- [Announcer] Major funding for this program was provided by the City of Austin Office of Arts, Culture, Music, and Entertainment, Tommy and Alexandra Maher, Sandra Honaker, John Wright, Janet Walsh, Midori Munguia, Grace Horvath, Jasmine Mobasseri, Brenda Isaacs-Booth, Matt Walsh.

Additional funding was provided by.

(soft music) And by.

(soft music continues) - Gelato's traditionally more dairy, 'cause I think it's like, let's increase your odds of diarrhea, rather than regular ice cream.

It's like a cultural thing, I think.

I exclusively remember just Italian ice and the paper.

- Yeah.

- [Meghan] Classic.

- How may I take your order?

- Thank you, I am a bit indecisive.

Ooh, Dunkaroo.

- Me as well, ooh.

- What?

- We have family that's buried in the cemetery here, and like generations of- - Yeah.

We're neighbors.

- So growing up, yeah.

We're neighbors.

- They're all dead.

- Yeah.

- Oh, this is Dunkaroo?

Yeah.

Tastes like suppressed childhood trauma.

- Mm.

- Yeah, really good.

- Okay.

Growing up, we'd always come visit, plant flowers, water, and then we'd always come here for Italian ice, yeah.

- Yeah.

So I only associate dead relatives with Gelotti's.

- Yeah.

(laughing) I know it seems bleak, but it was always a treat.

What I started realizing as I got older is how bizarre it was that there is an ice cream shop that is practically- - Pretty sure- - A plot itself.

- [Meghan] Yeah, I'm pretty sure it shares property line.

(soft music) This is "How We Grieve".

- [Justin] A series hosted by two filmmaker siblings processing our grief and fear of death by learning how others handle life after loss.

- Film is integral in helping death literacy.

- How do you speak to kids about death at a developmentally appropriate stage?

- Death doula comes in, and one of the best things that we can do is just normalize death.

- Yeah, I've been feeling really dead on the inside lately.

- Well, I guess this is where we hug it out, so.

- I don't wanna hug.

This this- - Five, six- - Seven eight.

- Seven eight.

- And, okay.

- And done.

- Yeah.

- And scene.

- [Meghan] Last time I was here was for Aunt Dawn's burial, May 2017.

And I had gotten into a car accident a week before, but they were like, "Yeah, it's fine, it's fixable."

At the repast meal, I step out, call, and they're like, "Yeah, so actually your car is totaled."

And I swear to god, Tracy Chapman's "Fast Car", that song was playing in the restaurant as they were telling me, "Your car is totaled."

- Did you have a fast car?

- [Meghan] No, I got hit- - [Justin] You got hit by a fast car.

- [Meghan] The car was fast that hit me.

- [Justin] Yeah.

Well.

Let's go visit the fam.

- Let's go visit the fam.

I can't believe we came empty-handed.

Wait, can you just leave your car here?

- Yeah.

- Oh, okay.

I guess they go around?

- [Justin] There's no parking lot here.

(Meghan sighs) - Yeah, I guess- - This is the parking lot.

- I guess people don't really need a lot of parking.

Where are they?

Well, I see- - Follow me.

I know this well.

- I see Arab names.

I see Aslan.

- Yeah, right.

- Haddad, just point out the Arab- - Haddad.

- Patel.

- Patel.

I have not been here in years, and I can still find everybody.

And I hope that's good karma.

- I was never brought here, because I was too young.

And our family is just like in denial.

- Well, this is one of the family plots.

- Yeah, this is the most recent.

- Our beautiful Aunt Dawn.

- [Meghan] Beautiful gravestone, beautiful Aunt Dawn.

- [Justin] It's just a beautiful cemetery.

- [Meghan] Yeah.

(soft music) Back in 2017, the worst thing happened to the best person we know.

Our Aunt Dawn, who was like a second mom and a best friend, passed away suddenly at 47.

Aunt Dawn's death was the great big tragedy for this generation of our family.

We had no idea how to process such overwhelming grief, but we tried to figure it out through performing comedy, making films, and getting tattoos, much to our Arab grandparents' dismay.

- [Justin] When our Aunt MaryKay passed away in 2020, our grief compounded.

We turned to filmmaking again with a documentary about her life.

That's when we realized everything we were doing was more of a distraction from the grief, and we were actually pretty damn clueless when it comes to processing it.

