By Marc Levy
I made the trek to New York three times to see “Sleep No More,” the modern-dance reimagining of “Macbeth” and Daphne du Maurier’s “Rebecca” that since 2011 (and ending Oct. 16) has filled a literal multistory warehouse with explorable environments from a candy store to a graveyard. You race from room to room, following actors through the dark as best you can, lost in a crowd of fellow masked ghosts watching gore, sex, and witchcraft with a 1930s vibe. It’s utter sensory overload – and I’ve been kicking myself for nearly 15 years that I didn’t go see it when Cambridge’s A.R.T. helped put it on in Brookline’s Old Lincoln School for four months in 2009-2010.
So I wasn’t going to miss the Liars and Believers theater troupe’s production of “Don’t Open This,” an immersive theatrical spectacle commissioned by Arrow Street Arts for its grand opening ArrowFest in Harvard Square. It’s inspired by Punchdrunk, which created “Sleep No More,” said Georgia Lyman, executive producer of Liars and Believers and the producer of ArrowFest – she called it “Punchdrunk lite” – and was put together over about six months to run only three days. Saturday was everyone’s last chance to see it.
It’s not “Sleep No More,” because, for one thing, Arrow Street Arts has only a handful of rooms for the jumble of performance styles that are packed into “Don’t Open This,” and audiences can mainly run only back and forth between a couple. Liars and Believers does a great job of carving out spaces within those two main performance areas, though, if you stipulate that awkward craning, occasional claustrophobia, and apologizing to the people you’re stumbling into or blocking is as much a feature here as for Punchdrunk, which hasn’t figured a better approach in more than a decade and a half. In one corner, Fluteboy (with a trademark symbol, thank you) plays a glorious air while text scrolls on a screen behind him to undermine your belief in your own enjoyment (“You might be coming to the conclusion that classical music is something you only want to like … you uncultured swine”), while behind some shelving, nearly hidden from view, a single guest is introduced to someone’s pet turtle; there are running sword battles; a demon aerialist introduced by a satanic hype man on roller blades; a shadow play with puppets; a little girl dancing with a larger-than-life woodland monster; and throughout, comic bits by Minion-like bots in hazmat suits who roam the show’s cardboard built environment to encourage the audience in interactive play. What happens if you take some of their paper, fold a crane and hand it to them? Do it and find out. What happens if you get in their way? You might wind up being put to work – take this box and this box and this box and this box and put them over there.
Does it work? Not entirely. The box metaphor that is intended to hold the show together is paper-thin rather than cardboard-thick (though the clever cardboard constructions as you enter are nearly worth the price of admission) and can lead to some puzzling conversations later: The bots and the rogues work together to defeat the mother box because … why? Wait, didn’t we summon Satan – what happened to Satan? As a result of a fast development that seems impossible to test thoroughly with audiences before a three-day limited run, there is too much confusion about where audiences go and when, and dead time between escapades results. Having a single aerialist act also stands out as haphazard: Is that all there is? The elements of the show seem like a jumble of beloved items thrown into a box because you don’t want to lose them in a move; but when the box is opened and each is taken out in turn, they’re as puzzling as they are delightful. Hmm. Why did we pack this one again? Does this actually fit with the rest of my stuff?
But when it’s so much fun to get a package (and even to pop the bubble wrap), it’s hard to complain about ordering it in the first place. “Don’t Open This” is a terrific showcase of the abilities of Liars and Believers and the magic they can deliver, and therefore of the capacity of Arrow Street Arts (and by extension any performance space) to captivate and activate the imagination and excitement of theater. If not totally coherent as a concept, “Don’t Open This” works as a survey of what one might see and experience in the place it’s celebrating, from swashbuckling pirates to a moment of riveting connection with a cellist who looks at each audience member in turn.
There is a final trick that “Don’t Open This” pulls off: paying homage not just to Punchdrunk and its version of immersive theater but to Oberon, the theater that preceded Arrow Street Arts at its address. At the end of this Liars and Believers showcase, a theater piece turns into a dance party, exactly as Oberon’s “The Donkey Show” did weekly from September 2009 to December 2021.“Don’t Open This” has concluded its run, but ArrowFest runs through Sept. 15 at Arrow Street Arts, 2 Arrow St., Harvard Square, Cambridge. For more information on Liars & Believers, go to: https://www.liarsandbelievers.com/
