Faust
Punchdrunk
21 Wapping Lane, London
*****

Even as you walk down Wapping Lane in Tobacco Dock towards the venue for Punchdrunk's production, inspired by Goethe's Faust, you sense that an evening of theatre very much out of the ordinary is ahead. Audience members gather uncertainly in the road outside of the imposing iron gates that separate the disused warehouse at number 21 from the outside world, until a security guard opens the gate and ushers them through a corralled area, from which they can view the venue as it looms darkly against the January night sky. Once inside, they are dressed in grotesque white face masks and told to gather in groups, before being transported by industrial lift onto the various floors, released in groups of four. As they stumble out into the dark, the sense of trepidation is almost tangible; no one can be sure what they are about to come across.

As they wander around, through corridors lit only by candles and flanked by statuettes of the Virgin Mary, through eerily lit pine tree forests, cornfields and barns, deserted offices and storerooms, the sense of anticipation builds, and it becomes difficult to hold one's nerve. Suddenly, a woman bursts past them in the corridor, pursued by two men, who proceed to corner her in a locker room, force her into one of the lockers and throw her around, with seemingly scant regard for the whereabouts (or safety) of the onlookers, although one realizes in retrospect that this must be extraordinarily carefully choreographed - mustn't it? On other floors, there is old Faust's laboratory, and various recreations of small-town '50s America, including a cinema playing Touch of Evil, a crepuscular bar where young Faust cries over the photographs he spreads on the table next to his drink, while the barmaid alternates between singing My Funny Valentine at disturbingly slow tempo and swinging from the ceiling. A deep south fire-and-brimstone preacher stalks the corridors denouncing the practices of the commonality, and, in another room, a Walpurgis Night high school dance is in full swing.

The detail of the set is remarkable in itself, given the scale and variety that the production has taken on, and the energy of the performances, part-dance, part-drama, almost knocks the audience back with its force. The audience is given a guide to the original play, but then invited to piece together the action from their own necessarily unique experience of the production, which runs continuously for three hours in two ninety-minute cycles. It is difficult not to succumb to simply wandering around the set absorbing detail serendipitously, but a way of experiencing the narrative more conventionally is to follow individual characters around and see in which set pieces they become involved. Either approach is rewarding. A bar plays authentic fifties rock 'n' roll in the basement to allow the entranced and the bemused to rest their feet and have a restorative drink. This is a production that demands as much from its audience as it gives back and the reciprocal experience is exhilarating.

by Tom Scruton