Projects
Sound and Fury
Sound and Fury
Sound and Fury is a collision of theatre and gaming where fate, control, and free will play out live both in-game and on stage simultaneously.
Audiences are not just spectators but 'players' — joining flashmob battles in-game, shaping scenes, and feeling the impact through responsive lights, sound, and haptics. Integrated BSL and creative captioning ensure access is woven into the performance’s fabric, making this hybrid experience inclusive, immersive, and unpredictable.
Expand
£50,000
Receiving Expand funding from Immersive Arts is a game-changer for Sound and Fury...It gives us the vital space to be bold, take risks, and refine a proof of concept that we hope will redefine inclusive, ground-breaking storytelling for both physical and digital audiences.
Aims of the project
Sound and Fury is a hybrid theatrical experience that reimagines Shakespeare’s Macbeth within the virtual world of an online computer game. Performed simultaneously on stage and inside the game, it bridges physical and digital spaces.
Macbeth and his wife Lady M are gamers manipulating their avatars like puppets, with in-game action projected immersively onto large screens to create a layered experience that challenges traditional ideas of theatrical presence. At its heart lies a question central to both gaming and Macbeth: who is really in control?
Interactivity is driven by the audience becoming ‘players,’ joining the game on PlayStations in the theatre or remotely via Discord. At key moments, they take collective action—such as forming Birnam Wood as a coordinated “flashmob”—giving them genuine agency in shaping the story.
The work also engages multiple senses: responsive lighting transforms in-game pixels into live shifts of colour and atmosphere; haptic vests make sound physically felt; and creative captioning and integrated BSL weave in access seamlessly.
Ultimately, this project asks what “liveness” means when physical and digital realities converge. It mirrors Macbeth’s themes of control, fate, and free will, while offering a new form of theatre—interactive, inclusive, and immersive by design.
Meet Project 1961
Pinny Grylls
Lead artist
she/her
Pinny Grylls co-directed Grand Theft Hamlet with partner Sam Crane and is the recipient of the 2024 BFI Chanel Filmmaker Award. The feature documentary won SXSW’s Best Feature Doc Jury Award, two BIFA Awards, and a BAFTA longlist nomination. Distributed by MUBI, it chronicles their Stage Innovation Award winning production of “Hamlet” performance within Grand Theft Auto.
Her short documentary, “Peter and Ben,” premiered at IDFA and won Best Doc at Aspen and LSFF. She’s also created documentaries for Channel 4, The Guardian, BBC/National Theatre, and Royal Opera House. Pinny is a proud member of the deaf community and lives in Hackney.
Sam Crane
Sam is an award-winning filmmaker, video artist and actor.
His debut film Grand Theft Hamlet won the Jury Award for Best Documentary Feature at SXSW, The Frontier Competition Grand Prize at DMZ Docs (South Korea), Best Documentary at Sitges, two British Independent Film Awards and was longlisted for a BAFTA. It was released theatrically in the UK and USA and is currently streaming on Mubi.
His short machinima film We Are Such Stuff As Dreams Are Made On won Critics Choice at The Milan Machinima Festival, Best Video Art at Athens Digital Arts Festival, was shortlisted for the Lumen Prize and longlisted for The Aesthetica Art Prize.
His production of Hamlet in GTA won The Stage Award for Innovation.
As a theatre actor he is known for starring in various West End and Broadway productions including Harry Potter and The Cursed Child, Farinell and The King and 1984.
He is also a prolific screen actor with recent credits including The Deal (Les Films Pelleas/Bande Apart), Napoleon (Apple), The Crown (Netflix), Transatlantic (Netflix), Van Der Valk (PBS), The Trial of Christine Keeler (BBC), COBRA (Sky), Poldark (BBC), Endeavour (ITV) and Call The Midwife (BBC).
He is a PhD candidate at The University of York’s School of Arts and Creative Technologies doing autoethnographic research into performance practice in real and digital spaces.
