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Theatre listings > The Obituary Show. - Tour & World Premiere. Company - People Show. Company Website (has extensive details on how this collaborative company work). Cast - here . 2005 Tour Dates and Times - here . Seen to review at Traverse Theatre 28 October 2005. Run Time - l hour 30 minutes. Reviewer -Barbara Bryan. Refreshing action show also poignant. The Obituary Show - as the title implies - revolves around the subject of death. But the People Show 114 production does not dwell on the sombre aspects of this event. Musicians burst onto the stage to trumpet, literally, the life of an 'ordinary' pianist on whom Gareth Brierley, (playing an authoritarian newspaper proprietor), has been set the challenge of writing a full page obituary. As he starts to investigate the life of this man, we as an audience, are made to contemplate - in our celebrity driven environment - how every person has their own unique idiosyncracies. This is exaggerated in the office scenes where each individual displays their personality in the office politics. The articulate general dogsbody, energetically portrayed by one of the original People Show members, Mark Long, treats all with deference but is allowed to give vent to his encyclopaedic knowledge of the 60's rock stars or Jill Myers, the journalist, who ensures her power boundaries are not overstepped. But the show is also a comment on how we, as individuals, view death and subsequent loss. In the mortuary scene, when a fellow musician, George Khan only recognises the body of the pianist once a familiar hat is put on the cold head, we are reminded of how memory is both subjective and selective. There are imaginative stage props - a boat becomes a coffin, a filing cabinet houses the body, and a wooden box is touchingly transformed from a rubbish container to the ashes box. The Obituary Show is dedicated to Mark Boyle and Jeff Nuttall, a founder member of this experimental, collaborative theatre group, who died last year. And he would probably have felt it appropriate that this People Show 114 (celebrating their 40th anniversary next year) treats death, as one ought to celebrate life, with exuberance. But this refreshing show - with non stop action - also rather poignantly reminds us that people's memories linger and resonate in our consciousness for some time after their demise. © Barbara Bryan 29 October 2005 - Published on EdinburghGuide.com Cast - Gareth Brierley, Sadie Cook, Jill Myers, George Khan, Mark Long, Fiona Creese and Chahine Yavroyan. More details about these people's involvement with the show and the company on the People show website. 2005 Tour Details The People Show 114. Tour continues. 29 October at 7.30 at Edinburgh Traverse Theatre 0131 228 1404. 1 Nov - 5 Nov at 8pm Bristol Tobacco Factory Theatre 0117 902 0344. 8 Nov - 9 Nov at 8pm Poole, Dorset Lighthouse Theatre 01202 685222. 12 Nov - 13 Nov at 7.45pm London Studio 2, Riverside Studios 020 8237 1111. Tour Ends Theatre Editor, Thelma Good's e-mail is thelma@edinburghguide.com Although every effort has been taken to ensure the accuracy of the information presented in these pages, no responsibility can be accepted for any errors or omissions. Theatre listings >
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