25 Immersive Creators and Companies to Watch in NYC
From dance-theatre LARPs to site-specific dinner parties to interactive story rooms
Into immersive theatre in NYC? Perhaps you’ve been to Sleep No More a dozen times and compared notes with fellow obsessives. You might even try to “game” which track you get when attending Then She Fell for the nth time.
But there’s a reason why our own Zay Amsbury once called New York City “the gateway for immersive work emerging on the North America scene.” In addition to these two cornerstone, long-running productions by Punchdrunk and Third Rail Projects, there are a whole host of other interactive, immersive, and site-specific storytellers working in the New York City metropolitan area. Even a brief scan of this (admittedly non-comprehensive) list shows off both the breadth and depth of the work being made here.
So, with that said, here are 25 immersive creators and companies that you should be familiar with (presented in alphabetical order):
1. Broken Ghost Immersives: Helmed by Ian McNeely and Austen Anderson, this experimental immersive company produces live, theatrical events inspired by games. What does this mean in practice? Well, anything from a campy “convention for super villains” complete with secret missions and tons of backstabbing (The Rogues’ Gallery) to a “choose-your-adventure” memorial service inspired by R.L. Stine and David Lynch (The Wake).
The company is currently running the genre-hopping experience The Bunker: a live adventure game set in a post-apocalyptic world, combining live action role play with tabletop gaming and immersive theatre, with hundreds of potential endings.
Read our review of The Bunker. You can find The Bunker at Wildrence on the Lower East Side through September 16.
2. The Brouhaha Theatre Project: Founded by Nick Auer and Max Pendergast in 2015, Brouhaha loves making theatre that is “bizarre, rowdy, and provocative.” (And you can often find Auer working behind the scenes at any given Third Rail Projects show.)
Previously, their work Tunnel Odyssey (2016) combined disparate sources such as The Odyssey and The Oregon Trail; participants wandered through a public park and stumbled upon scenes original folk music and site-specific dance. The company is also working on a series of immersive dinners pairing local farm ingredients with live performance.
Their current show, Heydays, is an immersive coming-of-age story; 16 audience members stroll the grounds of Prospect Park and enter a dream-like world about a group of insular teens and the moments that shaped their lives. The production includes live music, food and drink, and intimate encounters with the characters as they attempt to re-live their high school memories. (Heydays continues through August 19 but is currently sold out.)
3. Rosie DeSantis/Letters in the Dirt: Rosie DeSantis is a a playwright, actress, and poet, and recent graduate of the Experimental Theatre Wing at NYU.
Her interactive play, Letters in the Dirt, took audiences through the memories of the late Aiyana Mo’Nay Stanley-Jones, a 7-year old girl shot and killed in 2010 during a botched police raid in Detroit. Attendees found themselves in a mysterious purgatory, greeted by a chorus of black children; the audience is then invited to play a “game” and given objects to help Aiyana understand where she currently is.
Originally staged at The Tank and Silent Barn in 2017, this participatory production was remounted at The Brick in 2018; DeSantis was also recently nominated for two New York Innovative Theatre awards for her work on the show.
4. Dysfunctional Theatre Company: For the past few summers, this Off-Off-Broadway theatre company has occupied House 8B on Governors Island, filling it with visual art, poetry, song, dance, and much more. Each year, the company typically includes at least one immersive theatre piece, if not more, with different shows happening every week throughout the summer.
This year, their Governors Island programming included a sandbox immersive performance of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, an immersive adaptation of the Pandora’s box myth (This is Not a Torture or an Engine), and a family-friendly murder mystery set in the Prohibition era. And these performances are all free to attend! You can find Dysfunctional Theatre Company on Governors Island through the end of September.
Read our interview with Artistic Director Amy Overman.
5. Educational Mobile Immersive Theatre (EMIT): EMIT was founded by Gianna Cioffi, Amy Frey, Jo’Lisa Jones, and Amanda Urban from a desire to apply immersive theatre in the educational space.
EMIT “brings immersive accessible Shakespeare and interactive educational experiences to learners of all kinds,” with the argument that students are better able to connect with the source material when they can experience it in an immersive way. The company’s work is adaptable to different kinds of spaces and is available for school field trips as well as in-school performances; EMIT also has a strong emphasis on creating ADA accessible, sensory-friendly environments.
