Party Skills for the End of the World: Lockdown Special

How do you party in lockdown? What do you wear? What do we do? What should you bring? What do we need to know?

In 2017, Nigel Barrett and Louise Mari from pioneering cult performance collective Shunt brought the party to end all parties to MIF17. Now, exclusively for MIF Live, they’re attempting to squeeze their genre-defying epic show into the tiny digital portal that connects all of our isolated worlds during lockdown. We invite you to join us and raise a glass to celebrate the things we’re still able to share when we are so close and yet so far away. Come and hang out, make some friends, learn some new skills – and dance like nobody’s watching.

During lockdown, we worked with MIF and the original creatives to manage a 300-person immersive, interactive live theatre event, combining video conferencing and online broadcast technologies to allow multiple remote performers, visual effects, a full sound design, multiple interactive ‘skill rooms’ and the ability for the audience to converse and react to the performers.

The show was run from the Mesmer studio using our repurposed animation computers.

Client:
Manchester International Festival

Location:
Online, 2020

Services:
Video & Projection Design
Technical Consultancy
Equipment Hire

Team:
Stream Director: Ian William Galloway
System Designer: Salvador Bettencourt Ávila
Audience Manager: Barbora Senoltova
Showcaller: Emi Bagshaw

Production Credits:
Directors: Louise Mari & Nigel Barett
Production Designer: Bethany Wells
Lighting Designer: Marty Langthorne
Sound Designer: Ben & Max Ringham

Photos:
© Manchester International Festival / Mesmer