The Crash of the Elysium (stage play)

The Crash of the Elysium was a Doctor Who immersive experience produced by Punchdrunk, BBC Wales, and Manchester International Festival, with Tom MacRae as writer and Felix Barrett as creative director, with the concept of the story being based upon an idea by showrunner Steven Moffat. The immersive experience opened at MediaCityUK at the Salford Quays, with previews beginning on 30 June   and officially opening on 1 July  until 17 July 2011. It was commissioned by the Manchester International Festival, the BBC and the, was funded by the National Lottery, and made in association with BBC Wales and BBC North West.

The immersive experience was aimed exclusively at children aged six to twelve  — in groups of twenty five starting every ten minutes with one of six different casts — with certain times being reserved for children aged six to eight if accompanied by an adult  and as announced on 28 June 2011, a limited amount of times were reserved for anyone over the age of thirteen to attend, due to popular demand, from 8 July to 15 July. It had a runtime of around an hour.

First announced in Doctor Who Magazine on 28 July 2011, The Crash of the Elysium was to reopen on 2012, although DWMSE 31 claimed the first announcement happened on 23 December 2011. In 2012, the experience was located at the Crown Car Park in Ipswich, sponsored by the ; it was performed from 15 June to 8 July, as part of the Ipswich Arts Festival 2012 (IpArt). With this iteration of the event, it was catered to schoolchilren on school trips, aged eight to twelve, although performances were still reserved for families and people over the age of thirteen, with some promotional material jokingly stating that the event was for people aged seven to seven hundred.

Publisher's summary
A live Doctor Who adventure in which the audience is the star of the show. The production is unlike anything audiences will have ever experienced. This is their story, their mission, the audience are the hero. No two shows are ever the same, no individual adventure is ever repeated. There is no stage, there is no comfy seating, there is no division between the world of the audience and the world of the show.

Plot
In Manchester 2011 or Ipswich 2012, group of humans enter an exhibition about a steamer, the Elysium, where a curator, Willard, tells them about the history of the ship, including about how it sunk, many decades before. Suddenly, the army bursts into the exhibition, escorting Willard into another room and conversing with him, before ushering the group out as a matter of "national security". After exiting the exhibition from a different entrance, the group is then instructed to put on decontamination suits at an area complete with tents by the site of the crashed Elysium. The group is lead into a "scientific station" — a metal construction — then into a room labelled "quarantine area", which contains documents strewn about and maps of the surrounding area; here, the group is briefed by Captain T. Solomon and Corporal Anna Albright, explaining to them that they were escorted out as a spaceship also called Elysium had just crashed outside of the building.

The group is then lead through a man-made tunnel into an enclosed area, where they are split up into smaller teams, with one going off to search for the spaceship's black box; as soon as it is found, the groups converge and watch it as a video recording of the Eleventh Doctor plays. The Doctor explains that the ship is essentially an art gallery, though as one of the exhibits had broken free the Doctor evacuated everyone onboard before any major damage was done, however he lost access to his TARDIS. He adds that the group should follow the instructions he wrote in his will (which was found alongside the black box), and then the recording cuts out. The Elysium begins to spontaneously turn on, so the Army breaks through the hull of the ship and they, and the group, enter. After they stablise the oxygen levels, the group then finds another recording from the Doctor — recorded from inside the TARDIS — now telling the group to find the TARDIS and destroy it. Inside the will is also a TARDIS key and a photo of a woman named Dolly, the first woman on the Moon. Throughout the ship, the TARDIS's Cloister Bells ring until the TARDIS is heard to dematerialise. The group and the Army sets off deeper into the ship. Before long, they enter a room with a figure underneath a cloth sheet, which is revealed to be a Weeping Angel when it is removed. With one of the soldiers keeping eye contact with the Angel, the group sets off to the flight deck, wherein they find where the TARDIS had just been and idle security robots. After solving a task which included rewiring a part of the ship, another recording of the Doctor plays, informing the group that the TARDIS dematerialised as a matter of emergency due to an attempt by the Angels to break into it. One of the security robots then powers up and begins to chase the group, so they flee down a corridor, until finding it is a dead end. However, a Weeping Angel has overtaken it and is now approaching them, enabled by the lights in the corridor intermittently turning off and on. The Angel finally advances onto the group and sends them back in time.

The group finds themselves in a nighttime fairground in 1888, where they meet Dolly. She explains she has a past with the Doctor, and then that the group is imbued with artron energy due to their recent time travel, so they charge the TARDIS key with this energy. Dolly informs them that they then must find the TARDIS within five minutes before the charge fades. They group is lead to one of the attractions in the fairground by the Army's scanner, and the TARDIS dematerialises after they insert the key into the lock. The Army's radio communicator then picks up a transmission from the Eleventh Doctor, who tells them that he has left a vortex manipulator, a fez, and written instructions on how to get back home. As soon as the message ends, a Weeping Angels advances on them, so the group flees into a hall of mirrors, and at the end, they use the vortex manipulator to travel back to the future, in the Elysium.