Next up, they’re presenting an interactive experience in late October as a way to raise funds. But this won’t be just any fundraiser — it’s going to be a 1980s prom-themed escape room, with live performers, called Time Of Your Life. What happens when the Prom Queen turns against the student body? You’ll just have to attend to find out.
6. Exquisite Corpse Company: ECC is a Brooklyn-based, integrated arts company of filmmakers, actors, playwrights, sculptors, dancers, and musicians founded in 2012.
Previously, Exquisite Corpse Company has presented immersive productions like A Ribbon About a Bomb (2017), a surreal immersive production around the lives of Frida Kahlo, Remedios Varo, and Leonora Carrington, as well as The Enchanted Realm of Rene Magritte (2016), both set in abandoned mansions on Governors Island. Their productions often blend immersive theatre with installation art.
Currently, the company is presenting This Is A Distraction, a series of new works about identity and the effects of the 24-hour news cycle. This Is A Distraction consists of four thematically connected, site-responsive plays, all set in a non-traditional space complete with a visual art gallery; audience members are free to peruse the gallery before performances. The series runs through August 26th at The Parlor in Manhattan.
7. Exquisite Muse: You might know her best as The Queen in the now-closed immersive theatre production Queen of the Night, for which she created and choreographed her role. Or perhaps you’ve spotted her performing at the Illuminati Ball or at an immersive party at the House of Yes in Brooklyn.
But dancer-actor Katherine Crockett also has her own immersive events company, Exquisite Muse. Keep your eyes peeled for news on her upcoming Warholian Dream: an immersive dinner and party.
Expect this interactive, Pop Art, 1980s-inspired event to take place later this year at an artist’s loft (to coincide with the Warhol retrospective at the Whitney Museum of American Art — natch). And make sure to bring your best Warhol, Basquiat, or Haring to the shindig.
8. Group .BR: Group .BR is NYC’s only Brazilian theatre company and aims to present Brazilian culture through the performing arts; the company also produces its plays in Portuguese with English subtitles. Their immersive theatre piece Inside the Wild Heart is being remounted later this year.
Inside the Wild Heart is a non-linear, sandbox production around the works of Clarice Lispector, Brazil’s most acclaimed female writer, who is best known for her stream-of-consciousness writing style. The show explores themes such as freedom, faith, violence, time, love, maternity, innocence, and solitude. Audiences will have the chance to freely explore intricate installations have intimate encounters with the performers inside the world of Lispector’s life and works.
Previously, the company staged Infinite While it Lasts (Infinito Enquanto Dure) (2013 and 2014), a site-specific play inspired by the life and works of Bossa Nova composer Vinicius de Moraes, set in a bar.
Inside the Wild Heart returns October 18.
9. Andrew Hoepfner: Hoepfer may be best known for his creation Houseworld (2015), a surreal dream-world where participants could wander the rooms of a multi-floor home and dance with a fairy, go on a secret quest, philosophize with a bathtub guru, or simply hang out with a a stoned roommate named Charlie.
Or you might also know Hoepfner from his collaboration with Melinda Lauw: Whisperlodge, an intimate autonomous sensory meridian response (ASMR) spa which continues to delight audiences across the USA and has been featured in the New York Times, the Atlantic, and more. (And as a bonus: Whisperlodge has returned to NYC for a brief run August 11–19).
Hoepfner is finishing up a new piece called Bottom of the Ocean, in which guests will journey through a ceremony of invented rituals leading to the unknowable mystery. The show is currently being performed and developed in secret. Hoepfner hopes to mount its first public run in fall 2018 or winter 2019.
Listen to Andrew discuss Houseworld or Whisperlodge (with co-creator Melinda Lauw) on the NoPro podcast. Read our Q&A with Hoepfner and Lauw about Whisperlodge or our review of Houseworld.
10. Alyssa Kim: You might know her from her work on Kerrigan & Lowdermilk’s immersive musical The Bad Years or the zombie-thriller Bedlam. Kim has also worked with Jeff Wirth at the Interactive Playlab and is currently the Director of Interactive & Experience Design at Journey Lab.
Kim is currently developing a new, intriguing multi-part immersive project. Welcome to the world of The Institution, a sci-fi dystopian society where people with special psychic abilities have been imprisoned. What abilities are we talking about here? “The power to control the movement of another human through manipulation of neurons,” says Kim.