So we looked to our parents, and they taught us the classic Syrian immigrant repressed Catholic approach, ignore the subject entirely, and then you never have to process it.

(crickets chirping) - [Meghan] This isn't unique to our family, though, because it seems to be the standard in America.

Statistics show that nearly half of the population is struggling with grief at any given moment.

Why aren't we talking about grief and death when literally everyone will deal with both at some point in their lives?

- [Justin] We're going on this journey to explore all the ways people cope with grief and death across cultures and communities, hoping it helps us finally process our grief from our aunts' exits.

- We're just two siblings and a camera, trying to make people talk to us about stuff no one wants to talk about, including us.

I had guilt not coming here after the burial, like literally, I haven't been here since the burial.

And, or to her house.

And it's like, like I had moved to Austin, so I was like, well, you know.

Every time I come home to Jersey, I would go to her house.

And then after she passed, I was like, "Gonna avoid any locations that trigger her memory!"

- When I was a teenager, Jiddo would pick me up probably every other week, and we would come here.

I had no choice in the matter.

And he would say, "We're going to take care of the plots."

- [Meghan] Yeah.

- And take care of the plots meant we're bringing flowers, gardening tools.

I would get anxious, I'd be thinking about is this where we go?

This is it?

Are we conscious underground?

All these dark anxiety-driven thoughts about mortality, and eventually grief when we were actually losing relatives in our lifetime.

The big cherry on top, if you will, was Jiddo would say, "Okay, let's go get ice cream next door."

And you know.

- Yeah.

- We would go next door and get a lemon ice, and as I'm eating that in the back of his car, I'm still thinking about death.

- Nice.

- And like- - Nice.

- Questioning, you know, where does it all end?

- Yeah.

At Gelotti's, apparently.

How do they fit?

We've got Jiddo's parents.

- Yeah.

- You're thinking like it's a pretty big, what do they bury them in?

- Casket?

- Casket.

They're here?

- I think one, two.

- One, two, and then Dawn's on the other side?

- Yeah, but I think- - Does that mean- - I think- - This person's going this way?

- I'm assuming that Mom and the other two daughters are also here, and maybe it's just like a multi-level scenario.

- Multi-level?

- That's all I can think of.

- Like an upstairs downstairs unit?

- I think it's maybe a loft.

Maybe a duplex?

- [Meghan] How do you want to be buried, or memorialized?

- I don't know.

Underground freaks me out.

- Yeah.

- Claustrophobia.

Especially if there's any chance that there's some kind of, I do feel like our- - You might be alive?

- The likelihood, yeah.

(laughing) I might be alive.

- Spencer has the same- - There's a small chance that I might still have a breath in me.

- Yeah.

Mausoleums are pretty baller.

- [Justin] I think that might be a nice option, so I can be above ground.

- [Meghan] Yeah.

- [Justin] People can come into my tiny home.

- [Meghan] Tiny homes.

- [Justin] Tiny hipster homes.

- [Meghan] Since comedy has been our chosen medium for grief processing, we wanted it to be the first topic we explore.

No one I know has blended comedy and tragedy more seamlessly and chaotically than my friend and New York-base comedian, Ben Wasserman.

Ben hosts a comedy show called "Live After Death".

What started as a standup set dedicated to his dad, granddad, uncle, and four friends who passed away, one after another, turned into a variety show with a monthly residency at Sparrow Funeral Home and Blair Mazzarella Funeral Home in Brooklyn.

It's been so popular and beloved that Ben ended up taking the show on the road to other funeral homes, cemeteries, and death-focused spaces across the country, including a two-night show at the historic Greenwood Cemetery.

We met up with Ben at his apartment in Brooklyn to get ready for the final show of his run at Blair Mazzarella Funeral Home.

- Okay, wait, so.

What you can do for me, here's my piñata.

- [Meghan] Nice.

- I don't know why I'm being so neat with this, considering it just gets smashed.

- It's beautiful.

- Thank you.

- [Meghan] First time we met, we were doing standup in an Italian restaurant- - Yeah.

- [Meghan] For patrons who did not sign up.

- [Ben] Did not wanna be there.

- No, they're like, "I came here to have carbonara, and there's a lineup-" - And now you're doing this.

Yeah.

- "Of nerds, just ******* working out their childhood traumas."

- Yeah, it sucked.

