Awake! Awake!

By STEVE VINEBERG  |  October 21, 2009

The actors are earnest and manage to maintain their focus while audience members trek clumsily through their story. And that’s the real problem with Sleep No More. As meticulous as Barrett and Doyle and their collaborators (no designers are listed on the ART Web site, and you don’t get a program) have been about creating the environment, and as clever as their Shakespeare-inspired visual ideas often are, the presence of unstaged spectators in every room and hallway continually interrupts the theatrical experience. The idea is that we’re all part of the performance, but I kept getting the untheatrical feeling that I was at a crowded museum exhibit, craning around the five people in front of me to try to see a painting.

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