Our first peek into this new project will be with chronicles: Chapter 1, taking over Dixon Place for one night on August 14th; those in attendance might even find themselves incorporated directly into the story as characters.
11. Linked Dance Theatre: Run by Co-Artistic Directors Kendra Slack and Jordan Chlapecka, this dance-theatre company combines text with live music and movement to create original works. They’ve staged their productions in locations ranging from an old 1930s steamboat to deep within Central Park to the crowded sidewalks of Manhattan’s East Village.
Most recently, they were the artists in residence at West Park Church on the Upper West Side, where they staged Beloved/Departed, their take on the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice myth. Previously, they remounted their production of Like Real People Do last year, which took audiences on a walking tour through one couple’s failing relationship via Tompkins Square Park, Washington Square Park, and Christopher Street Pier.
The company is currently revisiting some past works for the potential of a remount, while “reading more Oscar Wilde, and hosting some Midnight Dinners to incubate all of these ideas.”
Read the NoPro reviews of Like Real People Do and Beloved/Departed. Listen to our interview with Linked Dance Theatre on the NoPro podcast or read more about their approach to creating immersive work.
12. Live In Theater: This interactive theatre company has been taking its murder mysteries to the streets of Manhattan since 2009. Audiences may find themselves conscripted into 1970s-era NYPD as rookie detectives solving the case of a murdered NYC politico’s daughter, or potentially acting as members of the defense, prosecution, and jury in the trial of Mary Mallon (better known as Thyphoid Mary) in 1915. All of their live experiences include an outdoor component and happen rain or shine.
Plus, the company’s creative director and founder Carlo D’Amore was part of The Interactive Deep Dive in Austin this past year, creating an experience where Verge journalist Bryan Bishop found himself living in an alternate timeline over the course of four days during SXSW. (You can read more about this ground-breaking work in The SimuLife Diaries.)
Live in Theater’s newest work, This is When We Rest, mixes interactive theater with roleplaying; the experience puts participants into a scenario where an asteroid is about the annihilate the Earth. This is When We Rest is currently in the playtest phase.
13. LubDub Theatre Company: LubDub is a hybrid physical theatre company animating stories of science, magic, and myth. The company features multiple Queen of the Night original cast members and alumni of Georgetown University, and is lead by Caitlin Cassidy and Geoff Kanick.
Their expansion of their interactive show The Doubtful Guest in 2017 at the Public Hotel included text, movement, sleight-of-hand magic, and audience interaction — not just with performers, but with each other. The production drew upon American spiritualism, the performers’ personal histories, and the question “What does it mean to be a host?” Plus: a lot of snacks.
Catch LubDub next on September 7 as part of the variety show 44 Charlton, hosted by Julian Fleisher.
Read the NoPro review of The Doubtful Guest and listen to our interview with LubDub Theatre Company on the NoPro podcast.
14. No Peeking Theatre: No Peeking Theatre was created by Amanda Levie in 2012 to create a new format of theatre without one crucial element: sight.
Audiences are blindfolded at all of No Peeking Theatre’s shows and asked to rely on their other senses during the show: smell, sound, touch, taste, and more. This approach allows for the same experience to be offered to the sighted, blind, low-sighted, and disabled. Part of their mission is also create a platform for underrepresented populations to have their inspirational and important stories told. And the company also prioritizes presenting its work in wheelchair, walker, and cane accessible buildings, and being as environmentally-friendly as possible.
Their most recent work INDIGENOUS explored the stories and lived experiences of Native Americans in an intimate, sensory environment and aimed to confront ugly truths about who and what “America” really is. Expect much more to come from No Peeking Theatre as their new season includes their first children’s show and their first original full length comedy, as well as the return of their historical horror piece Mother Leeds (2017).
15. PopUP Theatrics: PopUP Theatrics is a partnership between Ana Margineanu, Tamilla Woodard and Peca Stefan to create immersive and site-specific, impactful theatrical events. (You might also be familiar with Woodard’s directorial work via 3/Fifths and Miami Hotel Stories.)
Earlier this year, they brought their work #TheNewOldHome to Berlin. In this work — a cross between puzzle, audio drama, and interactive installation — participants encountered a 78-year-old Romanian woman who has recently moved from her village to a small town. However, no one believes that she can see parallel versions of herself inside her TV set, except for her granddaughter.
