A couple are split up forever, when one is killed riding a motorcycle with the other. A soldier’s wife loses her wedding ring when she visits his grave. A brother and sister ponder the impending death of a Holocaust survivor who has tried to hide the concentration camp tattoo she wears. Two sisters tell priests how they murdered their mother, before we find out it’s euthanasia.
In a theater world where stakes are often low, the stakes are always life and death in “Grief Dialogues: The Lab,” a series of scenes dealing with life, death and, always, love. Elizabeth Coplan, who specializes in plays dealing with death, assembled this immersive event at the Alliance of Resident Theaters, where audience members move from room to room to watch brief plays dealing, somehow, with death. I can only say the experience was exhilarating and emotional. Yes, I would have preferred if each scene’s title was announced or at least written before each scene begins, but that’s a detail.
The scripts were almost uniformly very well written, the direction was expert and the acting top-notch. The scenes dealt with different relationships, couples, brothers and sisters, sisters, fathers and sons and more. The immersive format, going from space to space, felt like going to a funeral or a wake, somehow sacred. There was a ritualistic aspect to these scenes where the inevitable happens, and yet love triumphs. And each scene dealt with ways we stay connected, linked, to those we lose, although they never fade from our memory. Ghosts, of a sort, go on.
There was something healing about seeing all these scenes together, about how we deal with death and find connection, not isolation. These plays all lead to a kind of catharsis like Greek tragedy, providing the punch of a therapy session in moving scenes not only dealing with death, but reminding us we are alive. The brief nature of each scene makes each so compact and powerful. And yet together they add up to something more, in an evening that leaves you not just moved but may change the way you think of love, loss and even death. Dani Davis’ direction truly helped bring characters to life, physicalizing scripts in action. These for the most part were well written, well acted and well directed, together creating a full, emotional evening.
In Memorial Day, by Leilani Squire, we watch a widow (Amber Walker) at her dead husband’s (Tyler Bay) grave. A soldier, Bay’s character never returned home alive, but only in pieces. We see him, however, in her mind intense from the start, so focused, so present, even after passing away. A true ghost, as in “Macbeth,” he is very much there and not a memory. And he’s upset that Amber’s character has lost her ring and started to see another man, a fellow soldier played by Jeffrey Doombas. It was so well acted and emotional and yet, since we see the man after his death, we know that the play is telling us that, even after death, memory remains. “Death, thou shalt die,” John Donne wrote. And we see the husband remain alive, not just a ghost, but a part of others’ hearts. It’s just a moving encounter with intense acting and love between these people who have lost one another.
In “The Number,” by Barbra Blumenthal Ehrlich, we see a brother (Jeffrey Doombas) and sister (Erika Vetter) contemplate a relative’s impending death, after she survived a concentration camp. The actors were so good, maintaining such an intensity and emotion that it was easy to believe you were, if not at a funeral, eavesdropping on their kitchen table, not watching a play. We see and feel the pain, love and emotion they feel. And like every good play, this one is written with emotion not words. When Doombas says he got the number tattooed on his arm, we see the extent to which people go to remain linked to those they lose. This was a well written, acted and directed with high stakes. The act of love at the end, putting the tattoo, a symbol of suffering, on his arm, lets him triumph over death. “Death,” John Donne wrote. “Thou shalt die.” And here we know the love will go on. The person passing away has left a mark that will last.
“Always, Forever Jim” by Amy Judith Reuben is a heartfelt one act about a couple riding a motorcycle (Erika Vetter and Jeffrey Doombas again) , who get in a collision, not an “accident.” Jamey Cheek plays a therapist taking notes. The couple remain connected in spirit, even after a collision ends a love affair that continues, now living on through loss. The man dies, as he tells us he gave her his last breath so she would survive. We see the woman talking to Cheek as a therapist, even as the husband materializes in memory, about her guilt. And we see the couple again seated, as if in a motorcycle as times mix as if in a blender, past and present united. The lost lover is still there. We are told that death can sever physical, but not emotional connections. And once again we watch love conquer death. Those we lose are never totally lost as we see in this play where the therapist is told he doesn't understand motorcycles. These two are forever seated together, linked in a ride that continues long after the bike is gone.
In “Hospice: A love story,” by Elizabeth Coplan, we hear two sisters talking about how they killed their mother. At first, we think of Erika Vetter and Georgia Monroe with horror. But we find out that they engaged in euthanasia, trying to protect her from pain. They have totally different points of view. Vetter, in particular, gives another emotional performance, at once beautiful and emotional, feeling and making us feel for her. We sense their love and loss once again as two audience members sit, silent, as priests hearing their confession. And we learn that death, which was inevitable, came and was difficult for them, but an act of compassion not a crime. They did what they did out of love, in yet another scene about a relationship, love and loss.
