Back in April, I went to watch ‘7 Steps to Feel Completely Happy Again’ for the first time - a play written and produced by Teigan Banks.
The play is centred on Amber, whose mother has passed away from cancer. In order to try and process this, Amber finds herself in a dystopian dreamworld where she must meet the personified stages of grief, who tell her that she will soon be happy again once she has completed all 7 steps.
After being told that journaling, taking up knitting and a hot bath will solve all of her problems, a distressed Amber tells the audience her frustrations; how can such a huge thing like grief be neatly polished into stages?
It is soon revealed that the stages of grief were never intended for those who had lost a loved one, but instead conceived to try and help those who were dying to process their own death. The central message is that there is no set guide on how to grieve; everyone processes loss differently.
Although 7 steps is based on Teigan’s own experience of losing her mother when she was eleven, she has managed to create a piece of art that feels deeply personal yet universal. After leaving the theatre, you could see the impact her words had on everybody there. I wondered how it would feel to touch your audience in such a way.
This was one of the first things I asked when I met with her in the park, where we sat for hours discussing her inspirations, the writing process and bringing her play to life.
Last year an opportunity arose from the Queen Mary Theatre Company, a university-run programme that gives students the chance to take their play to festivals. Teigan knew that her topic of choice would be grief, as she had written about it before as an advocate for the charity Winston’s Wish. This would be narrowed down when she watched her brother perform in a play centred around the 7 stages, and developed further after listening to Cariad Lloyd’s book ‘You’re not alone’, where Teigan learnt that the Kubler-Ross Method was originally intended for those who were dying. She thought meeting the 7 stages might be funny as they could be portrayed as ridiculous caricatures.
The play is moving, yet hilarious: comedy isn’t always the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word death - I was intrigued at how naturally this seemed to flow throughout her work. I asked her if humour had played any role in her grieving process;
“I communicate with people through humour and it would be odd not to make it a part of my play. Life isn’t always really sad. It can definitely be a coping mechanism and it's more common than people assume” she told me.
On making her audience cry, Teigan said that it was moving and often, overwhelming, “It reminds me that my words have weight, and it's powerful to see strangers crying and connecting with the message of the play.”
This message is that something massive like grief cannot be encapsulated in 7 stages. Teigan mentioned that she found the stages silly and annoying, which is why she wrote an entire play mocking them.
The concept that there are 7 stages of grief is not only misleading, but has serious consequences for individuals trying to cope with losing a loved one. Not only do they undermine prolonged grief, they can be isolating and make you feel like you aren’t grieving in ‘the right way’. Teigan told me that she sometimes felt “like everyone else had moved on while I was still trying to process it all” which is why it is important for her that the play would act as a reminder that people can take longer to live with grief, and there is no one set path to feeling better.
In some ways, she found writing the play cathartic, mostly by being able to share her message and educate her audience on misinformation. Explaining and sharing her own experiences with the cast was essential in executing her vision - this was made easier due to the friends and connections she had already made on her English and Drama university course.
Teigan’s cast played a pivotal role in overcoming certain challenges, like choreographing scenes. She sometimes felt that it was hard to know when to be still and when to have movement, but finding ways to navigate this became a group effort, “all of these challenges were able to be overcome because of our dynamic. Everyone really cares about the play and wants to make it good.”
The cast also played a role in developing some scenes. One part of the play that stands out is when Amber meets depression - Teigan told me that she initially didn’t know what she wanted and had just written ‘depression scene’ on her script, but, “the cast worked collaboratively to make it what it became.”
The depression scene can only be described as heart-breaking. Amber shares a final cup of tea with her mother and recounts the small and big things that she won't get to experience: no more coffee dates or walks along the beach. her mother will never see her take her exams, move to university or get married. Joni Mitchell’s ‘Both Sides Now’ plays in the background, only just masking the sound of the audience sniffling and reaching for tissues.
Scenes like this is why it was an advantage to have her own friends as castmates, who could deliver such an emotional moment tied directly to what she herself had experienced, “Due to the nature of the play, I needed people who could do it justice. I’m lucky because I already knew 2 of the people that auditioned. They all care a lot about me and the play's message. It would’ve been much harder if I was working with people I didn’t know very well.”
The technicalities of putting on a play has definitely been one thing Teigan has learnt about, but on a more personal level it has reinforced that time doesn’t mean anything when it comes to grieving, “I’ve watched the play so many times and I still get emotional. Sometimes I feel so surprised that I feel this way and can connect with people about this very sad thing that has happened to me.”
Since meeting with Teigan, she has taken her play to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival which garnered a four star professional review by Richard Stamp. She has continued to make her audience laugh, cry, and most importantly, remind them that grief affects everybody differently, and learning to live with loss has no time limit.
Follow the Instagram for updates and more showings of ‘7 Steps to Feel Completely Happy Again’
Other Reviews of '7 Steps to Feel Completely Happy Again'
- https://theweereview.com/review/seven-steps-to-feel-completely-happy-again/
- https://tickets.edfringe.com/whats-on/seven-steps-to-feel-completely-happy-again#:~:text=Luke%20Pereira%2032%20days%20ago,the%20core%20of%20this%20production.
If you are need of grief resources
- https://www.itstimecharity.co.uk/
- https://winstonswish.org/
- https://www.thegriefgang.com/
- https://open.spotify.com/show/1WzhWSvVLQJjPNX5PLH5Af
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