Immersive worlds

Abstract

The theatre designer Alex Eales talks to Benjamin Fowler about his ten-year collaboration with the director Katie Mitchell. They address the very detailed fourth-wall naturalism of productions including Cleansed (National Theatre, 2016) and Happy Days (Deutsches Schauspielhaus Hamburg, 2015) and Mitchell's interest in sealed, immersive scenographic worlds. Eales unpacks the role of textual analysis in the design process, showing that what may appear to be bold conceptual departures remain rooted in and responsive to the text. He then explores continuities between the naturalistic productions and the Live Cinema work. Eales traces the evolution of this form from the early experimentalism of Waves (National Theatre, 2006) through the subsequent Live Cinema work he has designed in Germany, including Wunschkonzert (Schauspiel Köln, 2008), Fräulein Julie (Schaubühne Berlin, 2010) and Reise durch die Nacht (Schauspiel Köln, 2012). The conversation then considers how this work has evolved to give shape to an individual consciousness or point of view, before investigating how these experiments have in turn influenced the more conventionally naturalistic productions. Throughout, Eales offers insights regarding the ways in which Mitchell's highly collaborative work is conceived and executed.