Synopsis
"Something's bound to happen soon, but at the moment, the main problem is your energy. Your chakras are fucked. Especially since your last boyfriend left you for a barista he met at Café Nero. Half her head is shaved, she’s got a lip piercing and an entire Polish short story tattooed on her arm."
That Was All is a one woman show which tackles issues of grief, identity and the possibility of self-acceptance in a chaotic world. ‘She’ is a nameless character and sometimes reflection of the ‘current millennial’. A woman who graduated with an arts degree from a top university but is struggling to live up to the aspirational identities she’s created for herself.
We follow her story through two different time frames. In the earlier time frame, our central character is off to a seemingly ordinary evening at the pub with her father. We follow her through all the average mundanities. An argument in the car where her father insists on adopting a pug, regardless of her mother’s anxiety around the idea. A free round offered to them on behalf of the pub, though it feels bittersweet. An aggressive argument about ordering a Caesar salad. The arrival of our main character’s love interest, a plumber she met at Fabric the weekend prior. Her father’s two am Samba dancing solo. A debate with a teenager wearing a Kurt Cobain t-shirt about the importance of self-transformation. One which drives her father to tears. Though it seems like an average night, something isn’t quite right.
In the later time frame, our central character is working a full-time bartending job and going through all the mundane realities of her life. Another failed relationship, and the disappointments of her own career set-backs. She tries to find herself in more new age movements and meets Paul, a gorgeous hippie who practices Rolfing and embodies a kind of spiritual calm which she’s both jealous of and drawn to. Through her attraction to Paul, she ends up spending a day with him and the “world renowned healer” ‘El Divino’. ‘El Divino’ initially seems ridiculous to her. He’s a stereotype of himself and the whole thing feels like a sham. But in the end, ‘El Divino’ forces her confront herself and finally let go.
In the same sequence we discover that the evening at the pub was one of the last she spent with her father, a man who was dying. As our main character is finally able to confront the reality of death and her own grief – she finds the space to accept, let go and release her grip on all these endless identities. |
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