Transcript of Bitesize Ep 85 - Transcript

Charlie:
Hello and welcome to the British English Podcast. Today we have Matthew Calver back on the show. My friend from university that has been with me for over 12 years. We realised last episode, um, not with me. We're not together. You made it sound like. Yeah, yeah. We're friends. Always been a platonic relationship. Um, we've, uh, we've been discussing London recently, and I felt like we should go deeper into an experiential experience, which is kind of the same word in a different derivative, experiential theatre. That's what he went to, um, in greater detail. So let's do that right now. So you've been living in London for quite a few years and you went to quite an interesting event that I was very jealous of and for some reason still haven't done. I've googled it multiple times and I've told people, shall we do this? And for some reason it's ended in a no. But I it was like, yes, oh my god, yes. And then let's just go for dinner. Yeah, but this thing. What what is it?

Matthew:
Well, now you ask me, I'm completely blanking on what it's called. Can you remember what it's called?

Charlie:
So what was the what was the actual experience you went to? What was the story?

Matthew:
Was it so many intertwining? Well, three intertwining stories, I think. Okay. So I can't remember what it was called, but essentially it's a experience that happens in. Oh, it's hard to explain the theme as well, let's say. Immersive theatre. It's an immersive theatre experience. Okay. Um, it sort of feels like it's maybe a bit, you know, Westworld. Yes. You know that show.

Charlie:
So Westworld, for anyone who hasn't seen it, is the idea of robots becoming so human like that. They don't know that they're robots. And it's an island where humans go to, to interact with the story of these robots that are going through a sort of sequence of events, and the humans can do whatever they want with or to the robots. It's quite dark in some ways, but then the robots start to I won't spoil it.

Matthew:
And then the robots take over the world for the world, which is pretty much the plot of any robot based film, isn't it? Like, hey, there's some robots. Guess what? Guess what? They're taking over. Be afraid. That's pretty much the premise for all robot shows. Yeah, that's by the by. Okay, this is very like Westworld. Western world. Westworld like world. Westworld. Like, in that you are interacting with this kind of experience. I think it is also kind of wild Westie as well. Yes, it is similar to Westworld. Um, but obviously the people aren't robots, they're actors. Oh I see, yes. Yeah. You're not interacting with robots because we don't have the technology yet, but let's.

Charlie:
Just, um, make it quite tangible. So whereabouts in London was it?

Matthew:
Yeah, it was in, uh, East London. I want to say like Wapping. Wapping? It was in Wapping. Wapping, I think it was in Wapping. Okay. So in that kind of Docklands area. Okay. Yeah, I think. Okay. Um.

Charlie:
And it's in London.``

Matthew:
It's in London, it's in London somewhere.

Charlie:
And it's in a warehouse.

Matthew:
Huge warehouse, huge warehouse, massive warehouse. Uh, bigger than you think it's going to be.

Charlie:
So think of a warehouse and then ten x.

Matthew:
It's a big it's a big boy. It's a big old warehouse. You go in and of course, it doesn't feel like a warehouse. You don't just sort of step into a empty warehouse. It's. They've built two film sets, essentially. Oh, wow. Within this warehouse complex. And you go in and a story starts without your input. So it just starts like a play starts and then you kind of just follow along. Um, you can pick different characters. Each character has their own storyline.

Charlie:
And when you say pick, you mean to follow.

Matthew:
Just follow.

Charlie:
So it's in a warehouse and you're following them through different rooms.

Matthew:
Through different rooms.

Charlie:
A theatre played through multiple different rooms and levels.

Matthew:
And levels.

Charlie:
And they're all on their own sort of journey as a character.

Matthew:
Yeah, but all of the characters obviously intertwine, so the characters will speak to each other and interact with each other and things will happen, and you just kind of. And you can stop, you can stop following this person. You can just switch to another person and start following them, which.

Charlie:
Excites me so much. I just need to go. I was very close to going to a sort of Guy Fawkes experience like that. Um, but we ended up going for a beer instead, which is just as interesting.

Matthew:
Yeah, just keep it original. Yeah.

Charlie:
So I don't know if you guys listening have experienced this kind of thing, but for me, this is just so novel. This is so exciting, such a sort of unique approach to entertainment. Um, so living in the actor's experience. So how long is it?

Matthew:
Oh, it goes on for a while. I think they do it twice or three times. The same thing. The same.

Charlie:
Thing.

Matthew:
But you obviously follow a different person.

Charlie:
Oh, you get to do the loop again.

