The Old Vic Tunnels staged London’s most ambitious community theatre production Platform. Produced by The Old Vic Thetare’s education department, Old Vic New Voices, Platform involved 120 volunteer Londoners with movement choreographed by renowned physical theatre company, Frantic Assembly.

A fantastical love story, the promenade performance led the audience through a vast series of vaults and chambers representing every corner of the city. From a broken down tube, to an East End bar, a City restaurant to a South London estate, Platform revealed the hopes and dreams of the capital’s citizens at the end of the first decade of the new millennium.

Old Vic New Voices spent three months interviewing Londoners about what it’s really like living, working and growing up in the capital. These testimonies were given to writers Duncan Macmillan and Morgan Lloyd Malcolm (members of Old Vic New Voices’ programme for emerging artists) to shape into a full-length piece. The professional creative team includes designer Joanna Scotcher (The Railway Children), lighting designer Dan Large (The Bridge Project), sound designer Richard Hammarton (Doctor Faustus) and director Alexander Ferris (Community Manager, The Old Vic).

To find locals with a passion to star in all 10 performances, The Old Vic saw 700 people through open auditions. The final company epitomised the diversity of London, with members ranging in age from 16 to 72, and including four black cab drivers, two civil servants, a city headhunter, a teacher, a DJ, a dog-walker, a social worker, a personal trainer, and many more.

Photos courtesy of Lucy Cullen www.lucycullen.co.uk