The Music of Curtain’d Sleep

Music has always played a central role in Entita productions and choosing a musician is often one of the first decisions we make when starting to plan a new project. I’d go so far as to say I now personally struggle to think creatively about a new production until we have the music in place! Since our very first play Fall to the Top in 2012 we have matched the music of a single artist or band to a production and carefully weaved their songs into a soundtrack that becomes an integral part of the piece.

Day 1 of R&D – “The undiscovered country”

Up until this point Curtain’d Sleep has only ever existed in ‘Safehouse 1’ in Peckham, as part of Basic Space Festival. Taking the piece out of a derelict Victorian house and converting it for a black box studio is the biggest creative challenge Entita has faced to date. Not only has this opened up huge design questions (which will be the subject of another post soon!) but the conversion will affect the whole tone of the show. Very few immersive shows have been reworked into more traditional studio performances, so to paraphrase Hamlet we are indeed stepping into “undiscovered country”.

The Origins of Curtain’d Sleep

When Curtain’d Sleep first came to life in late 2015 it marked a significant departure from our previous work. The project was to be the first time we’d step outside the relative safety of a theatre space by mounting an immersive / site-specific production – a challenge both exhilarating and nerve-wracking in equal measure.

Curtain’d Sleep started as a simple question – why does Shakespeare’s Ophelia die offstage?