Lydia's Funeral Video by Sam Chanse

"Lydia's Funeral Video" is a one-woman play written and performed by Samantha Chanse, a writer, performer, educator and arts organizer based in New York and San Francisco. In this apocalyptic satire, devout bank clerk Lydia Clark-Lin has 28 days to terminate an unplanned pregnancy, shoot her own funeral video and do some standup comedy. As the camera rolls and Lydia gamely sets about her grim task, a story emerges that is at once hilarious and unnerving. This publication unites the full theater script of "Lydia's Funeral Video" with a new counterpoint narrative that enhances this dynamic realization of a live theater experience in book form. It also includes development and production notes that chart the daunting process of developing a solo performance, along with project documentation and community response and engagement. Seamlessly weaving in questions of race, gender identity and more existential questions, "Lydia's Funeral Video" is bold, unpredictable storytelling at its inventive and unsettling best.

Kaya Press