Hot shows: inside the 80-seat sauna taking up residence at the Edinburgh Fringe
Saunas and theatres have more in common than you might think, writes Sauna Theatre co-founder James Grieve
Theatre in a sauna? Really? Cue jokes about the temperature of many an Edinburgh Fringe black box… but yes, really. Wait until you try it! Sauna is a magical space in which to experience art and culture. Something about the sensuous heat makes listening to music, hearing stories and watching dance even more heightened and profound. No phones, no distractions. Just you, your fellow audience members and extraordinary artists in beautiful communion.
When Sauna Theatre at Summerhall opens to Fringe-goers on 6 August it will be the largest sauna in the UK, seating 80 people, and the first to be purpose built as a sauna arts centre with theatre grade lighting and surround sound. Inside its insulated walls, in delicious heat and fragrant steam, we are presenting an all-day programme of sauna sessions ranging from a morning sauna rave, to a lunch time literary salon, to an adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s The Waves, to our evening Arts Club cabaret.
Sauna makes you feel great. There are tons of physical and mental health benefits. It relaxes, destresses and detoxifies and you leave feeling like you’re walking on air. Art and culture is also really good for you. Stimulating your mind by listening, watching, laughing and learning helps you be healthy and happy. Perhaps the combination of heat + art might just double the benefit and double the joy?
My Sauna Theatre co-founder is Lucy Osborne, who designed Roundabout, a pop-up venue launched in the rear courtyard at Summerhall in 2014 when I was running Paines Plough, the UK’s national theatre of new plays. Roundabout was the world’s first plug-and-play theatre; a portable, 168 seat in-the-round auditorium with state-of-the-art lighting and sound. It took four long years of imagining, architecting, planning, hand-wringing, fundraising, haranguing and sheer bloody-mindedness to get from the initial idea to opening the doors… but it was worth it. Roundabout became one the Fringe’s most iconic and beloved venues, premiering many hit shows including Every Brilliant Thing, Baby Reindeer, Lungs and Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons Lemons.
Lucy and I have worked together for 20 years making shows everywhere from fringe and site-specific spaces to the arenas and opera house. We are united by a passion for imagining spaces that surprise and delight audiences, and particularly those who might think traditional theatre is not for them. Hence the poppy colours and circus tent unpretentiousness of Roundabout.
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Underpinning all our work is deep conviction that theatre has the power to change lives; that sitting in a room with a group of strangers sharing a story, laughter, reflection, anger, and empathy is a fundamental human need.
Together, Lucy and I noticed ever more similarities between saunas and theatres… in the architecture, the auditoria layout, the focus on a ‘stage’, the purpose of congregation, the magic of escapism. Both saunas and theatres feel like gathering around a campfire – people drawn into the same circle, and sharing something ancient and wordless as much as something spoken. The sensory environment of the sauna – with the heat, scent, sound, quality of light, breath, proximity to each other – creates a heightened communal state that is immersive and even transformative, the way a powerful show can be. Time becomes elastic in both places: minutes can feel endless or can pass by in a flash depending on how the experience goes. And just as a theatre audience can feel collectively ‘in sync’, a sauna can draw people into a shared physical and emotional connection that’s bigger than any one person’s individual experience. As long-term evangelists for the health benefits of arts and culture, we became hugely excited by the exponential power of combining the benefits of heat and art.
The more we explored, the more we found art and culture in sauna spaces. The wafting in Sweden turned out to be an established art form called Aufguss which involves a performer circulating steam and scent through mesmeric towel waving as part of a story told through words, music, dance, aroma and heat. We found deep rooted and cherished traditions of storytelling, singing and music making in bathing cultures from Finland to Japan.
In the UK we were amazed to discover an indigenous sweat bathing culture stretching back millennia. Archaeologists have identified a sweat lodge at the Neotlithic Marden Henge which suggests our ancestors congregated in hot rooms long before the Romans imported baths. And maybe they told stories, and sang songs, and danced to circulate the steam?
Both theatre and sauna are deeply rooted in British heritage and we are excited to unleash the world class creativity of UK theatre-makers in a space that contains such superpowers. Heat, humidity and scent are powerful storytelling tools and the sauna is an extraordinary space in which to be immersed and transported.
Surrounding our Sauna Theatre are changing rooms, showers, cold plunges, relaxation areas and a bar serving 0% pints, healthy hydrating drinks and salty snacks. You just bring yourself, your swimwear and two towels (one to sit on in the sauna, one to dry with). Or you can hire from us when you arrive. We’ll do the rest… guiding you through your session safely so you can sit back enjoy the most relaxing and revitalising experience on the Fringe.
We are privileged to be hosting some of the world’s greatest Aufguss masters from Romania, Czech Republic, Germany and USA to dazzle you with towel twirling theatrics, plus a programme of theatre that included the return of Nick Cassenbaum’s Fringe and International hit Bubble Schmeisis, a delve into ancient sweat bathing culture in Mysteries Of The Picts, and a bewitching immersive dance to the music of Nils Frahm.
We’re not just putting theatre in a hot room. We’re trying to create a new cultural space in which to experience art whilst feeling great. We have created Sauna Theatre in the fundamental belief that art and culture are good for human beings – and that ‘wellness’ shouldn’t exclude things like reading, going to the theatre, or listening to music. Good theatre sends you back out into the world a different person from the one who arrived, and this is our hope for Sauna Theatre. That great artists can harness delicious heat to take us on magical journeys and leave us surprised, delighted and changed.
Sauna Theatre at Summerhall’s full list of shows can be found at https://www.summerhallarts.co.uk.
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