St Ann's Warehouse, New York. Director: John Tiffany. National Theatre of Scotland.
Frantic Assembly, Lyric Hammersmith. Directors: Scott Graham & Stephen Hoggett.
Royal Court Downstairs. Directed by Vicki Featherstone.
Royal Shakespeare Theatre, RSC, Stratford. Directed by Polly Findlay.
V&A exhibition at the Prague Quadrennial.
★★★★ Time Out ow.ly/QP8Py "jaw-droppingly sophisticated sound design"
"What you hear has the intimacy of someone whispering in your ears, as if snuggled up beside you. But, more than that, thanks to an array of sonic gadgetry ... the effect is fully immersive – so that you hear sounds from all sides, conjured with disconcerting pinpoint precision."
"we too are taken into a synapse-altering space, floating free of modernity's plastic trappings. Does that sound like a far-fetched claim? Honestly, with this head-turning, spellbinding show, hearing is believing."
★★★★★ The Independent ow.ly/QMvzV "A must-see - or perhaps I should say, a must-hear."
★★★★★ Financial Times ow.ly/QMvHG "a rich and intricate soundscape ... this one-man show bursts with colour and life, a seamless blend of technology and storytelling."
★★★★★ The Scotsman ow.ly/QMvLH "a complex, beautifully-balanced and almost infinitely inventive stream of live and recorded sound, delivered to the audience on headphones,"
★★★★★ The Herald ow.ly/QMvX5 "sound designer Gareth Fry ... [has] integrated a dazzling technical display into McBurney's journey ... in an astonishing theatrical feat where discovery is all."
★★★★★ Variety ow.ly/QMw6S "Gareth Fry's design piles up layers of sounds — recorded interviews, foley effects, a soundscape of McBurney's home study. The effect is a soundcloud of a process, in which fact and fiction, past and present, research and production intermingle, spinning a story out of the air."
★★★★★ The Stage ow.ly/QMwgg " the performance is transferred from the stage deep into the heads of the audience (literally, or so it feels). ... his whispers move around the inside of your head: the way stories are heard at night by a child on the way to sleep, ... Advanced technology and storytelling are married to take a great yarn deep into its roots"
★★★★★ WhatsOnStage ow.ly/QMxlA "This extraordinary show is a sonic blast and a half ... Sometimes you catch yourself turning around in your seat, so convincing is the wrap-around aural babble of voices, insects, crackling fire, rushing rivers."
★★★★★ The British Theatre Guide ow.ly/QMwpy "McBurney and his hidden cohorts create some amazing visual and more particularly audio effects ... sounds that initially emanate from his actions begin to reverberate and take on lives of their own."
★★★★★ Edinburgh Guide ow.ly/QMwPj "a vividly evocative soundscape with its myriad of voices and music revolving in our mind."
★★★★ The Guardian ow.ly/QMwvJ " In a solo performance made with many people ... he pulls the thread of a story from out of the noise of contemporary western life and the sounds of the jungle to create a meditation on interconnectedness, perception and time."
"McBurney's piece is a Chinese whisper of a show from a far-distant world that is delivered straight into the audience's head using binaural technology and headphones."
"the technology combines with McBurney's dense, complex storytelling to lure us deeper into the thickets of the imagination where time is not just one dimension, where there are many different kinds of language and where jaguars hunt."
★★★★ The Times ow.ly/QMxdt "this revelatory new one-man show from Simon McBurney and his company Complicite, can make you hear the world through new ears".
Short film accompanying the UN Global Goals project, for 59 Productions. Broadcast on BBC1 and MSNBC.
Broadcast on CBeebies over Christmas and on BBC2 on New Year's Eve.