When Stella Artois first invited me to their Time Portal event, I thought “what on earth is this?” And then I read the phrase “Victorian interactive theatre” and I was all over it! The general concept of the event was that it was a 40 minute immersive, promenade theatre event taking us back in time to the very first Wimbledon.
The event began as it meant to go on, we all received a Stella Artois drink of our choice. I opted for a raspberry Stella Cidre and it was delicious. (Almost too delicious as it went down so smoothly.) We were then ushered along to meet the scientist behind the Time Portal and then to hop into the machine ourselves.
The machine spat us out in Victorian London, several hours before the final of the first ever Wimbledon tournament, and we went on madcap adventures to help our lead find a new tennis racket. There were magic tricks, pickpocketing, and a plethora of literary characters (Sherlock Holmes to Ebenezer Scrooge.) I did miss a section where everyone else was locked up in jail waiting to be rescued, because I had been picked to, and I’m not making this up, have afternoon tea with Queen Victoria. That was delightful, and I’m hugely glad I got that 1-on-1 experience, though I wish I could have been in jail too. (First time I’ve ever said that.)
The cast was hugely up for it, which is a deal breaker for immersive theatre. Nothing takes you out of the moment more than an actor who seems a bit embarrassed. I didn’t follow the plot at times. Why were we in Scrooge’s bedroom? But I had an absolute blast and that’s all you can ask for a Saturday afternoon.
Once we’d completed our time traveling machine, we went to a secret bar downstairs to drink more Stella and enjoy the current Wimbledon footage on several large screens.
It’s a shame that this event was only running for 4 days. You could tell a huge amount of effort went into it, and I personally, wish that it had run longer so that more people could have had the chance to enjoy it.
* I was a guest, and received my tickets for free but all my opinions are forever my own.*
