrunk’s immense undertaking and incredible work, and from a producer’s standpoint, they are straight up geniuses at business and marketing – an unusual quality in an experimental theater company to say the least. I went back almost immediately, and going back the second time by myself I had a completely different experience, saw many, many more rooms and an entirely new story, but even then, things were beginning to change at the McKittrick Hotel, and not necessarily for the better for the audience.
That evening was not one of but THE most extraordinary art experience I had ever had, and I stayed up half the night doing research on the symbols I found scattered around the place and on the show itself (this was before there were programs listing the characters names or the book that they now try to sling at you at the end of the show). The handful of people I knew who had been to the Boston run at ART had said a lot of hushed and reverent but cryptic things about it, so my partner, Kevin, got us tickets to the industry dress rehearsal at the beginning of March. Click after the jump at your own risk.įor those who have been hiding under a rock for the last 8 or 9 months, the biggest sleeper (couldn’t resist) hit in theater right now is the off-Broadway immersive theatrical experience, Sleep No More, presented by constantly boundary pushing and extraordinarily admirable UK company Punchdrunk. WARNING: The following post contains a whole MESS of spoilers, not just of the much talked about “secrets” of the show, but of the grumpy, ruining it for everyone else variety.
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