A new immersive VR theatre experience is coming to Brighton Dome. Presented by leading site-responsive practitioners dreamthinkspeak and Access All Areas, a company of learning disabled and autistic artists, it fuses mixed reality with live acting.
unReal City explores what personal connection means in a world that is becoming increasingly digital. In a 40-minute performance, an audience of two people at a time are given Oculus headsets and take their avatar characters on a journey to a fictional city.
Guided through a series of scenes in their virtual world, including a block of apartments, cinema and cafe, the guests can meet and interact with other residents and each other. At key moments, audiences will come back into the real world to find themselves re-located in an unexpected twist of circumstances.
unReal City is a work-in-progress production, bringing together two of the UK’s most innovative performing arts companies. Brighton based dreamthinkspeak are renowned for bringing interactive performances to a range of buildings and locations, including disused shops and factories, while Access All Areas are leading the way in supporting the artistic development of learning-disabled creatives and performers to champion their inclusion in the sector. Their immersive events create intimate moments of interaction between performers and audiences in public spaces.
“As an associate artistic company of Brighton Dome, we’re thrilled to be bringing unReal City to this iconic venue,” said dreamthinkspeak’s Artistic Director, Tristan Sharps. “And to be collaborating with Access All Areas and their incredible performers. As we stand on the verge of a new Metaverse, we wanted to ask vital questions about how we relate to each other in our increasingly virtual world and how digital connectivity is radically changing our sense of reality. Now that the current pandemic has continued to drive us towards online platforms to communicate from the comfort of our own home, these questions feel more urgent and relevant than ever.”
“We are thrilled to bring unReal City back after we all moved to a life online halfway through the first run,“ said Nick Llewellyn from Access All Areas. “The eight Access All Areas artists have each created their own unique response to the themes around creating safe and truly inclusive virtual communities in which to meet new friends. We can’t wait to bring it to Brighton and invite new audiences to experience the show.
Following its premiere at Battersea Arts Centre in 2020 and its run at Brighton Dome, both companies will continue the project further as they test out new uses for the technology developed with Brighton-based technology designers Piotr Nierobisz of Munchingsquare and Andy Baker of Ixxy, with sound design by Gareth Fry.
unReal City comes to Brighton Dome Founders Room on Fri 21 Jan – Sat 5 Feb 2022, with performances running throughout the day and evening.
images by Stephen Allright
