Theatre Preview - 1984 (Tower Theatre Company)

Big Brother, I love you!

It's for good reason that Tower Theatre's forthcoming production of 1984 will be immersive, the theatrical experience beginning the moment you arrive at the venue... George Orwell's classic dystopian novel is an immersive reading experience in itself. In the entire dystopian genre 1984 is arguably the story that plunges the reader most deeply and to the most unsettling effect into an authoritarian madness of the future. (Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale achieves similar levels of claustrophobia, it and 1984 sharing some serious DNA.)

The entire first third of Orwell's story is dedicated to building the strange and claustrophobic world of its hero Winston Smith. An office drone in the so-called Ministry of Truth, Winston is a weary and ailing product of IngSoc (English Socialism), a post-apocalyptic political movement that has achieved unprecedented levels of power and influence in what used to be Great Britain. 'The Party' is in control, its ostensible leader Big Brother casting an electronic eye over everyone's movements to pick up on the merest hint of dissent.

Winston's home life is surveilled by an intrusive form of television. His workplace is a minefield of potential informers, his social life a dull and bitter joke. Each social interaction is fraught with the peril of accidentally betraying his secret longings to the Thought Police; even his neighbour's malevolent children might rat him out if he fails to conform. Every aspect of his existence - the drab surroundings, the fatuous conversations, the shitty food - is intricately created by Orwell on the page, resulting in a combination of comic mundanity and perpetual low-key dread. And through Winston we gain a sense of the society's oppressive nature as a whole. If he is inwardly screaming for an opportunity to rebel, how many of his 'comrades' are also living lives of sublimated despair? And how much is he putting at risk, when he reaches out to grasp a single thread of hope?

It's a scenario that's screaming itself for an innovative and exciting theatrical treatment, and Tower's new version of Matthew Dunster's stage adaptation promises to deliver. Last year the play's director, Angharad Ormond, brought a psychologically intense production of Diane Samuels' Kindertransport to the same Theatro Technis space that will be hosting 1984. If the former show toyed with text-based experimentation, this new enterprise is a quantum leap into madness - and based on rehearsals to which I've been party, the insanity will be nothing short of thrilling.

The immersive aspect is key. A conventional stage production would offer you the basic story of the novel, any insight into Orwell's broader dystopian world provided only through the characters' exposition. With an immersive approach, however, the audience experiences Winston's society along with him - in the auditorium, the foyer, the theatre entrance... You're not simply here to see a play, you're entering Airstrip One, a principality of Oceania, and The Party is in control. You're listening to Newspeak, tangling with Doublethink and rubbing shoulders (possibly) with members of the Thought Police. Get used to it. Anything that occurs on stage is part of that whole. To paraphrase Geoffrey Rush from Pirates of the Caribbean, better start believing in dystopia - you're in one.

1984 has a hugely talented cast and creative team, one well-equipped to bring the immersive experience to its public. Preparation by the ensemble cast has proved memorably dynamic, and the performances should be no less intense. It's great timing for the production too. Orwell could easily have coined the phrases 'fake news' and 'alternative facts' himself, when writing his most famous political satire, and part of the immersion is into a world of media propaganda and misinformation - somewhere that has no touchstone for reality. The company is preparing to take you to a place where The Party creates your reality, and where your capacity to tell truth from lies is steadily undermined.

Tower Theatre Company's 1984 will run at Theatro Technis, Camden from Wednesday 28th February to Saturday 10th March (for full dates and times click here), and will include two post-performance Q and A sessions, one of them with George Orwell's adopted son Richard Blair. Tickets are available from the Tower Box Office. Freedom is slavery. Big Brother's victory is inevitable. Book now.