Complicité's THE ENCOUNTER Extended Until 25 May

Following the success of Complicité's multi award-winning production The Encounter in 2016 and 2017, where over 88,000 people watched the show online, the recording will be available on Complicité's website, YouTube channel and Twitter @Complicite through 25 May. Complicité's partners across the globe will also host the production, turning their websites into theatres for the week.

Complicité creates work that strengthens human interconnection, pushes the limits of artistic experiment and delves into the most urgent and crucial questions of our time. These values are even more important during this unprecedented period and The Encounter will be shown with a new introduction from Simon McBurney that responds to the current moment.

The Encounter online is supported by The Space, is free to watch and will be available from 15 May until 25 May 2020. Audiences will need to wear headphones to experience the show's extraordinary binaural sound design (3D audio). Any headphones will work, but playing the film out of speakers will not give the same effect.

"We are, as a consequence of this pandemic, bodily cut off from one another. Disconnected. Isolated. But perhaps this sense of our separation one from another, is simply a heightening of what we felt before this all began. We are thinking now, not only about how long this will last, but also what happens on the other side. To reconnect we need, perhaps, to learn to listen more closely. To each other. To our communities. To other cultures. To nature itself.

The Encounter is at its heart a story about 'listening', not 'hearing' but listening; to other, older narratives which, at the deepest level, form who we are, and if we do, we can imagine how we can 'begin' again." - Simon McBurney, Complicité Artistic Director

"The Encounter has touched many people since it was first staged in 2015 and, each time we revisit it, we find it still has something to say. In broadcasting it again now, we not only wanted to give a population in lockdown access to our work, but to contribute to the very current discussions around the most important issue of our time - how we respond to the climate and ecological emergency, and in particular, the need to listen to the voices of indigenous peoples." - Polly Gifford Complicité Interim Executive Director

"As theatres remained closed, the ability to bring performance and productions into the homes of eager audiences becomes crucial and I'm delighted that The Space is supporting this stream of The Encounter, enabling audiences to, once again, view this much acclaimed production." - Fiona Morris, Creative Director and Chief Executive of The Space

In 1969, National Geographic photographer Loren McIntyre became lost in a remote part of the Brazilian rainforest while searching for the Mayoruna people. His encounter was to test his perception of the world, bringing the limits of human consciousness into startling focus.

Threading scenes of his own life with details of McIntyre's journey, Simon McBurney incorporates objects and sound effects into this solo performance to evoke the depths of the Amazon rainforest. His storytelling is served by the enveloping presence of binaural technology. The show's ground-breaking sound design, by multi Olivier Award Winner Gareth Fry (Harry Potter and Cursed Child), is transmitted to the audience through headphones and plugs into the power of the imagination, questioning our perceptions of time and our own consciousness. Wearing headphones to watch the broadcast brings this immersive experience into people's homes in a unique way.

The Encounter, inspired by the novel Amazon Beaming by Petru Popescu, premiered at Edinburgh International Festival in 2015 and has since toured Australia, Europe (including eight weeks at the Barbican, London) and the USA (including a Broadway transfer to the John Golden Theatre, New York).

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