A couple of weeks ago I was at Camden’s Roundhouse for the National’s spectacular FastForward Fundraising gala, in which the vast Victorian engine shed was turned into a glamorous dining room for a seated banquet. And for the Roundhouse’s re-opening last summer, it hosted a thrilling promenade production, Fuerezabruta, that turned it into a playground of the imagination. At the time, I wrote, “This vast circular, industrial ‘found space’ is exactly the kind of infinitely flexible environmental setting that shows like Fuerzabruta need to come alive in – audience, playing space and performers become one, moving to the show’s weird but distinctive rhythms that redefines movement as harnessed performers fly through the air and then unharnessed ones throw themselves about in a watery pool lowered directly above your head. It did, however, mean that the restorative work on the Roundhouse itself was hidden from view. But though the venue itself should have been the star itself last night, there will be other opportunities to see it close up and more personally.”
That chance finally came last night when the venue hosted the London premiere of Tim Supple’s “Indian Dream”, as the production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream that he created under the auspices of the British Council in India and was first performed in the UK as part of the RSC Complete Works Festival, has become dubbed. The space has been seamlessly turned into a semi-circular amphitheatre – complete with temporary seating that is, thank God, actually comfortable (there are even armrests and cushioned seats, not the dreaded plastic football stadium installations that are the bane of the Edinburgh Fringe and some venues in London). The seating (for some 1,300 people) wraps around a large, high and wide stage, perfect for epic productions like this (and with the cast clambering over a climbing frame of the rear wall of a set, there were echoes of a former Roundhouse tenant, De La Guarda).
However, unmiked and performed in six languages as this production was, it wasn’t always easy to hear the words; of course Supple’s approach is more about the visual and musical than the language on this occasion, but with such a voluminous vertical and round space to fill, there are clearly going to be acoustic challenges to straight drama taking place here.
But the Roundhouse has once again taken up an important role in providing London with an exciting home for work of a different sort. Ironically, however, its not one that the production specifically demands: it is going on an extensive autumn UK tour to more conventional venues, and it will be interesting to see how it plays in them.
