Following the success of Complicite’s The Encounter online in 2016 where 67,500 watched the show online in one week, the recording will be available online again from Friday 19 May at 7pm for one week in May 2017 on Complicite’s website and YouTube channel and on BBC Arts.
The Encounter online will be free to watch and will be available until 25 May 2017 across the globe. Audiences will need to wear headphones to experience the show’s binaural sound design (3D audio). Any headphones will work, but playing the film out of speakers will not give the same effect.
In 1969, National Geographic photographer Loren McIntyre became lost in a remote part of the Brazilian rainforest while searching for the Mayoruna people. His encounter was to test his perception of the world, bringing the limits of human consciousness into startling focus.
Threading scenes of his own life with details of McIntyre’s journey, Simon McBurney incorporates objects and sound effects into this solo performance to evoke the depths of the Amazon rainforest. His storytelling is served by the enveloping presence of binaural technology. The show’s ground-breaking sound design by multi Olivier Award Winner, Gareth Fry (Harry Potter and Cursed Child), is transmitted to the audience through provided headphones and plugs into the power of the imagination, questioning our perceptions of time and our own consciousness.
The production premiered at Edinburgh International Festival in 2015 and has since toured Australia, Europe (including a four week run at the Barbican, London) and the USA (including a Broadway transfer to the John Golden Theatre, New York).
Here’s what Benedict Cumberbatch thought of the production:
For more on The Encounter and how we were able to bring it to new audiences online read The Encounter- a case study in live streaming theatre