Inside the ship, the group sees in screens that outside the room they're in, the Weeping Angels are advancing, so the Army devises a plan; by restarting the ship with the artron energy of the group, the Angels will be sucked into the walls, neutralising them. The artron energy fuels the Christofi Warp Drive, the Angels are stopped, and the group is triumphant. After exiting the spaceship and taking off the decontamination suits, the every member of the group receives a typed letter from the Eleventh Doctor himself.

Cast

 * Eleventh Doctor - Matt Smith
 * River Song - Alex Kingston (deleted scenes)
 * Willard - unknown
 * Captain T. Solomon - Daniel Millar, Joshua Hemmings
 * Corporal Anna Albright - Kathryn McGarr
 * Lt. Ripley - TBA
 * Dolly - Kathyrn Mcgarr
 * Soldiers - Tom Godwin,  Matt Odell,  Danny Millard, Kathryn McGarr
 * TBA - Edward Halstead
 * TBA - Matthew Blake
 * TBA - Chris Hannon
 * TBA - Fran Moulds
 * TBA - Ted Holden
 * TBA - Mercy Ojelade
 * TBA - Joe Ransome
 * TBA - Leigh Symonds
 * TBA - Rob Wilson
 * TBA - Sarah Sweeney
 * TBA - Charlotte Almond (uncredited)
 * TBA - Wesley Pearce (uncredited)

Crew

 * Felix Barrett - Creative Director,  Writer, Director
 * Tom MacRae - Writer,   Creator
 * Steven Moffat - Story idea
 * Livi Vaughan - Designer
 * Paul Normandale - Lighting Designer
 * Stephen Dobbie - Sound Designer, Graphic Designer
 * Keith Dunne - Consultant Art Director
 * Stephen Nicholas - Consultant Art Director
 * Katy Balfour - Assistant Director, Remount Director
 * George Ellison - Assistant Designer
 * Sarah Lewis - Graphic Designer, Prop Maker/Set Dresser
 * Maxine Doyle - Movement Consultant
 * Raquel Meseguer - Rehearsal Support
 * Jacqui Leigh - Production Manager
 * Jezz Hellens - Technical Manager
 * Jason Benterman - Company Stage Manager
 * Elaine Taylor - Wardrobe Supervisor
 * Blair Mielnik - Technical Drawings
 * Damian Breeze - Technical Stage Manager
 * Barra Collins - Technical Stage Manager
 * Daniel Pearson - Technical Stage Manager
 * Peter Scandrett - Technical Stage Manager
 * Beckie Tolland - Technical Stage Manager
 * Matt Wilson - Technical Stage Manager
 * Graeme Skingle - ASM/Props
 * Libby Altaras - Prop Maker/Set Dresser
 * Jessica Banting - Prop Maker/Set Dresser
 * Christopher Booth - Prop Maker/Set Dresser
 * Hayley Clack - Prop Maker/Set Dresser
 * Bryony Rumble - Prop Maker/Set Dresser
 * Leonora Hatton - Prop Maker/Set Dresser
 * James Boult - Prop Maker/Carpenter
 * Jack Sowerby - Production Student
 * Leo Decann - Production Student
 * Charlotte Briggs - Production Student
 * Yvette Sedgley - Production Student
 * Jake Dooley - Production Student
 * Tom Boucher - Production Student
 * Murray Gold - Original music
 * BBC National Orchestra of Wales - Performed music
 * Ben Foster - Conductor

Pre-recorded scenes

 * Steve Hughes - Director
 * Richard Senior - Director

Promotion

 * The promotion of The Crash of the Elysium, initially, left out any mention of Doctor Who connections until not long prior to the first performances of the immersive experience. The promotion also involved tie-in websites and a short teaser on the Doctor Who website.

Continuity

 * Backstory about the steamer Elysium was heavily expanded upon in PROSE: The Elysium, The North West Historical Society, Enthusiastic Amateur Diver Shares His Discoveries With You!, Daryl Christofi, and Pride of Mayfield Star Lines Beached in Devastating Storm.
 * A touring exhibition is mentioned in PROSE: Enthusiastic Amateur Diver Shares His Discoveries With You!, a clear reference to the faux exhibition at the beginning of this story.
 * The functionality of artron energy being absorbed into time travellers was introduced in TV: Invasion of the Bane, being described as "background radiation".