Punchdrunk announces new London home amid plans for largest live show yet
Hattie Fisk
Monday, September 6, 2021
The world's leading immersive theatre company, Punchdrunk, has unveiled plans to establish a permanent home in Woolwich Works, London, where it will launch its new production, The Burnt City, in March next year.
Julian Abrams
The Burnt City will be the companies first London work since The Drowned Man (2014), and will be based on the fall of Troy. The piece has been described as the company's largest live show to date.
The new space, which will be more than 100,000 square foot, will be where the production is created. Staged in 60 to 70 different rooms, The Burnt City will be performed in two separate buildings to separate Troy and Greece. 34 performers will take part in the production, and 600 people will be able to take part in each performance. The audience will be masked in a ‘Covid-friendly’ way says co-director and choreographer Maxine Doyle.
She continues: ‘Once the show is up and open we want to open the doors in the day and invite a range of community groups and artists to make work in response to our work’.
Artistic director Felix Barrett, who is co-directing and designing the production, said: ‘We are doing a show, but we are also building a theatre. To be doing all those simultaneously is crazy.
This show is a long time in the making, we have wanted to do it for many years, but needed the right space. The source material is so rich and resonates today - it holds a mirror to our society.’
Punchdrunk will be transitioning from Tottenham, where their company operated from their building in Fallow Cross – a space that was used for rehearsal but not for public productions. The news space in Woolwich Works promises to do both.
The Burnt City runs from March 22, with an official opening on April 21, and is booking until August 28, 2022.