Matthew:
You do the loop again. So it's the same thing happens. Wow. But you can obviously follow. So you get a different perspective of the story. Right. You go to a different area.

Charlie:
So if if it was like a theatre and an escape room made a baby, is it a bit like that? Yeah.

Matthew:
And then also it's it really reminded me of playing a kind of computer game, like an RPG computer game. Right. But you're the person. Yeah. So yeah, yeah, yeah. Everything kind of happens around you for your experience and for your entertainment. Yeah. And everyone else is kind of like, yeah, like going through their motions. Did you ever.

Charlie:
Get tripped out by it and then start touching?

Matthew:
Well, this is the thing. They never break the third wall. So the whole the.

Charlie:
Third wall.

Matthew:
Third wall is where the third wall in cinema and TV is, where they look into the camera. Oh. So typically they never look down the lens because then you're essentially you're looking.

Charlie:
It's.

Matthew:
Breaking. It's breaking the illusion that the cameraman's not there. Yeah. So if they look into the camera, you feel like, okay, there's a cameraman there because they're looking at the cameraman. It's called breaking the third wall. Nice. And they don't do that at pretty much at all. So you can be stood in front of them like one of the actors, and they would just kind of, like, look past you and kind of just continue interacting with their other actor. And it's almost they're completely like, you're not there.

Charlie:
And so you could pretend to be a ghost. This is the closest thing to being a ghost.

Matthew:
Yeah, it's the closest thing to being a ghost. But then sometimes they do and it is so jarring. Oh my gosh, when it happens. So it happened to me once I was following this character into a bar. And it's really weird because there's obviously really high action bits and there's some bits and you just follow your character and they'll just sort of be going about their normal day. Like this character was just like cleaning the bar. And you're.

Charlie:
Are there many people in the room with you?

Matthew:
So yeah, it depends. So you can you're going around and like one character will have like six people just sort of like and sometimes running after them because they run and like dart in and out of places and you lose them.

Charlie:
I can't believe how fun this sounds.

Matthew:
Yeah, it's really good. And then some of them, you just like if you find the characters on their own, you're just following them. You're like, oh, that's so creepy.

Charlie:
So you're just watching them maybe wash their dishes.

Matthew:
Yeah. And this is, this is great. And I was following this one, this one character. And then she went to a bar and she was like cleaning the bar. And then she just sort of was cleaning the bar, and then she just looked at me. Oh. And was like, come with me. And I was like, what? Me? What if she.

Charlie:
Could speak to you?

Matthew:
Yeah. You know, you kind of look around at any other actors. There's no other actors. So I was like, okay. And she took my hand and she took me to a secret room behind the bar.

Charlie:
Oh my gosh.

Matthew:
Sat in this like tiny cupboard behind the bar that had all of these, like, trinkets, like pinned to the wall and maps. And she was talking about this, this plot that was happening. And then she fed me a grape. And then she fed me a grape.

Charlie:
What? that's was why she said, come with me.

Matthew:
Yeah. And she's like, this will protect you from what's about is as quite sexual.

Charlie:
Was it was there a bit of tension?

Matthew:
No there wasn't. No. But Lauren's one was a bit weird.

Charlie:
You went with your partner and you divided up. Yes.

Matthew:
They advised you to separate. So you have, like, completely independent sexual experience. Sexual experiences. Um, and then I just got let out, and then it's like you don't exist anymore, right?

Charlie:
So you're out of the set and it's like, game over.

Matthew:
And then they just go back to interacting with the world like, you're not there. Oh, wow. It's a really interesting Lauren got taken into.

Charlie:
What was her sexual experience.

Matthew:
A sexual experience. But she did get led down on a, I think like a plinth or a bed.

Charlie:
Oh, and.

Matthew:
Apparently she said there was like someone hiding in the corner that got closer and closer every time the lights came on. Yeah, it was, she said. It was very intense, like very scary. Oh, right.`

Charlie:
Yeah. Some of it is quite thriller like.

Matthew:
Yeah, it's very thriller like. The end scene. I won't give it away. If anyone wants to go and find out what this is actually called and then go and see it. Yeah. The end scene right at the end where you change worlds a little bit, so you kind of go right into a desert world instead.

Charlie:
Oh, very Westworld

Matthew:
That gets very, very raunchy. Oh, raunchy. Very raunchy.

Charlie:
As in, you're watching people.

Matthew:
It gets raunchy. And then. And then very, um, violent.

Charlie:
Oh, God..

