LIVING WITH THE DEAD, written by Cosette Bolt and directed by Matthew Attwood will perform at Augustine United Church, Edinburgh. A Youngish Perspective holds this exclusive dialogue with Cosette and Matthew.
What inspired you to set a story in a mortuary, and what drew you to exploring death from such an intimate, day-to-day perspective?
Cosette(C): This story exists because tragedy exists. I was compelled to write this piece after hearing the staggering number of lives lost as a result of natural disasters, human disasters, and the pandemic. I recognized the normalcy with which people tossed around numbers of dead in the hundreds and thousands but seemed scandalized by smaller scale tragedies. I wanted to set the scenes in a liminal space of life a death to confront the audience with snippets of real lived experiences. It does not matter how these people passed; it matters that they lived in their imperfect and meaningful ways. I found myself tired of glamourizing and eulogizing the dead, and I wrote a piece I needed to see when trying to make sense of grief and loss. You cannot speak of life without death, and it is disingenuous to speak of death without speaking of life.
The play gives the dead a moment to remember or relive something—was that your way of giving them a voice, or were you also speaking to the living through those memories?
C: I see the scenes as a moment to witness something at the heart of the character. For some reason or another as these characters physically spend their last moments preparing for death, their bodies tell a story for those willing to listen and engage. In this way the dead and the living enter into an exchange of meaning and become more than a number amongst thousands or however many. Our society has sterilized and commodified the grief process to the point that we have forgotten how to engage with loss. By providing a sampling of experiences, even for a moment, the audience is invited into the lives behind the numbers.
How much of Living with the Dead is about the living, really?
C: Living with the Dead is all about the living and challenging the traditions that have allowed us to create and perpetuate such distance between ourselves and care for dead. We as humans carry ourselves through this world with however long we are granted and yet are so fearful of what comes next that we have created an empire of death care and whole markets of industry to deny that we are transient beings. Not thinking about our death will not protect us from it. Not thinking about how we leave this world will only perpetuate fear and harm our loved ones in the future when we inevitably pass, ourselves.
As a playwright, do you feel like we need more honest conversations around death, especially in theatre? How do you balance the heaviness of the subject with something that still feels human and watchable?
C: I believe there is a theatrical duty on the part of every playwright to create stage-worthy shows. Just as in life there is tragedy mixed with the comedy. Life like theatre is never just one thing. I do not think every piece of media needs to serve the purpose of inspiring deep, philosophical discussions around mortality, but I think there is something to be said about a general unease around certain topic in the theatre. In these uncertain times within the industry, people want the sure things-the things that sell. There are those that want to be challenged by what they engage with, and I would encourage writers to continue to write the hard things. Balance is found in writing truthfully. Everything in Living with the Dead is a theatrically packaged, real conversation based in true experiences. It feels human because it is human with a touch of whimsy and a dash of audio-visual tomfoolery.
Directing a show about death could easily turn very dark or overly sentimental—how did you find the tone for Living with the Dead?
Matthew(M): In a show that could be consumed by darkness, I wanted to explore life and what it means to live. This meant having to find the humour and quirks in the characters and their personal situations that gives us a glimpse into their lives. Everyone has different life experiences and whilst we can’t escape the inevitability of death; and the following grieving process, I’ve made it my mission to ensure that this production is full of colour. I have strived to find the balance of honouring those who have passed as well as highlighting the importance of allowing them to be remembered as the vibrant people they were.
What kind of conversations did you have with the actors about embodying both the living and the dead? Did you want the audience to feel close to these characters or observe them from a distance?
M: I’ve worked collaboratively with Cosette and the cast to give each of the lives explored a sense of personality. In the rehearsal room we have investigated the text and played with use of ensemble, costume, light and sound to allow for world building to see the world through the lens of each character being “processed” in the morgue. The audience are taken on a voyeuristic journey in this production, observing the characters in this morgue setting. But as we get closer to the end, we soon realise how close we’ve been to them all along.
Not So Nice! is about pushing past “polite” theatre—what did “not so nice” mean for you in directing this play? Were there moments where you wanted the audience to sit in discomfort?
M: Absolutely! The “not so nice” element of this production is having to sit in the discomfort of death and grief. Not one person grieves in the same way as another and this production allows the audience to resonate with multiple different characters and life experiences. The heart wrenching moments in the play can be seen as ‘difficult’ for the viewer, however they are integral as they create a dialogue about what it means to remember and be remembered.
As someone working in independent theatre, how do you keep making bold, meaningful work like this while balancing all the pressures of running a company, especially in the current creative climate?
M: The honest answer is that it is tough. It’s a hard graft due to the lack of access to funding which puts pressure on artists to try and find creative solutions to combat the difficulties of making theatre. However, I am of the belief that you can’t stop yourself from living and doing the things you want to achieve because of the barriers people put in front of you. Myself and the whole team at NOT SO NICE! are resilient theatre makers who are driven by our creative ambition and our excitement to collaborate with artists to make meaningful work like ‘Living With The Dead’ and other projects that uplift artists and enables discussion on topics that are “not so nice”.
Tickets and info can be find here: https://www.notsonice.co.uk/event-details/living-with-the-dead-by-cosette-bolt-2025-04-25-19-30