Making Immersive Accessible

Immersive theatre presents unique challenges to providing accommodation and accessibility measures for audience members, particularly in “sandbox-style” immersive theatre in which audience members roam through a curated environment throughout the performance. The physical and transitory nature of this form creates a significant roadblock to offering typical access options like listening devices, closed captioning, and wheelchair accessibility. In addition, most immersive productions do not fall under any particular Actors’ Equity Association union contract due to the untraditional format and therefore don’t have a local regulating body to monitor the work nor hold them to the same standards (and repercussions) as a unionized production. A third consideration is that much of immersive theatre is produced on an independent scale and does not have access to commercial funding or institutional support. These combined conditions have led to the immersive industry being quite complacent regarding accessibility.

Regardless of these issues, the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) requires all public accommodations, which are defined as businesses that are open to the public, to be ADA compliant and provide reasonable accommodations for disabled people. If a theatre publicly offers its tickets and takes money for them, it is legally required to be ADA compliant. Despite this mandate, many immersive productions do not offer reasonable accommodations for disabled spectators to access the event at the same level that nondisabled spectators can. At the same time, “reasonable accommodations” are up to interpretation and often aren’t actually proper accommodations to provide equitable access. Because of the lack of standards, many performance venues interpret this requirement as simply being wheelchair accessible, but they do not offer additional accommodations in the design of the experience nor as a la cart requests. While a performance may see this as meeting the requirements of the ADA, not exploring additional accommodation measures furthers the accessibility divide. In this essay I will analyze two immersive productions and propose various accommodations they can make to become more accessible. While this is geared towards sandbox-style productions, the recommendations can certainly be applied to various performance practices.

I assess the productions based on hallmark elements of sandbox-style immersive theatre. These are the most prevalent elements that I have encountered in sandbox-style productions over time and across locales in my experience as an immersive theatre scholar, producer, performer, and critic. They are:

• Audience identifiers: objects or costume pieces that are required to be worn by audience members throughout the performance 
• Curated environments: the architecture and set dressing of the physical space where the performance takes place
• Trailing: the act of an audience member following a performer closely throughout the performance 
• Staging: where the actors are placed in the environment during the performance

This non-exhaustive element list aims to represent the most popular elements in the form and those that are most susceptible to inaccessibility. My analysis considers the ways each production utilizes each element and how accessible the productions have been created or adapted to be. My analysis of the two productions is based on first person attendance of the performances: I attended Sleep No More in 2013, 2022, and 2024 and Life and Trust in August 2024.

Sleep No More

Sleep No More was a sandbox-style immersive performance created by Punchdrunk and produced by Emursive that has run in London, Boston, New York City, and Shanghai in various iterations as early as 2003, but at their flagship location at the McKittrick Hotel in New York City from 2011 to 2025. The piece was largely a physical theatre/dance performance that adapted and took inspiration from William Shakespeare’s Macbeth and Alfred Hitchcock’s Rebecca among other film noir pieces. Audience members were free to roam the six floors of the venue to create their own unique experience of the work.

The production required a plague doctor-esque mask as the audience identifier, which was worn over the face throughout the production unless removed by a performer or docent. In fact, the removal of the mask by production staff outside of a one-on-one scene acted as a signifier that the audience member should be removed from the production, so keeping it on was integral. The first time I saw Sleep No More in 2013, a friend who worked in the wardrobe department warned me to bring a wad of tissues if I wanted to wear my glasses under the mask, as the trick at the time was to jam the tissues in between the mask and glasses to make it work. While a valiant effort, the tissues did not help me, and I chose to forgo my glasses and see the blurry version of the production instead of working through the discomfort of keeping my glasses on under the mask. However, later versions of Sleep No More had an adapted mask available for guests with glasses that included a small piece of foam fitted into the nose of the mask. During onboarding, in my experience, the production member handing out masks automatically provided the adapted mask to those wearing glasses.

This issue fostered a sense of competitiveness and sometimes even aggression among audience members trying to be the first trailer and therefore the first in the room in order to see the action.

