When theater becomes more real than life itself

This is the way all theater should be. Immersive. Participatory. Spatial. Deadly. The audience wears masks, the actors don’t. Together you inhabit the world of the stage. An abandoned hotel in NYC’s Chelsea, transformed into an otherworldly labyrinth: a psychiatric ward, a forest, a cabaret, a graveyard, endless rooms. You move through the dark space, looking for clues, actors appear from nowhere embroiled in psychological and physical warfare. Few words if any are ever spoken. It’s like a dream, and its not clear who the dreamer is. Eventually you end up at a macabre last supper where the guests are drenched in red light and blood. They move in slow motion, they tie a noose around the neck of one of the guests, the music swells, the victim stands on a chair, the chair is kicked out from under him, the lights go dark, the body goes limp, swinging back and forth, the masked viewers, you, silently return to the world, where a raucous party is taking place back in the cabaret, laughter, glasses tinkling, a singer croons, the band plays… catharsis.