MOUNTAINEERING

Salisbury Playhouse

MOUNTAINEERING was billed as immersive theatre and certainly it was one of the strangest experiences I have been involved in.

Set to the backdrop of a radio show, you spend the entire performance contemplating the life decisions that you make in the company of complete strangers.

Indeed it wasn’t long before I was asked to reveal my own secret to a complete stranger in the row in front of me.

It was certainly an awkward moment being asked to share an intimate moment from my life on a notepad.

Beforehand, it was billed as a performance where your choices affect the way the show unfolds. Yet those choices were few and far between, apart from a moment where the audience were asked to decide on their favourite packet of crisps.

Despite this it was truly thought-provoking and the audience were forced to contemplate their own life decisions.

It was definitely something that many in the Salisbury audience would not have experienced before.

But I felt this show could go far further and utilise the multi-channel headphones to a much better effect.

Maybe it would be too complex but I would have loved to have seen three shows interwoven together, making full use of the innovative head-sets.

Mountaineering is worth watching and an imaginative show commissioned jointly by the Playhouse yet the potential is there to take it to another level.