MY MOTHER’S FUNERAL: THE SHOW at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe

★★★★★

“The prowess of Jones’ writing and Charlotte Bennett’s direction is unique and utterly refreshing”

My Mother’s Funeral: The Show is a crucial and stunning piece on trauma mining in the arts. Based on the experience of losing a loved one and discovering the expense of death unjust, Kelly Jones writes a masterpiece that challenges the notion that dying is the great leveller. A breath-taking meta-theatrical triumph: this performance follows 24-year-old Abigail as she desperately pitches and writes a play about her mother’s (very) recent death. When a stranger turns to you at the end of the show in tears letting you know they intend to immediately ring their mum, you know the performance has done its job.

Playwright Kelly Jones presents a stunningly honest voice on the issues of how the arts industry treats trauma and social commentary. Jones delivers a powerful and poetic script that skips between tearjerkingly direct experiences of navigating the death of a close family member and trying to respect a dead relative’s wishes. The complexity of her writing is brilliantly clever and pulls the audience in from the moment Nicole Sawyerr (playing Abigail) takes to the stage. Sawyerr gives her all to the performance, holding the audience tightly in the palm of her hand.

As a microphone takes centre stage, as does our grief-struck protagonist. Moments where Abigail takes the mic on her feelings work beautifully into the meta-theatrical premise of the show and the sound production flies in support of it. Touching on themes of gentrification, demonisation of the working class, and estranged family relationships, My Mother’s Funeral touches nerves with the utmost composure and tact. The throughline of commentary on the divide between working class communities and the arts industry is sharp and so very needed. As the show holds a mirror to its paying audience, gasps and tears and laughter are elicited from the audience.

The staging (Rhys Jarman) is dynamic and drives the creativity of the show. Similarly, the gorgeous lighting (Joshua Gadsby) and sound design (Asaf Zohar) are as electric as the knife-edged acting. Samuel Armfield (playing Abigail’s brother and a particularly distasteful theatre producer) and Debra Baker (playing Abigail’s mum, healthcare professionals and an ignorant actor) multi-role phenomenally. The two flawlessly switch between different accents and well-crafted physicality. The direction is tasteful, thoughtful and comedic from beginning to end. This show catches you howling with laughter one second and wiping tears away the next in well-earned moments of emotional tension. Armfield and Baker’s supporting roles combine to pressure the devastation and rage of Sawyerr’s acting as her voice echoes both forcefully and delicately into the space. In particular, the climax of the show is directed with terrific effect, highlighting the pathetic hypocrisy of marketing trauma in theatre at the expense of real people.

My Mother’s Funeral breaks down what it means to write from your own experience to receive financial gratification from others. The prowess of Jones’ writing and Charlotte Bennett’s direction is unique and utterly refreshing amongst an arts landscape that is so readily available to sacrifice its creatives for the sake of entertainment and shock value. The perspective this show provides and its innovative delivery and conception is deeply essential.

MY MOTHER’S FUNERAL: THE SHOW at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe – Roundabout @ Summerhall

Reviewed on 23rd August 2024

by Molly Knox

Photography by Nicola Young

MY MOTHER’S

MY MOTHER’S

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