Smelled like sex but looked like blood …

Part of discovering something new always confounds one’s mind – as to whether one should form any opinion exactly at that moment or wait for the experience to settle down while reeling under it at the same time. That’s what I felt when I came out from the McKittrick Hotel at 530 W, 27th Street, NYC. But then

What’s done cannot be undone

An old dilapidated office building abandoned for ruins was converted into an immersive installation and performance by the group Punchdrunk directed by Felix Barrett and Maxine Doyle. Loosely based on the story of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, SleepNoMore is a tribute to the speakeasy generation with a touch of evil inspired by Shakespearean story telling and characters; each swaying and moving to a surreal David-Lynch-meets-Electronic music foisting the audience into a sexual frenzy.

SleepNoMore allows audience to be anonymous and faceless (literally!) – wearing masks and moving in complete silence; the audience runs, walks leisurely or  follows actors through a maze of more than 100 rooms – each one specially designed to add to the supernatural theme of the whole performance.

Though one can see direct references to Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, King Duncan, Banquo, Malcom, Macduff and Lady Mcduff yet there were other characters and their own stories more refined and developed – each had an arch. Malcom never had too much of limelight in Shakespeare’s play however in SleepNoMore he sings a jazz number about his life – tears trickling down his face with an impish smile, looking at the audience breaking the 4th wall.

There were instances when the characters started touching the audience and made gestures of making love. A few audience members were given letters to deliver and a few were kissed and touched sexually. Well there was a scene where Macbeth falls down as I was following him and he looks at my eyes for a good 10 secs. I should have picked him up – I didn’t! Though I did mess around in other ways. I wrote down a letter to no one which might be lying there for someone’s amusement I guess –

Why do I always end up in situations like this when I am so ALONE

If anyone from the production discovers this – please give me a shout out! I can tell you the background of my story and why I wrote that 🙂

By pricking on my thumbs .. something wicked this way comes

I forgot myself when I followed the naked Macbeth to a room where thye showed the witch invoking apparitions showing Macbeth’s future just before he kills Banquo. The whole room was filled with odors of spice, wine and a confusing but sharp stench – very sexual and mysterious. When a couple of us followed Macbeth into the room, we were ushered to a corner and then the strobe lights started flickering along with the music of Ed Rush – “Reece” – heavy electronic music paced along with fractured visions of Macbeth dancing around with the witches and a naked man with a Goat head, blood on his stomach which Macbeth drinks with frenzy. One ghost carried a bloodied and just-born baby and another one carried a small tree depicting the walled garden.

I can never forget such a combination – strobe light, blood, sex, surreal imagery and sensual stench. I played around with my hand under the strobe light and felt the immediate need to install some in my own house. Everyday will be a surreal experience – replace the Electronic music with Jazz on one day, heavy metal on another or drum & bass on any given Sunday.

Courtesy: New York Times

Actor Nicholas Bruder who played Macbeth moved me in the last scene – for a man who thought he was invincible, for a man who could do whatever he wanted, for a man vain and proud – he showed resignation – resignation to fate and this whole world that came crumbling down – depicted by a confused and insidious smile followed by fear.

There were things that could have been better. Members of the audience could have been less confused and more decisive as to what they wanted to do. Because of their sluggishness I couldn’t run and catch up with Macbeth for a few scenes (as you might have correctly guessed, I followed Macbeth in this visit).

The set design by Felix, Livi Vaughan & Beatrice Minns was mind bending – specially the children room with headless babies, the apothecary room, the rest rooms, the parlour … something suffocating yet thrilling.

Courtesy: Go.com

Dance performances were mostly ballet and jazz. However, there were signs of other modern dance forms which I was not aware of.

Being in a place which resembled Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Eyes Wide Shut’ (yes.. a lot of people will tell you when you get in – but honestly it’s only for those masks and nothing else is remotely close to an orgy), getting blood sprays (paint) on my shirt, locking eyes with actors and following them, seeing actors unfazed by audience staring at their naked bodies, witnessing violent scenes like murder and the one where Macbeth kills the pregnant Lady Macduff and a surreal strobe-light dance to heavy electronic music which was so anachronistically placed in a speak easy set up – it will be insane of me to say I liked it … but yes I loved it …

it smelled like sex but looked like blood and tasted like sweat … that was Sleep No More for me … what will it be for you?