Biped Monitor - Nunhead cemetery - Aug 4

We’re off to another immersive theatrical event – this time outdoors at Nunhead Cemetery of all places . where is Nunhead Cemetery ? “
“ Err, Pete, you do know where it is, don’t you ? “ I am asked by fearsome other half.
“ Oh, behave, course I do “…
Uphill, down dale, further we meander into the darkest recesses of south east London. Brockley, Lee, Lewisham..the names that send a shiver through the veins of every dweller of N1, NW1, SW1 and all other numbers that follow the post codes letters of “civilisation. Finally we pull up outside the cemetery gates – completely deserted , not even an owl to be heard.
“OMG – you’ve gone to the wrong fucking cemetery!”
“Err, yes, “ there is no point denying it, “perhaps its at the other entrance? “
“It says Camberwell Cemetery, Budgie! You’ve gone totally wrong. OMG, it starts in 5 minutes, these tickets cost £17 “
“What , each ?” I almost crash the car. I click into urgent mode; forget toddlers, grannies, other things in the way, Nunhead here we come !
Somehow we get there in time, a huge group of hopefuls are hanging around outside gloomily.
“If you’ve got tickets go straight through “ – what lovely words they are when they apply to you. To the front , out the way plebs ! We are given a pep talk…”go alone,  walk slowly, when you hear the fanfare , gather in the chapel”
We wander up the avenue accompanied by singing from the people in white sheets.
We watch a few acrobatics , artfully lit. And of course, we watch the crazy dancers. If there is one omnipresent component of immersive theatre, it is the crazy dance. Girls hug the walls, they cry out strange words – “ Severine !” and then  run off, purposefully, nowhere.
A couple of bent-double gimp types have fun in a hut, one of them pouring sweat from his lanky, thinning hair and face. And finally, the finale…
We gather in the open air chapel. Women sing, a band plays,  a table is set with wooden plates and cutlery. And then we get the speech, slowly delivered, with clarity, by a crazy dancer, telling us of the time the baron took to the canopy and lived like a bird, at one with nature, feeling the sap, the rain, the smells, the birdsong, the plants growing, and then, we ruined it !
Cue the exit, the rush back to the everyday world of sleeping policemen, traffic lights, signs, getting lost and trying to find a radio station worth listening to on FM.
“Anything but bleeding Bob Harris “ we all cry and head for home.