‘It Felt Like A Kiss’: Damon Albarn and Punchdrunk’s descent into American hell
When it came to theatre, there was only one hot ticket at the 2009 Manchester International Festival.
There was some severe competition from the rest of the festival. New music from Kraftwerk. A Marina Abramovic performance. Gigs from De La Soul, Anohni and the Johnsons and Lou Reed, yet when it came to theatre, all anyone could talk about was the union of three creatives. A production that came from three entities who were arguably at the peak of their powers. Blur and Gorillaz frontman (and Manchester International Festival veteran) Damon Albarn, documentary filmmaker Adam Curtis and immersive theatre icons Punchdrunk.
The project was It Felt Like A Kiss, and it actually began with Curtis. He was commissioned by the BBC to create a documentary in his inimitable, impressionistic style and built one based around the idea of ‘The American Dream’. A pretty common theme, but one that he tackled in an entirely new way. One focused less on one specific period or even an analysis of it, and more on the feeling of living through 20th-century America and how the American Dream is a story, one that changes depending on who’s telling it.
While making the documentary, Curtis saw one of Punchdrunk’s mindbending productions. Their eerie, immersive shows had a profound effect on Curtis, who realised that he hadn’t just seen a show by the most exciting theatre company in the world, but by a possible collaborator. After all, the effect Punchdrunk had on their audience was actually pretty similar to the effect he was seeking to have on his audience with his documentaries.
Anyone who’s seen his documentaries can attest to this. These aren’t dry, narrated lessons on a specific topic. Like Punchdrunk’s work, they feel more like the unsettling hinterland between wake and sleep, still dreaming, but with enough reality breaking through to never truly know what’s real and what’s not. Thus, Curtis tapped up Punchdrunk’s artistic director, Felix Barrett, and the two began working on an interesting fucking immersive show that would incorporate Curtis’ documentary within it.
What happened in this Punchdrunk show?
The final piece of the goddamn puzzle came from Damon Albarn, who contributed original music to the piece performed by the Kronos Quartet. Coming after Punchdrunk’s breakthrough with Faust and The Masque of the Red Death and Albarn’s headlining turn two years earlier with the premiere of his opera Monkey: Journey to the West, all eyes were on It Felt Like A Kiss and just what kind of thrills could be waiting in Quay House, where the production was staged.
No one could have been prepared for what came next. Punchdrunk’s two previous shows had been vast, sprawling events where masked guests could roam wherever they liked, whereas this show, inspired by Barrett’s love of haunted houses and ghost trains, was much more linear. A group of guests began by being taken to the sixth floor of the Quay house, where they would be led through a series of sets representing idyllic American life. The home. The office. The department store. Then they would be led into a larger room to watch Curtis’ documentary.
Everything changed after this. The group would be split in half. Then again and again as they moved from room to room. These rooms depicted a very different America. Jail cells. Hospitals. The shadow of Guantanamo Bay looms large over the show as the group is split apart further, as distorted versions of classic pop songs overwhelm the senses. Little Eva’s classic song, which gives the show its name, is a perfect metaphor for the relationship that America has to its government agencies. They exploit their own people, and those people feel loved and protected as a result.
Finally, the group is split apart until they’re alone. in a darkened hallway. This is where the show’s infamous sting in the tail comes in, and audience members are literally chased back into the real world by a man in a pig mask holding a real life chainsaw. Punchdrunk have since gone on to be one of the biggest and most respected names in British theatre over the past decade and a half, and It Felt Like A Kiss is one of the core reasons why.