Their newest work, Orietta Crispino’s Let Me Cook For You, is presented in partnership with TheaterLab; the work is an intimate, site-specific one woman show set in a real-life kitchen and was workshopped this past March to test audiences. It’s being described as “a collage of inherited myths and apocryphal histories, melding the intoxicating act of storytelling with the ritual of preparing food.” Look for its return very soon.
16. Ava Lee Scott: Have you ever had your fortune read at the McKittrick Hotel? Chances are that you’ve run into Ava Lee Scott, an actress and artistic director working in film, theater, television and virtual reality, who played a character at Sleep No More for several years. Scott is also the Founder and Artistic Director of Actors Theater of NYC and is the creator of immersive plays such as Tennessee on Hudson (2017) and Serenade (2014–2015).
Scott is currently creating an ambitious multi-platform project called ANNABELLEE, inspired both by Tarot and Edgar Allan Poe. Audience members will be able to experience ANNABELLEE through a variety of ways: an immersive theatre piece, an interactive website, an app for VR/AR experiences, and live experiences through socialVR platform, AltspaceVR. One of the VR components to ANNABELLEE will premiere at the North Bend Film Festival in late August.
Stay tuned for more announcements around ANNABELLEE’s immersive theatre component.
17. Show:UP!: Lead by Culinary Director Chef Shellie Porter and Creative Directors Nickolas Vaughan & William Bryant Miles, Show:UP! creates immersive, interactive, often hilarious dinner parties in real homes.
Their current season of shows, City of Dreams, is a transmedia soap opera spanning Instagram, live performance, and more. Attendees might interact with the characters of Carlos, Derrick, Rebecca, Oni, or Troy on social media or even find themselves conscripted to help run the dinner party. And experiences are limited to 12 attendees, keeping participants in the middle of the action.
Read the NoPro review of City of Dreams: Episode 2 and our Q&A with Creative Director Nickolas Vaughan.
18. Silver Dream Projects: Silver Dream Projects was founded in 2017 by Andrew Wehnke. The collective currently is comprised of over 20 Purchase College students. Inspired by Andy Warhol’s Factory and the Pop Art movement, their ongoing Dream Factory project aims to be a two-year, multi-platform experience culminating in April 2019 with a large-scale immersive event.
Currently, interested Dream Factory participants can follow the various “Superstars” on Instagram, speak to them on the phone, decipher clues in coded emails, and attend live events. Most recently, the company has run a show-within-a-show experience Femme Fatale at Dixon Place, as well as an ARG/scavenger hunt experience in Union Square, Find Whips.
19. Sinking Ship Creations: Sinking Ship Creations is a New York City immersive theatre studio run by Ryan Hart and Jason Knox specializing in live-action roleplay (LARP) events — both original works and those of independent and emerging larpwrights, with an emphasis on works by women, People of Color, and the LGBTQIA community.
Most recently, the company ran an immersive cyperpunk LARP, Project Ascension, which placed players in a dystopian New York City 15 minutes into the future, one filled with hackers, grifters, con artists, and more. Participants and performers were spread out all over the city, from seedy hotels to public parks to dollar slice joints, over the course of 14 hours. Read NoPro contributor Leah Ableson’s review of this experience.
For their next project, Sinking Ship Creations presents The Mortality Machine, which combines live-action roleplay and site-specific dance; theater-goers will be full-on participants as they explore a modern day myth of the afterlife.
Expect to hear more about this LARP meets dance-theatre experience soon, which is expected to debut in January 2019.
20. Suku Dance Lab: Suku Dance Lab is a Brooklyn based dance-theater company founded by Talia Moreta and Belinda Adam.
Their most recent work, Ama de Casa, was an exploration of both motherhood and Latinx tradition, which also doubled as a house party. Audiences entered into the world of an older Catholic Latina woman: the matriarch of the family who came to the United States as a single mother. Attendees ate, drank, danced, cried, and shared stories together with the Mother of the House.
Next up they have Anima, a solo immersive dance-theatre piece that explores and challenges the ideas of femininity, which will have its premiere in Brooklyn in November.
21. This Is Not a Theatre Company: This Is Not A Theatre Company was founded in 2013 by director Erin B. Mee and playwright Jessie Bear.
This company has performed at dinner parties, in pools, at restaurants, in homes, and more; they have even created site-specific, sensory podplays for the Staten Island Ferry (Ferry Play) and three MTA subway lines (Subway Plays).
