COLAB and Yippee Theatre present Dead Hard, an immersive panto romp at COLAB Tower, London Bridge, this Christmas.
We all love a Christmas panto, right? The slapstick humour, the colourful costumes, audience involvement and festive vibes. But pantos aren’t just for kids, and over the years, we have seen a growth in adult Christmas pantomimes, where everything is dialled up to twelve with lashings of additional sauce. But this Christmas, panto comes with an extra kick as COLAB and Yippee Theatre invite us to the newly named COLAB Tower in London Bridge for an immersive panto experience like no other, one that writer, director and founder of COLAB, Bertie Watkins proudly calls “a comedic panto romp” as we discuss his new show, Dead Hard over zoom.
“It’s a parody of Die Hard,” says Bertie with a broad smile. “But obviously, it is very different from the actual Die Hard! We have a cleaner who thinks he’s a policeman who hasn’t come to terms with his sexuality. He uses his hyper-masculinity to try and cover up that he might want a kiss and a cuddle from someone of the same sex. But a bank heist changes everything!”
It might sound like a delightful on-stage mix of Die Hard and Dog Day Afternoon, but as Bertie points out with a glint of excitement in his eye, Dead Hard is a genuinely immersive experience.
“We’ve got explosions, drag queens in high heels, Go-karts, roly-polies, and more. It’s crazy chaotic, with drag silliness around every corner. And, yes, we’ve got Hans Gruber!”
Of course, Hans Gruber is essential to any Die Hard-inspired production, parody or not, with the late, great Alan Rickman turning in one of the finest Machiavellian performances in action-movie history. It’s an iconic performance that Bertie was keen to celebrate.
“Every year I fight with my family because I wanna watch Die Hard and they wanna watch Love Actually! It is the classic debate over what constitutes a Christmas movie.”
“Because of Alan Rickman’s legendary performance, we didn’t want to put full drag onto Hans. I mean, yeah, he’s in sequins top to bottom with high heels, but he’s not got the eye makeup or a wig. Our Hans is the sort of panto villain who becomes the shining star of any show, a love/hate figure. We made these little five-pound note flyers with Alan Rickman’s image instead of the King. It’s our quiet salute to his brilliance.”
Bertie founded COLAB in 2012, and since then, it has grown into one of the leading immersive theatre companies in London; however, as Bertie says, creating immersive theatre like Dead Hard comes with more than a few headaches, challenges and sleepless nights.
“COLAB is a decade old, and I feel several decades older! I didn’t think too much about immersive theatre until I started university and began to explore fringe theatres. I began to realise theatre could offer audiences so much more, and I wanted to make my own stuff. Our first show was in a cupboard, in The Vaults, literally! Following that, we just went from strength to strength, but it doesn’t always feel like that. At the moment, it feels more like exhaustion!”
Bertie smiles. “An amazing amount of work goes into making the story immersive because you’re thinking about the audience the whole time. You might expect me to say that the script is ridiculously thick, but in reality, the actors are so good that we adopt bullet-point acting, giving the cast the critical parts of the script and then letting them interact with the audience as freely as possible.”
“Then, there is the performance space or building. We have just converted an office building, which was boring and stuffy. It was a soulless space in London Bridge, with this horrible flower logo everywhere from the previous tenants. We spent days scraping off over a thousand flowers! There is no simple comparison with traditional theatre, where everything is already in place; the amount of work required to convert a space is massive. But COLAB Tower also offered us the opportunity to launch the first fully DDA-compliant immersive theatre space in London!”
DDA compliance, or Disability Discrimination Act compliance, involves ensuring that buildings meet accessibility standards for people with disabilities. It is fair to say that while most theatres meet the basics, the experience for disabled audience members is often less than great; as Bertie says, “Disabled audience members rarely get to experience a show in the same way as everyone else, with wheelchair seats often right at the back of the auditorium!” Bertie continues, “We were fortunate to have inherited a building at COLAB Tower that was already highly accessible. But we have still had to add further ramps to create access to some of the more funky spaces, and we are still making adjustments, like lowering part of the bar we just installed.”
Even given the changes already made to the building before Bertie and his team took it on, it’s refreshing to hear such commitment to inclusion and accessibility, and thankfully, the new COLAB Tower will be here for a while yet, as Bertie explains.
“So we’re now programming the space. We have a mini festival in February and March, followed by ‘The Successor’, a sort of prequel to King Lear set in a world resembling Succession. Of course, rewriting Shakespeare isn’t at all risky! Plus, we have artist studios and a gallery that will always be open. We’re making it a place for young companies to come and make two-week shows, with additional cabaret, jazz and drag nights. It’s going to be really busy.”
And as for next Christmas, “Dick Whittington might work,” Bertie ponders, “Yeah, we could do that, but let’s see how Dead Hard goes first.”
Dead Hard will entertain guests at COLAB Tower from December 10 to January 12. Book Tickets.
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