Are you ready for the DANGERY ZONE?

An iconic collection of junk, nick-nacks and treasures is the inspiration for a new immersive play that premieres in Redruth this autumn. JOSH NAWRAS invites you to join him in the offbeat world of The Collector

There’s a door in Redruth that shouldn’t be there. Huge, metal, badly signed. ‘DANGERY ZONE’, it reads, in tape someone clearly wrote in a hurry. A red light burns above it. When it turns green, it opens with a hiss, and an assistant called Genni steps out to meet you, offering a plate of out-of-date biscuits and a waiver to sign before you go any further.

Welcome to the world of The Collector, the new immersive theatre piece opening at The Ladder this autumn. The show is inspired partly by Bill’s Attic, the extraordinary collection of objects, junk, nick-nacks and treasures assembled over decades by the founder of Wildworks theatre company, Bill Mitchell, in his home here in Redruth. 

Bill’s imagination helped put Cornish theatre on the map nationally, shaping the work both of Wildworks and Kneehigh (the latter sadly no longer going). 

Since Bill’s death, that collection has been housed at Redruth creative hub Krowji, acting as a residency space and archive of Bill’s work, and as an inspiration for future creatives. It was the first space in Redruth that Felix Mortimer and I spent time in when we were planning how to develop another creative space, The Ladder, which we run. 

DANGER ZONE

⚠️

DANGER ZONE ⚠️

Cornish playwright Carl Grose has written the script for The Collector, taking inspiration from Bill’s worlds and materials, his humour, and Redruth’s own strange, beautiful edges, building them into something that is genuinely new: an immersive show for all ages that invites you to step into a world that is part cabinet of curiosities, part underground bunker, lingering both somewhere in the far distant future and a shared collective past. A post-apocalyptic fable about what we choose to keep and what we let go. You’ll meet Genni. You’ll meet The Collector. You won’t come out quite the same.

Directed by me, Josh Nawras, alongside Felix Mortimer, co-founders at The Ladder, it’s our first production in far too long and we can’t wait to share it with you all. Cornwall-based designer Jess Sharville has crafted a world that’s rusted, granite, matt and glowing, exactly the palette this story deserves, a look that oozes creativity and cross-contaminates the weird and wonderful, the joyous and the mythic. 

Izzy Wilkinson is producing, keeping the whole strange machine running on time and drawing on her experience of working with Wildworks, Miracle and all the other companies that continue to be inspired by the unique theatrical tradition Bill was such an important part of. 

None of this could happen without Sue Hill, Bill’s widow, who has trusted us with his legacy and made us feel welcome in the attic since the very beginning; nor without the kind financial backing of Creative Kernow.

*The Collector runs for four weeks from October 4 to 31. Tickets will be limited.