- "In front of me."

That was one of the last shows I did in New York, so I remember like, the lineup, we all friended each other on Facebook.

- [Ben] Yeah.

- Followed each other on Twitter, what comics do.

- Yeah.

- You would work your dad's death into every Facebook status.

- Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

- And this is before I experienced grief, and I was like, "This is really funny.

I'm not sure if I should be laughing at this."

- Yeah.

- But I just love how you are shoving it into every- - Yeah.

- Set.

- Well it was like, I don't know.

It's one of those things where I think most people who lose, have this sense of, like, I can't talk about anything else right now.

- Yeah, what else would I be- - It's crazy- - Talking about?

- And it's crazy that all of you are not talking about it.

- Yeah.

- I didn't know how else to interact in the world.

- Yeah.

- Without just constantly bringing up the fact that he was dead.

So then anytime someone was, like, making a joke, or anything, something was trending, and be like, "Well, don't forget.

I am really feeling (censored) up right now."

- It was weirdly comforting for me, like before my aunt's death, I was like, "Oh, this is gonna keep going."

And then after my aunt's death, I'd be like, "Keep talking about it, Benny!"

- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

For as long as I remember, my dad was sick, and he was always like a marked man in my head, almost, in a way.

- Yeah.

- So it's not like it was a shock.

- But it doesn't make it easier.

It's like, you're kind of prolonging- - No, it still also feels shocking.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Like the day that he actually died, or the night that he died, I was like, "What?

You mean the guy who could barely breathe five minutes ago?"

- Yeah.

(laughing) - "He died?

That guy with pneumonia and cancer and COPD and emphysema?

He died tonight?

No, no, no, no, no."

- Whenever I describe just like a simple line about the show, I'm like, "Yeah, my friend hosts a show in a funeral home, and it's called Live After Death."

- Yeah.

- And I don't even have to give any more details, and people are like, "That's a really good idea."

- Yeah.

I think the funeral, I mean, that angle wasn't there initially, for sure.

- [Meghan] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- But like, I had an hour-ish of material, and it was too good to not do it.

And people are responding to it.

And at a certain point in my head, it became like the capstone to my actual grief in a way, where I was like, "Oh, if I," what if I just cut my hair right now?

(Meghan laughs) I was like, "Oh, if I do this show, then I can totally get over it."

And I think it was also a way for me to be like, "If I do a really good show for lots and lots of people to see, there's no denying that this guy cared about his people."

- Yeah, yeah.

- I just want people to know that this guy existed, and that these people, and my friends existed, and that they meant something to me.

Once I realized that I could do it at a funeral home, it was like, well.

That sells itself.

- [Justin] What's the oddest place?

I know that's- - That I've performed?

- [Justin] We're going to a funeral home.

- That I've done whoopie?

No.

- (laughing) Yeah.

(Meghan laughs) - Next month, I'll be in Phoenix at a taxidermy store that also has a classroom, and just as a combo of things, I feel like that's the oddest.

- [Meghan] Yeah.

- But also, I guess it's saying something that now funeral homes and cemeteries don't feel strange.

- Yeah, yeah.

- Like it's very normal walking into these places to perform.

But yeah, that's the oddest.

I think the strangest thing I've done is roast the staff of a hospice for their Christmas party.

The boss sent me this Google Doc of notes on her staff, and it was like, "Steven lost two wives to cancer consecutively within the span of eight years, is our head nurse.

Incredible man, you can make fun of his teeth."

(laughing) And like.

This is not a show about how it's funny that we die.

To me, it's like how I responded to the deaths was funny.

- Yeah.

- Like, my experience of grief can be funny, or something.

- Yeah.

- A lot of the show is, "wouldn't it be funny if this is how a guy dealt with death?"

I think this winds up connecting with people because I'm creating a space for people to connect in.

This isn't like picture yourself in my shoes, or I am depending on people's familiarity with what I'm talking about in order to relate to my story.

It is truly like a, "Hey, for the next hour or so, let's hang out, like, let's do a thing right here that we will only have for right now."

What do we got?

We got a few.

Hey, guys.

Doing a show next door.

It's not about you, we're not laughing at you.

Don't worry.

I hope you're chill with it.

I'm not gonna tell people you're here, but they'll kinda know that you're here.

Yeah.

Sorry you guys are missing out on the show.