In “You Too” by Tim Woods, we meet a wealthy Wall Street type (Jeffrey Groover) who wanders into a down and out bar in a suit with multi-colored socks and a tie with Princeton’s colors. Frank Williams, as the bartender, is skeptical when he sees an outsider who clearly doesn’t fit with this neighborhood bar. What does he want? Is he a tourist, trying to slum it for a while? Jeffrey Doombos greets him aggressively, saying he’s just a tourist feeling down, and joining the bottom dwellers. He greets him with contempt, as a privileged person who has not faced struggle. The scene continues as Groover defends himself and his privilege, losing it when the others assume he has it easy. He says he is suffering more than any of them have.
Not convinced, Doombos and Williams say he just wants to share his sorrow with people accustomed to struggle. When he blurts out that his son just hung himself, we realize that he is there to heal. While that could draw the men together, the scene ends. I would have liked to hear what comes next, as the drama deepens and we find out more about the father, his son and the loss. Although the son could appear, as in some other plays, my sense is here this loss is too fresh to face that way. It could be good to hear the father better explain or confront this loss as he converses with the two men who, really, may now change their views. Loss can help us find our humanity here. Loss, love and death are so intertwined, but here we see a man seeking solace, community from strangers. He wants to drink away his sorrows, but people who have struggled their whole life still see him as privileged, even if he now must face his own unimaginable pain. I'd like to see where the dialogue would go after the revelation.
“Lifelines” by Donna Hoke was the only play that, to me, used death as a distant subject matter without a heartfelt connection. It felt all technique and no truth, torn from the news, related to 9/11, but not from a personal perspective. The writing felt more like poetry than true emotion or dialogue and more about poetry than people. The rhythms were that of poetry full of alliteration, with the writer's hand very visible and the humanity hard to find. If someone wants to write a poem, they should write a poem. If you write a play, let the people talk rather than allowing the author to insert his or her voice, overriding and repeatedly interrupting the characters. As someone who knows people killed on 9/11 and was in New York at the time, I have always bridled at anyone who uses 9/11 to do their own art, rather than connect with emotion and the reality of the events. And a scene that spouts poetry, rather than actually giving us reality, to me, exploits 9/11 as subject matter, rather than respecting the event and the human loss of that day. Real people and real lives were lost that day. Trying to transform that into poetry, to me, means missing the point. Write poetry about 9/11 or a play, but don't write a play where the language is poetic, rather than sympathetic. This scene was not about life or death or love, but someone writing poetry about a horrible event. Its very emptiness and lack of connection only further dramatized the virtues of the other scripts.
"Grief Dialogues: The Lab" is a triumph, even if some moments may have missed a little. I missed some scenes, because they were simultaneous. I’d only say that ideally, this would be presented so audience can see them all. I found this to be a moving, emotional and, for me, singular experience. When I have gone to funerals, I have often been overwhelmed by the emotion, but more by the love than the loss. I felt the power not of death, but of love, of connection, that even life’s end couldn’t entire erase. This was a healing play, a show that let us see that death is not an end, that a funeral is a way to connect and not bid farewell. I felt this was a powerful and important project. And the immersive aspect to me was true theatrical genius.
While seeing things on stage separates us, with a fourth wall, we are part of each scene here, not separated by the safety of an imaginary line between audience and actors. John Donne wrote, “Death, thou shalt die.” While death comes to life here, so does love. Death matters most when we love someone. In “Grief Dialogues: The Lab,” we see people dealing with different deaths and losses. But the love not only does not diminish, but strengthens. We realize how much we value people as we lose them. One message can be to value each other while alive. We lose people when we take them for granted or ignore them. “Grief Dialogues: The Lab” is really about life and reminding us that we each have a precious gift and that we should make the most of it. We will lose loved ones some day or they will lose us. But each day we ignore them is a small death. We need to value our loved ones before we lose them, or we lose them twice, once today and once on the inevitable tomorrow after which no tomorrows follow. It’s a true shame that sometimes epitaphs say emotional or eloquent things after death that people never heard. Say what you mean to people while they are alive. Or in “Grief Dialogues: The Lab,” maybe we get to see people talking to loved ones' ghosts. " Grief Dialogues: The Lab" is a truly cathartic set of scenes, both moving and memorable. And the immersive aspect makes it not so much entertainment, but part of our experience, and part of our life in a way that a standard visit to the theater almost never is.
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