Punchdrunk

Punchdrunk is an immersive theatre company set up in 2000 by Felix Barret. When studying theatre at Exeter University he found himself unsatisfied with conventional venues and fell in love with site-specific theatre. This is what prompted him to essentially reinvent theatre into a brand new experience. Punchdrunk performances usually last around three hours and audiences are lead into a large repurpose building/ area (e.g. a warehouse). The special part about Punchdrunk is that no audience have the same experience, people are free to move around as they please watching anuy character that peaks their interest. You are not even limited to watching characters, you can spend hours exploring the immense depth of the set finding small easter eggs referencing the text that the performance is based on. If you are lucky you can be included in the action.

Key Features:

• Audience are masked - The audience sometimes masked to cover their faces from other audience members, this can help immerse yourself in the piece as you aren't focused on others in the audience
• Easter eggs within the set - These are small parts f the set that might be a reference to the text that the piece is based on, for example a famous quote and or object. 
• All five senses being utilised - Felix Barret wanted to bring theatre to life and so as an audience member most of your senses will be active at all times. For example there is almost always music and if there isn't it is purposeful. 
• Immersive - In a Punchdrunk performance the audience must be engaged in the theatre or it isn't Punchdrunk. They must feel as though they are there in the world of the character experiencing everything with the actors. 
• Site-specific - Punchdrunk often uses unexpected locations, such as deserted buildings, to create their theatrical worlds.
• Theatre Promenade - Audiences are free to explore and interact with the theatrical world as they please.
• Blends classic texts - Punchdrunk productions often incorporate classic texts into their storytelling.
• Epic storytelling - Punchdrunk is known for their epic storytelling and often they repeat the play once or twice in the same run through to allow the audience to actually experience the world fully. 
• Physical performance - Productions will often include physical theatre or some sorts. 
• Intricate set design - Punchdrunk sets are extremely complicated and detailed. For example in one of the performances an actor wrote a whole diary on their character which was filled with easter eggs. 

Punchdrunk is mainly performed in three types: masked, radical promenade and enrichment:

The original mask form was born out of early experiments at university and has since gone on to reach audiences worldwide. The name Punchdrunk represents the company's ongoing ambition to make their audiences feel 'punch drunk'. This state represents feeling alive, alert, emotionally and viscerally impacted; all your senses firing and tapping into the core human instinct of fight or flight. How this is achieved continues to be explored through Punchdrunk's evolving practice. To date the company has created 60 projects in disused buildings, theatre spaces, across cities, in schools, care homes, museums, theatres, involving immersive technology and other mediums. 

'Mask show' is a shorthand for the large scale productions where the audience experience a world constructed within a vast building, through a looping narrative. As the name suggests each audience memeber wears a mask. This approach was first piloted in Felix Barrett's original. Some of the masked plays include:

'Sleep No More (London 2003, Boston 2009, New York 2011 - present, Shanghai 2016 - present) - Sleep No More tells Shakespeare's Macbeth through the shadowy genre of film noir. This was the first large scale mask show that combined Felix Barrett's direction, Maxine Doyle's choreography and Stephen Dobbie's sound design. The show has since been remounted in Boston, New York and Shanghai adapting and developing for each location.'

'Faust (London 2006) Faust was an adaptation of Johann Wolfgang von Gothe's Faust reimagined in small town America. It was presented in a disused warehouse in Wapping, East London. The design approach expanded to fit the vast scale of the building, and the relationship between building, dance and audience immersion developed to create a strong aesthetic. Support for box office and publicity came from the National Theatre and helped secure the company's reputation in the wider theatre-going consciousness.'

'The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable (London 2013) Inspired by Woyzeck by Georg Buchner, The Drowned Man: A Hollywood Fable was set within the demise of a 1960s film studio; Temple Studios. The Day of the Locust by Nathanael West and the films of David Lynch were important influences on the show, which cinematically explored the merging of fantasy and reality, of fakery, duality and manipulation. The production was staged in a disused sorting office in Paddington and was supported by the National Theatre.'

Radical promenade represents a reinvention of the more traditional promenade theatre where audiences are led around a space or spaces moving from scene to scene. In Punchdrunk's approach the audience are cast in a role and become an active character in the journey. Generally speaking they move through a space accompanied by characters who interact directly with them. Although the work is heavily scripted and crafted, the audience have a feeling of agency and are often crucial in helping the characters to complete their story or mission. In this sense, they are cast in a role, and given a job to do, without them the performance cannot take place. This differs from the convention of a mask show, where audience and performers share the space, but the audience is invisible to the performers. 

An example of a radical promenade piece is: 'Against Captain's Orders (2015) Created in association with the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, this adventure for children and their families reimagined the museum's stores as a magical, archaic labyrinth full of precious items from maritime history. When audiences decided to touch an object on display, a security lock down led them to make an illicit journey into the museum stores where they recovered lost objects and ultimately saved all of maritime history. The production was staged in the museum's special exhibition gallery.'  

Punchdrunk's enrichment work takes the company's innovative practice into communities and schools, creating performances with and for children, young people and participants. Integral to the creation of these projects is the same commitment to exemplary design and performance that defines Punchdrunk's largescale productions for adult audiences. The creation of Under the Eiderdown in 2009 marked a key milestone in Punchdrunk's development and inspired a new way of making work.

'The Lost Lending Library (2013 - present) Punchdrunk's flagship primary school project is a magical travelling library which appears in a school as if by magic. The project aims to raise standards in literacy, speaking and listening. Every pupil in the primary school is invited into the intricately detailed library to meet the librarian, Peabody, where they discover an empty shelf waiting for more stories. The children are given temporary library cards and tasked with writing enough stories so they can become permanent members.' 

Abrams, J. (n.d.). A Guide for Students and Teachers. [online] Available at: https://www.mulberryacademyshoreditch.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Punchdrunk-Teacher-Resource-Pack-v7.pdf.

Hoggard, L. (2013). Felix Barrett: the visionary who reinvented theatre | Observer profile. The Guardian. [online] 13 Jul. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/theobserver/2013/jul/14/felix-barrett-punchdrunk-theatre-stage.