With a spoiler in the title, James Rowland Dies at the End of the Show is about death, life, and, crucially, the bit in between. It’s a show about living and what we put out into the world. It’s a delicate and uplifting piece of spoken word at the Anatomy Lecture Theatre in Summerhall, and is the last of a trilogy of spoken word pieces by James Rowland.
At the start of the show, we are told of the Golden Records put onto Voyager 1 and 2, which were the first spacecraft to leave our solar system. These records contained messages that aim to teach extraterrestrial life about life on Earth, containing everything from messages of welcome to music and the sound of heartbeats. If James had only an hour left in life, what would he want to say? This show is his Golden Record.
What follows is a set of vignettes from James’ life, covering his memories, his loves, and a detailed retelling of the folktale Robin Hood. James is humorous, and he can turn poignant in a split second, seamlessly guiding the audience through the highs and lows of each section.
The setup is simple, with a clock counting down the time, and James in a hospital gown with pages of illegible scribbles to signify each vignette. Music is a key component of James Rowland Dies at the End of the Show, and James times his storytelling perfectly to the music, giving a cinematic quality to his work that is genuinely impressive for a solo performance.
The show struggles a little from the heavy involvement of the folktale, which, while enjoyable, bears little relevance to the main theme for the majority of the show. There are a lot of interesting arcs to this piece, and it may be more satisfying to give more space for these to all come back to a singular point at the end.
While the show doesn’t quite reach the heights of the previous two critically acclaimed shows, James Rowland Dies at the End of the Show is an enjoyable and meaningful pondering on what we put out into the world and the little parts that make up a life.
