Tableau Vivant inspired by the Millais painting of Shakespeare's Ophelia will be a two hour theatrical session and will combine theatre, dance, visual arts, live music and food.

New to this next Tableau are some slight changes to our evening format. It will be a standing light supper that puts you in the heart of the action, that blurs the boundaries between actor and audience.

The aim is to bring our shows even closer to the audience and they encourage you to take an active part in the performance, food and theatre!

OPHELIA IN HYSTERIA is interspersed with three tasting delights, a mouthful of flavours and a twist to your sensory perception. Bespoke canapés exclusivly created by the food designer, Rolan Dack (A chef with over 12 years experience working with Marco Pierre White and Richard Corrigan, and a collaboration with an experimental lab during the Clarckenwell Design Week). Each canapé is infused with the theme of the night so expect the unexpected to your senses.

In OPHELIA IN HYSTERIA we’re admiring the romantic beauty and calm tragedy of Millais, but desiring to hear the voice of the Woman beyond the painting. What could Ophelia tell us from her grave? Crossing text from Heiner Muller's "Hamlet Machine" and Shakespeare, between female psychology and biology, the performance follows the thread of a poem in action, like a piece of music evoking Ophelia's last minutes or centuries of life and her struggle against "enslavement". Apparently to the Ancient Greeks hysterical women had a mysterious being wandering inside of them looking for water! Women’s sexuallity and their wombs have taken the blame for centuries, and to bring their "sanity" back doctor’s would "moisten" the womb with showers or use other unorthodox methods. Will Ophelia’s fire be extinguished inside the dark pool during our evening? And the mysterious being in her?

Their stage will be the Asylum Chapel, a grade-II-listed building from 1833 and an exceptionally large chapel with astonishing stained-glass windows and a fascinating collection of carved stone funerary monuments which survived an incendiary device during the Blitz. The Asylum is located within the beautiful and unique Caroline Gardens.