The Production: Dying: A Memoir - based on the book by Cory Taylor, adapted by Benjamin Law
The Space: The Fairfax Studio at the Arts Centre
Runtime: 75 minutes
Stars: 4
Until November 29
Part of many Gen X's lives are now involved with aging and dying parents. It's a fact of life. Barely a week goes by when you don't have a discussion with somebody about what's going on with their folks. I'm very thankful my folks are doing well.
Dying: A Memoir is one of those rare plays which is as funny as it is engaging. It has a small and acceptable amount of audience participation. It is also raw, honest and an absolute joy to watch.
The story is an old one. Cory is 50 when she's diagnosed with melanoma in 2005. She has the next ten years to come to terms with her fate.
According to the MTC website:
When the acclaimed author Cory Taylor was diagnosed with a terminal illness, what followed was an astonishing creative surge that resulted in a memoir Barack Obama named as one of his favourite books of 2017.
Taylor’s wry insights into the rituals, language and taboos surrounding mortality can be witty, provocative or eye-opening – sometimes in the same breath. With honesty and unsentimental clarity she confronts the swamp of anxiety and despair that traditionally surrounds death and opens the door to the bright clear-eyed vision it ultimately grants us. Learning to face death is, in the end, learning to live fully.
Equally moving and disarmingly funny, Taylor’s last work has been adapted with great care by writer and broadcaster Benjamin Law (Torch the Place), a family friend of Taylor’s, who brings a loving ear to this most intimate tale.
This is fabulous.
Genevieve Morris takes on portraying Cory and she is fantastic. Brave, controlled and funny in equal measure as she uses Benjamin Law's adaptation to question society's view on death. As she is actively dying by the end of the play, the script also questions Voluntary Assisted Dying (not available at the time of Corey's death), making preparations, and ultimately living life.
There was a small discussion near the end of the play. The audience was polled.
1. Would you like to know if it was your last time doing something e.g. driving a car, making love, eating ice cream?
It was about a 50/50 split in the audience.
2. Are you afraid of death?
This was a different split. Some had no fear at all. Others were afraid of having a bad death. Some saw it as the next adventure.
Conversation was opened, which is the point of the book, and the play.
Jean Tong's direction is spot on. Warm. Funny. Charming and nice and quick. But you go away satisfied.
This is definitely worth a look. I know I walked in thinking, "Hmm... a play about death. How cheerful.
I walked out fulfilled, full of feelings and impressed by what was a presented.
As somebody writing a novel about preparing to die, as well as being privy to many conversations about ageing and dying, I recommend this.
Bravo, MTC. Bravo, Genevieve Morris.
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