A few weeks ago, hanging out late with friends and discussing the impending closure of one of the most interesting art works I’ve ever seen, we purchased tickets to see Sleep No More one last time. I went when it opened in 2011 and loved it; the event involves wandering around a hotel in plain white masks watching performers in various scenes referencing Shakespeare’s Scottish Play, MacBeth. Each floor of the six story hotel is a maze of installations that periodically come to life as performance venues while the ghostly audience follows the actors, at times sprinting up and down stairs, to discover the aftermath of the preceding scene. Sometimes I raced along with the paparazzi, and other times I let the crowds vanish and explored the infinite curiosities alone. During one of these solo sojourns, I stepped into a space suddenly filled with life and, as I stood in the doorway, peering in to discern what piece of narrative clue I might discover, one of the actors offered me his hand, then unlocked a door and pulled me into a small room, took off my mask(!), blacked out the lights, made some squishy sounds then reappeared with faint light and a small white object, pulled out a syringe and doused it with a green liquid, then offered it to me, grinning. It was an unsettling moment, and had it occurred in a non-art setting, I would have been absolutely terrified, but I was very entertained and convinced myself that a long-running production would not be killing its audience and therefore this could not in any way be dangerous. So I ate it. He laughed maniacally as I assessed it’s gummy texture and sweet taste. Yum. Then he gave me back my mask, took my hand as we left the room and raced up the stairs where he pushed me into the middle of a strobing techno rave and ritualistic orgy with MacBeth and the Three Witches. Passing through bars, bedrooms, apothecaries, taxidermists, sweet shops, offices, forests and indescribable haunted spaces, the performers move gracefully, intersecting occasionally, and draw the audience into their engagements, eventually culminating in a Last Supper congregation where MacBeth confesses his crimes and is hanged, swinging above the audience in dark conclusion.
The experience is absolutely unique and unforgettable. It is good art! The show will be missed but has left it’s indelible mark (my fingers are still stained from the green gummy) on Theater.