Matthew:
Yeah. Not with the raunchiness like after. Right? Right, right. Yeah. Separated. Yeah. Separated. Yeah. Yeah.

Charlie:
And that's both. That's that's all from the actors or from. They're not. They're not pulling you in and be like punching, you know. But it's I swear you told me about somebody punching somebody. Maybe Harry did this. I think Harry did one similar. And he said somebody punched someone.

Matthew:
Someone got punched. It wasn't.

Charlie:
Harry. It was a YouTuber. English like a native. Uh, Anna. We did a collaboration with her, and she was an actress in this and some a customer took it as reality and thought that they needed to protect them. So they punched one of the actors, one idiot. I mean, really good acting, right?

Matthew:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, acting so well, I got punched. How was work? It was great. I acted so well. Someone punched me in the face.

Charlie:
Some get BAFTAs, some get Golden Globes, some get a punch in the face.

Matthew:
Yeah, yeah, that is dumb though. I mean, that's like you watch those videos of people with those VR headsets, like, jump into a wall because they just forget that they're in virtual reality. Like you, you've gone to the theatre, you know, these people are actors. Come on. Yeah. Not great. Yeah.

Charlie:
Um, any more to add to the experience?

Matthew:
Uh, it was just, I would say the set design was incredible, like the, uh, detail and the amount of just tiny little bits that went into making up the world really made it okay, because the acting was, of course, phenomenal. But the set, you really felt immersed in it. It was amazing. Someone was doing a very, very good job there.

Charlie:
Nice, I'm just going to read out some Time Out magazine suggestions. Monopoly Lifesized is one that's currently going on in Tottenham Court Road. Uh, the Gunpowder Plot. That's the one that I was mentioning earlier. There's the War of the worlds, the immersive experience. That's not it. No Phantom peak. That's the other. No, that's the other one that you went to. I think that's the, uh, the the drinking.

Matthew:
Oh yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yes. You're right. Yeah yeah yeah yeah.

Charlie:
So not that one but still that's quite a fun thing. Oh my god Fawlty Towers the dining experience. That sounds fun.

Matthew:
Wow, that does sound fun.

Charlie:
Priscilla at the party. Ginger line, the grand expedition. Uh, the great murder mystery. The murder express.

Matthew:
No, the.

Charlie:
Moonwalkers. That was the thing that you went to recently? Yeah. Maybe it's not on anymore. London's. No, no, maybe it's not on.

Matthew:
Maybe it's not on anymore.

Charlie:
But still, I mean, like the Gunpowder Plot one. That would be quite fun, I imagine. Yeah.

Matthew:
I think they're all very, very good. Very good. Yeah, yeah.

Charlie:
Um, Harry went to a Romeo and Juliet one and he said that was quite fun as well. So. Yes. Um, immersive theatre in London is what you want to Google if you're ever in London, check it out. Yeah, as will I.

Matthew:
I would like to go to the monopoly life size one.

Charlie:
That sounds quite fun, doesn't it?

Matthew:
It does sound fun. Yeah, yeah. All right.

Charlie:
We just googled what it was. The name of the thing that you went to.

Matthew:
Was Burnt city.

Charlie:
Burnt city.

Matthew:
Burnt city. Yeah.

Charlie:
Burn city as in b u r n.

Matthew:
A t e r g.

Charlie:
This guy. Honestly? Uh, yeah. So there you go. You can Google that. Burnt city. Burnt city. Nice. Would recommend. This was just a bite size episode, so we'll leave it there. But thank you very much, Matt, for telling us about your experience. Um, following somebody who ended up feeding you a grape.

Matthew:
That's what it boils down to. Yeah. And thank you very much for having me.

Charlie:
Pleasure. All right. Well done, guys, for listening to the end of this. We'll see you next time on the British English Podcast. Bye bye.

Matthew:
Bye bye.

Charlie:
We will be leaving the free version of this episode here for today. But if you did want to continue listening to this conversation, then head over to the British English Podcast.com where you can sign up to the Premium Podcast or the Academy. The premium podcast gives you the ad free version with transcripts, a full glossary, and flashcards, whereas the Academy gives you all of that, plus a whole lot more, including vocab, video lessons, writing assignments, weekly zoom classes. And you can also get paired with a new speaking partner of a similar level to yours each month to really get your speaking practice in. But if you were just here for the free version of this episode, then I thank you very much. Congratulations for getting to the end of this part, and I hope to see you back here next week for another episode. I've been your host, Charlie, on the British English Podcast. And.