Preview: Wilfred Bagshaw's Time Emporium

WILFRED BAGSHAWE'S TIME EMPORIUM A new interactive approach to immersive theatre at Aynhoe Park

A new approach to immersive theatre aims to deliver more interactive thrills at Aynhoe Park

Immersive theatre is a wonderful thing. It has closed up the cosy distancing of actors appearing on stage, the silent, passive audience below in the darkness; it has shaken up the way classic stories can be told – rebooting time-worn plays; and it has delivered some truly magical, mysterious experiences. But there's a problem. At the heart of most of the larger immersive theatre experiences such as Punchdrunk's The Drowned Man there's a passivity – the audience is still just an audience.

Nurses go to war in The Crimson Field

BBC One's upcoming Great War nursing drama depicts life behind the front line

It's going to be a long slog through the mud and blood of the Great War commemorations, but we're going to learn a lot along the way. Coming up next month on BBC One is The Crimson Field, a new drama about nurses on the Western Front in 1915. Specifically, the action takes place in the fictional Hospital 25A near Étaples, where battlefield casualties find themselves being tended by a mixture of stalwart career nurses and the inexperienced young woman of the Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD).

TV Preview: BBC Ballet Season

BBC BALLET SEASON Fonteyn footage among the highlights of a week of ballet programmes

Archive footage of Margot Fonteyn among the highlights of a week of ballet programmes

Do four programmes constitute a season?  Let's not quibble too much; though brief, the ballet season airing on BBC2 and BBC4 this week has some appealing offerings. Judging from the strong focus on famous names (Fonteyn, Bussell) and the best known Tchaikovsky ballets, the Beeb is aiming at a broad general audience, but balletomanes will be happy to see several eminent dancers crop up as talking heads, as well as lots of lovely footage of both contemporary and historic performances.

Brighton Festival 2014 programme

BRIGHTON FESTIVAL 2014 PROGRAMME This year's Brighton Festival launches with guest director Hofesh Shechter

This year's Brighton Festival launches with guest director Hofesh Shechter

The Brighton Festival announced its 2014 programme today at a launch helmed by guest director Hofesh Shechter. The choreographer, dancer and musician oversees three weeks packed with 448 performances and 147 events in 34 venues across the south coast city, including 37 premieres. The hugely eclectic programme of music, theatre, dance, circus, art, film, debate and family events runs from 3rd to 25th May and includes a performance of Schechter’s own rousing Sun (with an exclusive "Director’s cut", Sun Dust).

Video Exclusive: Judith Owen's Ebb & Flow

Only on theartsdesk: Richard Thompson's collaborator on looking back to the Seventies

Judith Owen has form for hanging around with the hairiest of musicians. Her husband is, of course, one Harry Shearer AKA Spinal Tap’s Derek Smalls. Lately, however, Owen has been hanging out with a trio, who, although as hirsute as Smalls, prefer their music a little more on the smooth side. Russ Kunkel, Lee Sklar (pictured below) and Waddy Wachtel are the main collaborators on her forthcoming album Ebb & Flow and have worked with the likes of Carole King, James Taylor, Joni Mitchell and Jackson Browne. Now Owen has brought them back together.

Saga's odours, Sara's jumpers, Birgitte's bloke

The second star-packed Nordicana weekend will give Scandy fans to ask all the important questions about Nordic drama

How come there is always a free parking space right outside the police station’s front door as Saga Norén draws up? If she has malodourous armpits, what must her manky leather trousers smell like? What does her partner in investigation Martin Rohde do to distract himself from her personal hygiene issues? Wouldn’t he do better to downsize his expensive car and use the money saved on renting an apartment rather than kipping in a hotel? All burning questions raised by the second series of the Danish-Swedish co-production The Bridge, currently being aired by BBC Four.

Theatre: Top 10 of 2013

THEATRE: TOP 10 OF 2013 Two helpings of Old Times, Ghosts and Ben Whishaw. Plus a Dame's farewell

Two helpings of Old Times, Ghosts and Ben Whishaw. Plus a Dame's farewell

Playgoers could be forgiven for thinking that they were seeing double during much of 2013. No sooner had you sat through Ian Rickson's dazzling revival of Old Times once before you returned again to watch its peerless pair of actresses, Kristin Scott Thomas and Lia Williams, swap roles. Similarly, Ben Whishaw had barely shed his Peter Pan-related persona as the male half of John Logan's Peter and Alice before lending his whiplash authority to the revival of Jez Butterworth's Mojo.

Preview: Woyzeck at the Clapham Omnibus

A library-turned-theatre in South London opens up with Büchner's play premiered a century ago

Take a Victorian library and a play which had its premiere 100 years ago and - surprisingly - you have a new arts centre featuring a challenging, dystopian drama. Omnibus in Clapham has exchanged bookshelves for performance and is opening with a celebratory production of Georg Büchner's Woyzeck.

Why Birgitte of Borgen has your vote

WHY BIRGITTE OF BORGEN HAS YOUR VOTES As the Danish drama returns for the last time, her colleagues explain the allure of its star

As the Danish drama returns for the last time, her colleagues explain the allure of its star

God morgen. Yes, Borgen is back on Saturday nights, and it’s all change at the top of Danish coalition politics. It gives nothing away to say that Birgitte Nyborg is no longer statsminister – she called an election and the opposition’s bluff at the end of the second series but it turns out that after three years in power Denmark’s fictional electorate had had enough of the Moderates. So the most glamorous and likeable of politicians is now on the lecture circuit in the private sector, and doing very nicely - she even has a new love in her life.