Their latest work, Cafe Play, returns to the Cornelia Street Cafe in September. Audiences will enjoy a three-course dinner during the show (included in the ticket price) to fully immersive themselves in the world of the café as the action unfolds all around them.
Read the NoPro review of Cafe Play and listen to an interview with Erin Mee on the NoPro podcast. (NoPro readers can save on the first five performances of Cafe Play this fall with the code NOPROCAFE and attend a special talkback session with the creators after the September 30, 8pm performance.)
22. Cynthia von Buhler and Speakeasy Dollhouse: Artist, director, and author von Buhler burst onto the immersive scene in 2011 with a story about the mysterious death of her grandfather in Speakeasy Dollhouse: The Bloody Beginning. Participants entered an enchanting world filled with Prohibition-era bootlegging, mobsters, infidelity, and the murder of Frank Spano, shot and killed on a New York City street in 1935. The Bloody Beginning was an Off-Broadway immersive success which ran for five years.
von Buhler followed this show up with two more productions — The Brothers Booth (2014) and Zeigfeld Midnight Frolic (2015) — before beginning her lavish Illuminati Ball parties in 2016. This currently-running excursion outside the city is held seasonally at an secret lakefront estate and is inspired by the Surrealist Ball hosted by the Baron and Baroness de Rothschild in 1972.
This fall, von Buhler returns to Manhattan, with The Girl Who Handcuffed Houdini, which follows private investigator Minky Woodcock as she investigates Houdini’s untimely death, complete with magic and authentic recreations of spiritualist demonstrations. The show is based upon the graphic novel of the same name, written and illustrated by von Buhler.
The Girl Who Handcuffed Houdini opens October 5.
23. Lance Weiler: An alumni of the Sundance Screenwriters Lab, Weiler has been the Director of the Columbia Digital Storytelling Lab since 2013, mixing story, play, design, and code in innovative ways.
Most recently he and his team showcased Frankenstein AI: a monster made of many, an immersive work-in-progress adaption of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival.
His new work, Where There’s Smoke, is currently in development, and mixes elements of escape rooms, true crime, podcasts, and immersive theatre.
In his words, “In 1983 my van burst into flames on a family vacation. Eleven months later my house would burn to the ground. As I explore my past I find mysterious connections to these blazes and come face to face with a closet full of skeletons.” In Where There’s Smoke, Weiler intends for audiences to collaboratively discover narrative snippets (in the form of short films, audio interviews, photo slideshows, etc.) about Weiler’s family by interacting with physical objects in a built set resembling a burned home.
24. WITNESS: WITNESS is a new immersive production company created by multiple folks who first cut their teeth working at Sleep No More.
Their sold-out show The Visitation ran last November at the historic Wyckoff House, the oldest building in the city of New York. Audiences were free to roam the grounds as they witnessed the tale of a farming family whose daugther claimed to be possessed by witches, and the two priests tasked with learning the truth. The Visitation returned to the Wyckoff House for an encore run from in March 2018.
The company plans to mount a new immersive production later this year.
Read our Q&A with Artistic Director Michael Bontatibus as well as our review of The Visitation.
25. Woodshed Collective: Woodshed Collective is one of the country’s premiere immersive theatre companies.
From Twelve Ophelias (set in a giant empty pool) to The Confidence Man (set on an old lighthouse tender ) to Empire Travel Agency (a “grail-quest” for four people which took participants deep into secret socieites, art galleries, moving vehicles, dark alleyways, secret auctions, and hidden parks), the critically-acclaimed Woodshed Collective has consistently pushed the boundaries of immersive and site-integrated work since 2006.
In 2017, their sold out immersive musical about Korean pop music won them new fans across the board, including musical luminaries like Lin-Manuel Miranda, as well as a whole slew of awards (9 Lortel Nominations including Best Musical, 2018 Winner of the Richard Rodgers Award). Look for KPOP, a coproduction of Woodshed Collective, Ars Nova, and Ma-Yi Theater Company, to return to Off-Broadway in 2019. We can’t wait.
Read our thoughts on KPOP and listen to an interview with Artistic Director Teddy Bergman on the NoPro podcast.
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Thanks to Edward Mylechreest, Leah Ableson, and Steve Boyle for their contributions.
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