I know you'd like it, 'cause everyone does.

But have a good night.

I hope you get to where you're going safely and healthily.

I'm Ben, by the way.

Cool.

- [Meghan] That's very sweet.

- There's like this hum of anxiety that I have of just being in a funeral home.

It's gonna be really interesting seeing somebody through entertainment, through comedy, unfold their grief, and talk about life and death in a personal way that hopefully we get some takeaway out of it.

- Well I'm just grateful I get to see it live, because I've been literally following Ben's journey with this show, and obsessed about the concept, because I was like, oh, another couple comedians I know are going through a ...time, too and they're dealing with it in an interesting way that is not traditionally the route.

Our family didn't really have that space.

They white-knuckle their way through their grief, 'cause they're like, "You gotta be strong."

Like, whenever someone's upset in our family, it's like, "Shut up, no, you don't," like, Mom and Dad walking me down the aisle, Mom was starting to cry, and Dad's instinct, response, was, "Diana, stop it.

Stop it, you're fine.

You're gonna be fine."

So it's like, we can't show emotions.

We can't show tears.

- That's not helping anybody.

- No, no.

- That's not helping anybody.

- No.

It's just funny 'cause like, we really are expected to stifle it, and I feel shame sometimes when I break, you know?

It's like, you're supposed to play it cool, guys.

It's just another very close family member that had a significant impact on our lives, just being gone permanently.

Come on, take a hit of this.

And like, it's aggravating.

I think Aunt Dawn and Aunt MaryKay would have loved- - [Justin] Oh yeah, they would have loved this.

- [Meghan] Something like this.

They would always come to our basement shows and stuff, so it feels like full circle.

- [Host] He's very funny.

I'm so excited to watch the show, and I really think you're gonna enjoy it.

Please welcome to the stage, Ben Wasserman!

(audience cheering) (audience applauding) - Hi, everyone!

I'm the intimacy director for the show.

I'm not Ben, by the way.

I'm a different guy.

(audience laughing) We gotta make sure everyone consents to what's gonna happen tonight.

This is an interactive show.

It's gonna be a little conversational.

You know, there's gonna be talking about suicide, death, grief.

I.

- [Audience] I- - [Meghan] I, Meghan.

- Do here solemnly pledge.

- [Audience] Do here solemnly pledge.

- To consent to whatever the (censored) happens tonight.

- [Audience] To consent to whatever the (censored) happens tonight.

- Unfold your arms.

That said- (audience laughing) That said.

- [Audience] That said.

- I know that consent can be revoked at any time.

- [Audience] I know that consent can be revoked at any time.

(upbeat music) (audience laughing) (audience cheering) - Oh!

If you've ever lost a loved one, make some noise!

(audience cheering) If you've ever lost a parent, I wanna hear you scream!

(audience members cheer) Oh, what if a sibling of yours has died?

(audience members cheer) Oh, what about a partner or a spouse!

Okay, New York!

(audience laughing) I'm just gonna pause to say I hope you all find love one day.

(audience laughing) Wait, is there anyone here in the room who has stuff that they wish they could say to someone who they've lost?

Who do you wanna talk to?

- [Audience Member 1] She'd be called Mahkba.

- Mahkba?

- Yeah.

- "She'd be called Mahkba"?

(audience laughing) And who is Mahkba?

- [Audience Member 1] Mahkba's is my wife's grandmother who raised her.

- Okay.

Okay.

When the show became sort of more how it is now, it was almost less about my, I mean, the show is less about my specific people, and more about everyone's experience with this stuff, but it was like, I want people to know about everyone's people.

- Yeah.

- I want people to be able to talk about everyone's people in a way that we're generally not invited to do.

- [Meghan] Yeah, it's like the wrong people are famous.

- Yeah.

Mahkba, if you're here- (audience laughing) Please let your presence be known.

(bell tinkling) Okay, Mahkba's here.

So you at least wake up.

(audience laughing) (bell tinkles) The floor is yours, yeah.

- Mahkba, I just want to let you know that your granddaughter is safe and sound, and that she says that I give her the same sense of security that you gave her in her youth, and she hopes that you are eating mangoes underneath the mango tree.

- [Audience] Aw!

- That's really lovely.

Thanks for doing that.

Back to sleep.

(audience laughing) Yeah, I lost my dad, and then I lost my grandfather.

