An acclaimed hit at the Edinburgh Fringe and London’s VAULT, Adam Scott-Rowley‘s You Are Going To Die is a 70-minute show performed entirely in the nude.
A physical theatre performance nudging on the margins of absurdist theatre, with only the lighting and a toilet which occasionally smokes as prop, Scott-Rowley, smeared with body paint, dabbles with issues surrounding death.
A guttural, ultra masculine figure gives way to a woman recalling the peaceful passing of her “pussy cat”. Later, a lamb meets its grisly fate in an instant.
A girl – child or influencer? – calls for help from within a well. An unctuous servant submissive pleasures his master. And there’s a lot of strutting, posing, and even a singalong led by a typical Northern comedian about an embarrassing sexual experiment.
There are certainly moments which make you think. A question to an audience member about where you go after death is met with “nothing.” Would a more lengthy answer lead to performer improvisation?
Some moments are head-scratching, but that’s the nature of the experimental fringe. Scott-Rowley’s character range is skilful, with every muscle in his body in play.
The power and vulnerability of the human form and its inevitable final journey to stillness and dust is the key message here. It is a performance of intensity that occasionally breaks the fourth wall, as latecomers discovered.
Why worry about your fate, asks Scott-Rowley? Life is to be lived and experienced in all its breadth and scope, beauty and ugliness, not sleepwalked through in a sense of dread.
Very funny at times, sometimes viciously provocative, often joyful, You Are Going To Die didn’t entirely work for me, but it is performed with bare-cheeked gusto and technical excellence.
Created in collaboration with Joseph Prowen and Tom Morley, You Are Going To Die is sinister, sharp and speculative in providing its little deaths, whether literal, ego, or “nothing”.
You Are Going To Die continues at Southwark Playhouse Borough until 4 May with tickets here.
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Image credit: Ryan Buchanan