Before entering “Viola’s Room,” you remove your shoes, hand over your phone, and slip on headphones. A woody, slightly sweet fragrance lingers in the air. You’re told to follow the light and nothing else.
In a city that never stops moving, you suddenly glide forward in darkness, immersed in whispers and shadows. It feels like being led through someone else’s dream.
Punchdrunk, the British company that redefined immersive theater in New York with “Sleep No More,” has returned with a new offering, this time staged on the fourth floor of The Shed. Where “Sleep No More” transformed a grungy Chelsea warehouse into a sprawling noir fantasia, “Viola’s Room” unfolds in a sleek cultural institution after a multi-escalator ascent. Gritty freedom has been replaced by polished precision.
Gone are the white masks and the thrill of discovery. Here, audience members travel in small groups, barefoot and subdued, guided only by flickering lights and Helena Bonham Carter’s intimate, velvety narration. You follow where the light leads, without any detours or deviation.
Adapted from Barry Pain’s obscure 1901 gothic tale “The Moon-Slave,” the story centers on a young girl named Viola, whose love of dance and fixation on the moon slowly unravels her sense of self. The tale is whispered through headphones as viewers move through a labyrinth of narrow corridors and themed rooms. There are no live performers.
At first, you’re instructed to sit quietly on a mattress on a teenage girl’s bedroom floor. With Carter’s voice in your ears in the dim light, the story begins to take shape.
Then comes the transition: you crawl out of the bedroom in an unnerving, Alice-through-the-looking-
Punchdrunk’s signature sensory craftsmanship is on display. Floor textures shift beneath your feet, from soft carpeting to sand to cool tile. Shadow puppetry flickers to life. Eerie soundscapes swell and retreat. A well-chosen ’90s soundtrack, featuring tracks like Seal’s “Kiss From a Rose” and Soundgarden’s “Black Hole Sun,” grounds the show in moody nostalgia.
Visually and emotionally, “Viola’s Room” feels like a Tim Burton film come to life, particularly “Edward Scissorhands,” where suburban softness meets otherworldly longing. Like the young girl drawn into Edward’s eerie world, we follow Viola deeper into a space where enchantment and unease blur together.
There are undeniably beautiful moments: a shadowy banquet table emerging from the dark, a crooked tree adorned with a ballerina slipper. But they pass quickly, without much dramatic weight.
Lasting just under an hour, the show offers little narrative propulsion or emotional climax. What begins as atmospheric gradually settles into repetitive melancholy.
“Viola’s Room” is not without artistry. It’s elegantly designed and often haunting. But compared to the sprawling unpredictability of “Sleep No More,” it feels overly controlled, even stifled.
For devotees of immersive theater, or anyone who has ever wished for Helena Bonham Carter to narrate a gothic bedtime story into their ears, it’s still an experience worth considering. Just temper your expectations, take off your shoes, and follow the light.
Through Oct. 19 at The Shed, 545 West 30th St., theshed.org.
