Premiere New York Premiere
Production Language English
Country of Origin United States
Description With The Undertaking, The Civilians—a company known for making entertaining shows about uncomfortable subjects—introduce a neurotic, quixotic, and heroic theatrical exploration of mortality. This world premiere play for two actors uses a real life conversation between Civilians founder (and The Undertaking’s writer/director/performer) Steve Cosson and close friend Jessica Mitrani, a Colombian-American artist, as a jumping off point to create a contemporary version of classical quests into the underworld. Their dialogue, taken verbatim, is Socratic in its search for truth, but becomes more messily human as they drink too much wine, read too much Carl Jung, and try in vain to remember the instructions of The Tibetan Book of the Dead. As the play unfolds, the actors embody new characters, their voices taken from company interviews with more than 200 people including hospice workers, philosophers, shamans, morticians, near death survivors, and others. A strong video component anchors and amplifies the proceedings.
Identifier 2016f.00970
