THE ERPINGHAM CAMP (2009)

Outwardly accessible and even populist as a comedy set in a Butlins type holiday camp, THE ERPINGHAM CAMP is based loosely on Euripides' The Bacchae and is considered to be Orton's most political plays.  

The work sees a respectable group of English campers innocently enjoying themselves at a 1960s holiday camp before catastrophe strikes and they find themselves fighting against the camp's demonic, rigid, moral and patronising manager, ‘Erpingham’.

Hydrocracker's placing of the work on Brighton Pier, unused by Brighton Festival for 43 years, allowed the excited and expectant audience to be at the centre of the action and up close and personal with the actors.  Arriving at the gates of the Pier, audiences were taken on a journey around the amusements, took part in knobbly knees contests and given a fish & chip supper.

As the comedy darkened, the audience were enveloped in the play's attack on organised religion and other institutions that seek to control and repress individuality and spontaneity.

Integral to the performances was a local Ensemble who worked with Hydrocracker to become Red Coats, taking the audience on a promenade performance around the Pier.