←Recommendations of Bereavement Leave

Our interrelation to the world and people in it is essentially what existence boils down to. Daniel Prillaman's 'Bereavement Leave' is a pitch-black satire of workplace operations as life, the circadian imminence of death, and the weight of making the world go round. One cannot avoid the Kafkaesque dealings we endure in this eternal puzzle for peace, for if you did isn't that just another form of decease? Which is the greater mystery, living or dying? Solemn themes synergize with cunning comedy.

Prillaman works expertly in layers of dread. Is the true impending doom the everyday dullness of the job? Or this bizarre plot? This being a Daniel Prillaman play, the answer is Yes, yes, and oh, baby, just you wait. The comedy makes the horror so much more horrifying, the horror makes the comedy even more batshit. Layers upon layers upon layers.
BEREAVEMENT LEAVE is the WORST play to see/read after a long week of work. BEREAVEMENT LEAVE is the BEST play to see/read after a long week of work.

Prillaman is one of the most interesting, unique playwrights I’ve found on NPX. His ability to serve up absurdity and surrealism seems effortless, seamlessly mixing the extraordinary and the mundane. In Bereavement Leave, we follow office co-workers through a typical week in a not-so-typical workplace. What I admired most about the script was the informality of the dialogue set against the evocative, image-rich, absurdist setting. Prillaman manages to find meaning in the seemingly meaningless. My brain cells felt slightly rearranged after reading it. If American theatre wants to be relevant, they should produce plays like this.

I LOVE THIS PLAY. The mind-numbingly anti-human setting contrasts masterfully with the backdrop of death, from finding a dead supervisor in the freezer to what is arguably the most human thing--dying. The Grim Reaper is a spreadsheet. Though numbers in the script, these numbers feel real, like real people. Prillaman's writing is excellent, as always--sharp, incisive, concise, and smart. The emotion opens up, the play defies expectations and becomes a real piece of theater. This would be AMAZING to see live

Who is the bereavement leave for when we're trapped in a world of quotas and nothing else matters? While reading this play, time, while precisely indicated throughout, strangely enough becomes meaningless and you're caught up in the whirring blur of a frighteningly godless routine punctuated by precisely crafted moments of real humanity --both the hopeful and the despicable. One week. Glimmers of the threatening and chaotic world outside the room are echoed within its walls and yet moments of humanity's strength and propensity to awareness shine through. Stunning.

There's a YA book not at all like this play, Adam Silvera's "They Both Die at the End." In it, there's an agency that contacts people and let them know that today is the day they die. They have no agenda. They do no harm. It's a boring, ruthless costumer service job. After reading it, I always wondered after the lives of those employees. In a way, this show seems to be the answer to my question. The answer is: soul-crushing. Capitalistic. Quota-filling. It's nothing personal, it's business. And business is cold. Another excellent world and show by Daniel Prillaman.

Wow, wow, wow. It starts out a very funny, very black absurdist dystopian office satire — for which I am absolutely the target audience. What I didn’t expect, and what elevates this play to something truly extraordinary, is how it deepens and expands emotionally as it goes, turning these office drones who don’t even have names into heartbreaking characters with depth and poignancy and power. That it achieves this without ever betraying its rules or losing its absurdist way is a testament to Prillaman’s immense skill. Bereavement Leave is a harsh and humane marvel.

Wow. This play starts out surreal, somewhat funny even. But I found myself entirely moved by the end. I am actually crying. This is such an amazing play that hits on so many important topics I can't even begin to list them. This would be such an economical play to produce and you will have audiences really talking afterward. I am sure different people will take away different things from this show, but all will be impacted. The mind of Daniel Prillaman's is one of my favorite strange places to visit.

Employees of this nameless company have numbers instead of names, wear uniforms that wipe out all traces of individuality (except, temporarily, on casual shirt Fridays), and are subjected to company meetings on "synergy." They are provided drinks laced with drugs to make their souless jobs tolerable. The work seems like simple data entry but with every click of the "enter" key people die. Some workers can stand it, others cannot. The corporate motto is "what must be done must be done," and what must be done with this wonderfully dark satire is produce it.

With witty dialogue and fantastic characters, Daniel Prillaman strips back the façade of "office space life" and takes us on a journey that by turns punches you in the gut and makes you howl with laughter. A very timely piece that should be produced ASAP.