After Life by Jack Thorne
Directed by Emily Reutlinger
New Athenaeum Theatre | The Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Glasgow | BA Acting 2025
5 November 2024 ⭐⭐⭐⭐
If you had to choose just one memory; one special moment from your life to carry forward for the rest of eternity, what would you choose?
That's the dilemma that greets the newly departed in Jack Thorne's thought-provoking play After Life.
Adapted from Hirokazu Kore-eda‘s award-winning film, After Life was the first show chosen to reopen the National Theatre in London in 2021 after the lockdowns. Developed before and during the global pandemic, it receives a brand new staging in 2024 at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, Glasgow.
Jack Thorne‘s play opens in a bureaucratic waiting room. Numbers are called and confused proprietors are led into individual cubicles by staff wielding clipboards. It could be any office or administrative location. And just like these ordinary institutions, the staff here are overloaded. They have 22 cases to process this week; they don't know how they will manage them all.
It's only thanks to the play's title that I have any inclination that all may not be as it seems. Indeed "the office" is in fact some kind of way station, the customers have recently died, and the workers? well that's up to interpretation. Angels, aliens or some other unfortunate souls trapped in an administrative role for all eternity? There are so many questions as both the audience and the dead settle in and acclimatise themselves to their new surroundings.
Thankfully one of workers explains the situation: All new arrivals have 3 days to select a memory that they will then exist in for all eternity. As the arrivals start to review their lives in search of 'the one memory' we come to know more about them and their backstories. One older lady recalls a red dress that her brother bought her for a dance, whilst a younger girl fixates on her time at Disneyland Paris. There's a woman who fondly remembers sitting beneath falling cherry blossoms, and a Japanese man who regrets his unfulfilling marriage.
The workers seem to genuinely care: they truly want to help their clients choose the right memory and to find peace in the process. It transpires that their job is not only as guides, but as filmmakers; They will recreate and film the memories. I'm not entirely sure I understand the reasoning and logistics of it all: It seems a pretty labour intensive task given how many people die each week. But nevertheless as a plot device, it's intriguing. The play becomes a study of life, death and of documentary filmmaking. And as always, RCS elevate it beyond it's fundamentals to create a beautiful stage production that's complex, touching and aptly memorable.
The production values for After Life at RCS far surpass that which should be expected of an amateur production. The staging, lighting, props and all technical aspects are excellent. This is a multifaceted story with many set changes and lots of moving parts. The attention to detail is outstanding: Screens slide silently across the stage, blossoms fall in precise volumes on demand, TV screens flicker, and rich, colorful lives are re-lived. Glittering stars light the auditorium, brilliant projections keep us apprised as to which day it is, and the sound levels and lighting are impeccable in every scene. It's just like watching a surreal, beautifully directed film in real time. I could rave about the production values for this one for days - it's unbelievably well done.
The performances are also exquisite. The entire company of 3rd year actors are superb. I have no idea if the varied accents on display are the cast's own of if they are just that good (probably the latter). But either way, the characters are all brought to life with convincing, tender sincerity as they come to terms with their grief and attempt to celebrate their lives. With powerful direction from Emily Reutlinger After Life manages to pack an emotional punch in it's short 90 minute runtime. Particularly moving: the montage of character's reliving their final memory and then walking contendely towards a light through the audience as the workers watch on proud at a job well done, had me genuinely choking back tears.
Jack Thorne's After Life at RCS is somehow epic in scale and yet intimate at the same time. It is a work that was previously unknown to me and yet one which will stay with me for a very long time. What does it meant to live, to die? What would be my memory? I haven't been able to stop thinking about that since seeing this show. And isn't that what great theatre is meant to do? - entertain us yes, but also make us think.
After Life was staged at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland from Tuesday 4 - Friday 8 November 2024.
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After Life Cast
FIVE Manasa Tagica
FOUR Mollie Milne
THREE Scot Greenan
TWO Darragh Kemish
ONE Israela Efomi
Beatrice Killick Livie Dalee
Hirokazu Mochizuki Kristian Lustre
Femi Taylor Aisha Lawal
Jill Smart Kaia Taylor
Henry Thompson Thomas Barrett
Katie Mia Dinitzen
Actor Jules Bilger
After Life Creative Team
Director Emily Reutlinger
Set & Costume Designers Mairi Therese Cameron, Mia Doyle
LX Designer Eoin Beaton
Video Designer Eoin Beaton
Sound Designer Daniel Barclay
Movement Director/Choreographer Amy Kennedy
Voice Support Jean Sangster
Dialect Coach Hilary Jones
BSL Performance Interpreter Catherine King
After Life by Jack Thorne at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, RCS Glasgow, BA Acting 2025, Directed by Emily Reutlinger
🎟️ Disclosure: I was invited to review this show and received a complimentary ticket in exchange. Whether I am invited or not has absolutely no impact on my reviews or star ratings.
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