Preparing for WHEN WE DIED

Credit: Ali Wright

Written by Alexandra Donnachie.

When I wrote the first draft of When We Died in 2016, I focused predominantly on the experience of the woman at the centre of the play and her story. That draft touched on the character's love of her job but was very much about the cosmetic stages of the embalming process; at one stage I imagined her as being more of a make up artist to the deceased rather than an embalmer. I may have got a little overexcited by the fact that Whoopi Goldberg used to be one... 

Things changed a little in November 2019 when director, Andy (Routledge), and I went into our final round of R&D as part of the Pleasance's LABS programme and concentrated on restructuring the play. It became evident that we should dig a little deeper into the details of the character's job, the embalming process and her intrinsic, intimate relationship to it. Her job is the one thing she has left to throw herself into as a way of dealing with her trauma and it provides her with a safe space, until it is threatened by the intrusion of the body of her rapist. 

I have loved getting to know the ins and outs of an embalmer's job and the When We Died team are excited to share with you some of the research which helped us to bulk up our knowledge of the job. 

There won't be test when you come to see the show between the 10th and 15th March at VAULT Festival (18:10), but we hope to see you there. Enjoy!

First up, Caitlin Doughty's book Smoke Gets in your Eyes is one of the best books I've ever read. Andy came across this book multiple times when doing his own research and lent it to me in the hope it might be useful. It's funny and entertaining because it reads so much like a novel, but it also gives a lot of insight into the life of a woman surrounded by death on a daily basis - out of choice. I can't recommend it enough. 

Caitlin also has her own YouTube channel  - Ask a Mortician  - which answers questions about death you didn't know it was okay to ask. It's very informative, but also lots of fun and was very useful when researching stages of the embalming process!

Kari Northey's videos have also been very useful. You can find her channel at this link. 

I also came across lots of articles when writing the play, including this one from The Guardian, published in 2001, and this one published in 2013. Often the articles I read led me back to the British Institute of Embalmers (BIE) in Solihull, and some of their members.

Andy and I referred to this step-by-step guide to embalming a lot during our Pleasance LABS R&D. It was extremely useful in the early inclusion of the process into the text. However, just because you can learn to do anything on the internet, doesn't mean you should; DO NOT TRY IT AT HOME.