The curated environment of Sleep No More included many different sets throughout its six floors. The individual sets ranged in terms of content, and many included uneven terrain, like carpeting or a room whose floor is filled with wood chips. Uneven terrain can be inaccessible for people with mobility and balance concerns, particularly those who use mobility devices like walkers, scooters, and wheelchairs. The majority of the space was dark or dimly lit, which posed issues for those with low vision or vision impairment. Neurodivergent audience members may have faced challenges navigating the overlapping audio and other overwhelming sensory elements, as well as the confusing design of the space that made it difficult to map where you were. Although each of these components is paramount in its own right for the individual accessibility needs of a variety of people, the most conspicuous and inaccessible aspect of the curated environment is the stairs. While the venue does have an elevator, the stairs were arguably the main mode of travel during the performance as actors used them. Audience members who were keen to trail a particular character may have found themselves suddenly sprinting up or down stairs and across uneven terrain to keep up with the performer and not miss out on the performance. However, stairs are inaccessible for many people.

The staging of Sleep No More was electric and aimed to play off of the curated environment to enhance the storytelling. The story unfolds throughout the environment without clear designations between performance space and audience space. While this is integral to the form, it is no excuse for poor sight lines and inconsiderate staging, which many immersive productions fall victim to. Sleep No More did a good job of considering the audience in the staging and made a point to move the performers through the space in each scene so that audience members got at least a taste of the action wherever they were. However, increases in audience capacity made this practice less effective, creating walls of people obstructing the sight lines in major scenes. There were also few seating opportunities available in main action spaces, and with such a large audience capacity, those who sat often had their view blocked by standing audience members. This resulted in repeatedly missed performance action for shorter audience members and those who were not the first trailers. Furthermore, this issue fostered a sense of competitiveness and sometimes even aggression among audience members trying to be the first trailer and therefore the first in the room in order to see the action.

Life And Trust

Life And Trust is a sandbox-style immersive production written by Jon Ronson, directed by Teddy Bergman, and produced by Emursive in New York City that opened in August 2024 and is performing an open-ended run at the time of writing. The piece takes inspiration from the legend of Faust and is set in the 1920s around the stock market crash. Similar to Sleep No More, Life and Trust is a physical theatre/dance piece that unfolds over the six floors of Conwell Tower.

Following the same format as Sleep No More, the piece also requires audience members to wear masks as audience identifiers, although of a slightly different design to that of Sleep No More. It seems the mask rules are a bit more relaxed at Life and Trust, and it is unclear whether the same mask removal signification system is in place. At the time of writing, Life and Trust has opted not to provide adapted masks despite being produced by the same company as Sleep No More and therefore having that industry knowledge and experience. Thus, the glasses versus mask problem persists and is made worse because the Life and Trust masks lie flatter on the face with less of a gap at the nose. This means that it is impossible to wear glasses under the mask at all, with or without tissues, as the mask will shift to one side or the other, moving the eye holes and blocking sight entirely. I opted once again to see the show blurry, but I noticed other audience members wearing the mask on their foreheads to see with their glasses.

The curated environment of Life and Trust is also similar to Sleep No More in that there are many individually designed rooms that vary in the same accessibility triggers as listed above: uneven terrain, darkness or dim lighting, competing audio and sensory elements, lack of seating, and a confusing layout. Most surprisingly Life and Trust seems to have missed the mark on some basic safety measures that Sleep No More maintained, such as marking stairs and ramps glow tape, which is a very simple safety precaution to take for people of all abilities. While safety and accessibility are different aspects of the same overarching concept, any disregard for general safety further complicates accessibility. An unmarked step can be difficult to navigate for a non-disabled audience member, but the challenge is compounded for an audience member with mobility or spatial relationship concerns. In a way, safety measures can be considered as basic accessibility measures even for non-disabled audience members as they are the bare minimum requirements for access to the space.

While the staging is again highly dynamic, the focus seems to be on engaging with the environment instead of the audience.

The confusing layout is also made worse in this case by the bar, which is the “off-mask” safe space to take a break or get help during the performance, being highly inaccessible. I experienced a minor medical emergency during the performance I attended, and it took over fifteen minutes to navigate back to the bar to get assistance. This raised a huge safety red flag in that audience members should always know where they can go if they need help or need a sensory or physical break from the production. It was further compounded to become an accessibility red flag in that, as a disabled audience member, I couldn’t easily access the things I needed to take care of my disability during the performance without significant interruption to my experience. It seems that Life and Trust almost discourages people from returning to the bar by placing bathrooms and water dispensers within the world of the experience, which actually is a great measure of accessibility, but the safe space of the bar should still be available and clearly marked.