So my dad, Howard, died the day Trump was inaugurated in 2017, yeah, it was rough, 'cause the whole world was thinking about, to me, the wrong guy.

(audience laughing) And like, a year later, my Uncle Brian, my mom's brother, died.

At this point, I know what you're thinking.

Why isn't my mom doing this show?

(audience laughing) And then in between that, my friend Nick killed himself, and then on the year anniversary of my friend Nick dying, my friend Ryan killed himself, which, like, they didn't even know each other, which was weird.

And then after, my friends Steve and Ragov both died unexpectedly, which was seven losses in three years is a whole lot.

Actually, Albert, can I have you come up here to help me with this thing?

Oh, eager.

Yeah, I love it!

Give it up for Albert!

(audience applauding) (audience cheering) Thank you so much.

Just stand right there.

Okay, who are you thinking about tonight?

- My grandmother, Marjorie.

- When did Marjorie pass?

- She passed on my birthday- - Oh.

- In April of 2020.

- Wow.

- When we were all isolated for COVID.

- Oh my god, that's so rough.

Maybe you experienced this after Marjorie passed, maybe you all know.

When people die, like the big, it feels big, right?

And it feels huge.

And these things are big.

But life just keeps going, and you're not, you don't have the chance to just sort of stop, because there are bills to pay, and there's other relationships that you have.

So I got my dad, my grandfather, my uncle, and my four friends on here.

These balls are proportional to how much each of these people meant to me.

(audience laughing) One thing that no one tells you about when you lose people is you can absolutely rank them.

(audience laughing) ("Paper Planes" by MIA playing) (audience laughing) (audience cheering) Yeah!

(audience clapping to song) Okay, so nice and loud, into the mic.

My dad, my grandfather, my Uncle Brian, oh, it's already too much!

My four friends!

What else, Albert?

- [Albert] Your grandma's dementia!

- My grandmother has dementia!

It's really hard taking care of someone with dementia, they don't remember who you are, they don't know why you're there.

They don't know anything.

It's really stressful.

What else?

- Sick cat.

- I have a sick cat!

My cat named Omar has asthma, and a tiny , which are unrelated.

(audience laughing) But both are really expensive, and it's so (censored) expensive to go to the vet.

Oh, it's so much!

What else?

- Other sick cat.

- I have two sick cats!

(bright upbeat music) I would hope that people walk away feeling a little more comfortable in their grief, and less alone with their losses, a little less scared, not of death, but of talking about it.

That's great, and that's cool.

I think the fact that people are just showing up and responding and participating is sick.

♪ Let them out ♪ Let them flow ♪ These ghosts ♪ These ghosts - It's the most interesting comedy show I've ever been to.

- I found it so moving, and also so funny.

- Normalizing the conversation I think is what happened here, and we all have, like we share a little bond.

- It was just the first time that I actually had a space to grieve her in a way that felt, like it did justice to our relationship and how much she meant to me.

- It has been an incredibly humbling experience.

When people come up and say thank you, or they're like, "Can you hug me?"

Or, "Can I cry with you?"

Everything else feels like gravy.

- Welcome to the roast of grieving.

A cemetery is actually not the most depressing place I've ever performed standup.

I've actually performed at two different hostels in New York, and the weirdest part about that line is that my parents do love me enough.

What else, what else?

Anyone else feeling dead on the inside lately?

Or outside?

- I think comedy's a good tool for processing grief.

There's nothing like the sweet release of tension during a funeral when somebody cracks a really good fart joke.

And then there are more insightful ways to use comedy to dissect grief, like the way Ben did with his show, "Live After Death".

It definitely made it way more comfortable to be in a funeral home this time around.

(bright upbeat music) ♪ Dead to me now ♪ Is the sound ♪ Of the ringing in my ear ♪ Cannot be drowned out ♪ Some poisonous years ♪ For me to drag around ♪ I'd rather put them down (music fading) - [Announcer] Major funding for this program was provided by the City of Austin Office of Arts, Culture, Music, and Entertainment, Tommy and Alexandra Maher, Sandra Honaker, John Wright, Janet Walsh, Midori Munguia, Grace Horvath, Jasmine Mobasseri, Brenda Isaacs-Booth, Matt Walsh.

Additional funding was provided by.

(soft music) And by.

(soft music continues) (music fading) (bright music) (exciting music)