It’s the end of everything in contemporary in America! - now what?

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Right now we are facing a world we are afraid of and unsure how to walk through. The idea of a disastrous cataclysm is slowly inching its way towards a reality. Every day we see or hear something that unhinges us from our steady way of living, propelling us towards chaos. In midst of this growing crisis and unfamiliarity we ask the question - now what? How can I take a step forward, into and beyond the chaos? What do we turn to immediately after a crisis? What about seven years after? Or seventy-five years after?

 

Mr. Burns, a post-electric play is an exploration of how we can cope in the aftermath of a tragedy and how we can steady ourselves when we are adrift in the world. It examines the idea that through the primal necessity of storytelling we can find comfort, clarity, and purpose.

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Storytelling is something we are all too familiar with as theatre practitioners - so much so we have decided to make a living out of it. The act of sharing stories creates connection and empathy. It helps us make sense of the insensible - life’s experiences, its dilemmas, and hardships. Stories can educate, inspire, and build rapport. They are a means of communicating, recreating, and helping preserve, or even build cultures. Stories can provide comfort or a way of healing amidst loss and grief.

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When I first graduated from college, life did not go easy on me. My parents had just finished a messy divorce and family life was yanking at me from all sides. I had no job, or even prospects of a job, no money, no place to live, a mountain of debt, and no plan. I was terrified of the chaos and uncertainty of my life. I found myself asking, “Now what? How do I take a step forward?”

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A few months passed in this tragic stasis, which brought even more questions like the previous, until I somehow ended up in the city of Chicago. But the rest of my circumstances had not changed. However, when I found myself among other people at a bar, or most often at my friends apartment (as I had no money to spend), my attitude changed. I found myself engaging with those around me, and my fears sort of melted away as the conversations built up.

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One night in particular, I knew no one at the get together, except my friend whose apartment served as host. I sat alone, fearful people would ask me what I did for a living, and what my ‘goals’ were - I had no clue. I found a little courage stashed away and walked up to a group who were swapping social stories from their time in college. Now this I thought I could do.

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I told an obscure story about my friend, the host of the party, who was my college roommate. It was from his 21st birthday, which definitely earned itself the title of cliché! People instantly began swapping their 21st stories and there was this energy harnessed and this connection created between myself and them. Those stories eventually blossomed into each of us exposing our fears of failure and the tragic circumstances of our lives. It was through that story that I was able to create those relationships, for us all to ask and maybe answer the question together - “Now what?”

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Mr. Burns is an exploration of the need for those stories. However, in this play storytelling isn’t simply a matter of leisure, but one of survival. The population has just experienced a huge devastation and in light of this catastrophe, we zoom in on a group of survivors, who are struggling to raise their spirits. They find comfort and connection by cobbling together, for memory, a retelling of a famous episode of The Simpsons. This sharing of stories offers up an entry point where they are able to find comfort and connectivity with each other, giving them the ability not just to survive, but to take a step forward with one another.

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The story of my friends birthday I shared with those who are now close friends and colleagues, has since become sort of immortalized. Through the years, I have recycled it over and over and over again. And in the process of retelling it, each word has been chosen carefully with exactitude. I know it’s ebb and flow by heart, it's pauses and its crescendos, and the climax of the story is reached with precision and finesse. And I am not afraid to use this story as an entry point into creating bonds, as not only have I perfected the hell out it, but it holds familiarity for me.

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We see that very same recycling of the familiar in the second act of Mr. Burns. Their shared stories, which once was a means of comfort and entertainment, serves a new function. Tasked with the charge of rebuilding, their values have shifted to that of exactitude - recreating these stories and memories with precision and perfection, remembering things exactly as they were. As things stabilize, people gradually begin to use these stories/entertainment as a way of talking about where they were and where they are now.

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I hate to admit it, but over the course of my story’s recyclings it has gained an elevated sense of theatricality. The people in the story have become sort of caricatures of their real selves. As I tell it people's names and identities fall away, and it takes on an entire life of it’s own. The location has altered and takes on immense color in my imagination. The language I use to tell it has reached new heights of extravagance. And now when I share it, I tend to set the stage, and harness my performativity  in its telling. The story has even earned itself a title!

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As Mr. Burns plunges seventy-five years into the future, we see the same thing happen to The Simpsons, as the retelling of these stories are passed down over the generations and become a bit skewed. Even though society has somehow managed to survive vicious times, people are still unable to speak about their difficulties directly. It’s through allegory and stylized theatre that they can find a vehicle to address what still plagues them. Where once stood low-brow pop culture oral storytelling, now stands the creation of myth and ritual.

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While my story of my friends 21st birthday pales in comparison to the story in Anne Washburn’s play, I see it take on a similar life and function through its progression. While I use my friend’s shameless actions to create a common ground between me and those I tell it to, this play uses pop culture and what is deemed “America’s most famous family” as a vehicle - showing that when everything - like everything - has failed, we cling to the only surviving truth, which is our stories.

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This play addresses the idea that the stories we tell truly infiltrate our lives, and shape us not only individually, but can build and shape our relationships and even our culture. Mr. Burns is about the necessity for storytelling, and its evolution. Facing a world that is only growing more unstable by the minute, what must we turn to? How can we answer the question, “now what?” This play proves that our stories elicit powerful emotional responses, and that no matter what happens, no matter what tragedies strike, we must harness this powerful tool, for both ourselves and our spirits.