Life and Trust also utilizes stairs for staging, which leads to the same trailing pitfalls as Sleep No More, although Life and Trust’s elevator was easier to find than Sleep No More’s. The performers’ staging in Life and Trust is supremely athletic, and nearly all of the characters that I encountered seemed to be moving at a brisk pace if not fully running, so there is a certain athleticism required of the trailing audience member in this experience. The staging of the piece faces some challenges in that the architecture of the environment is not always well suited for audience sight lines, particularly concerning the presence of what I assume are structural pillars in some rooms. While the staging is again highly dynamic, the focus seems to be on engaging with the environment instead of the audience. Dance sequences prioritize using the set over showing the audience members the action. With the focus on the architecture, audience scramble to follow the action around the space, which proves especially difficult for audience members with mobility issues. It is worth noting that the audience capacity seemed more balanced at Life and Trust, meaning the audience is better distributed throughout the space; so the scenes are not overcrowded, which helps with sight lines. Both the McKittrick Hotel (Sleep No More) and Conwell Tower (Life and Trust) are around 100,000 square feet, so the audience is likely slightly smaller in the latter. However, the audience distribution I noted isn’t necessarily indicative of audience capacity, but perhaps that Life and Trust wasn’t selling as many tickets as Sleep No More at the time of my visit.

Assessment and Recommendations

Both productions offer accessibility accommodations if audience members ask for them with advanced notice. In fact, Life and Trust has garnered significant attention from the immersive industry for making strides in accessibility due to the availability of dedicated docents to guide audience members with mobility needs through the experience. The same accommodation was available at Sleep No More but did not spark as much attention in the community. In my visit to Life and Trust I witnessed an audience member using an electric wheelchair making use of this dedicated docent accommodation. It appeared this audience member was following the same character track as me, but they were the last to leave each room and the last to arrive to new rooms, often resulting in poor sight lines and distance from the action. The docent and audience member took the elevator for travel and thus missed any action that occurred in transit, as well as losing the opportunity to trail properly. This audience member did still get to see the piece, but is it equitable if an immersive experience is made only partially accessible by accommodations? Considering both audience members theoretically paid for the same ticket to receive an entirely different level of experience, I feel that it is not equitable.

My recommendation is to first make the easy fixes that can be done in the current configurations of the show without significant investment or change on the production’s end. For Life and Trust, adding glow tape to their surfaces and foam to their masks is a fix they could make immediately. Additionally, I recommend stronger expectation setting in the pre-ticket buying experience productions, which is possible to do without “giving too much away.” Letting folks know more details about what to expect from the environment and sensory elements is always better than leaving too much out. It would be incredibly helpful to publish a list of available accommodations so that audience members don’t have to reach out only to find out their needs can’t be met.

A more significant investment that would take more time and could require considerable changes to the production would be consulting with a dedicated accessibility designer to devise additional accommodations offerings, such as making maps of the space available ahead of time. In an ideal world, I would also recommend reducing the overall audience capacity to remedy some of the sight line and trailing issues, especially if Sleep No More were to continue its run. Perhaps a performance or two a month could be allocated as “relaxed” performances that host a smaller audience and reduce some of the sensory hazards, like adjusting volume levels to make overlapping sound design more palatable and shifting lighting design to brighten dim areas and reduce strobing in others.

My main recommendation to sandbox-style immersive productions, as well as the overall immersive industry going forward, is to lead with accessibility from the inception of the experience. The difference between something that is designed for access and something that has been adapted for access is always abundantly clear on the receiving end. It is entirely possible to design an immersive production that allows audience members of all abilities the same opportunities to trail, see, and participate in the experience; the production team just needs to want to do so and budget for it. While funding scarcity may make accessibility measures feel like a burden, they are not a privilege or luxury, but a right protected by law. Accessibility needs to be treated with the same gravity as any other safety precaution in immersive experience making.