★★★★★
Marcus Is Alive is Marcus J Freed’s one-man show about the time he escaped death. One Shabbat evening, Freed crossed the road of a busy LA street, opting to jaywalk rather than use the pedestrian crossing to keep in line with the rules of the holy day. A speeding car sends him flying across the road, resulting in him hitting his head. Desperate to avoid the USA’s costly hospital bills, he rejects the driver’s offer to take him to a hospital, instead opting to be dropped off at a friend’s house. The friend rushes him to hospital, where he finds out he is having a brain haemorrhage, and needs two surgeries. The play focuses on the accident, subsequent recovery, and his hunt to find the man who hit him.
The script is very witty and flows together seamlessly. Freed combines heavier passages about his brain surgery with lighter moments. The Burr holes he has reminds him of Aaron Burr, which leads him to segue into some Hamilton puns. He parodies the neurosurgeon who operated on him, implying he was drunk and singing ‘Like A Surgeon’ to the tune of Madonna’s ‘Like A Virgin’ as he scrubs in. His jokes are much funnier than the audience gave him credit for, and he would thrive in front of a bigger crowd. He doesn’t try to minimise the surgery or how hard the recovery process was, but is not afraid to poke fun at himself, joking about the time he found a lump on his head that ended up being two fallen screws from his surgery, proving to his friends that he did indeed have “a screw loose”.
The Epilogue is touching, where he talks about the symptoms he experiences, such as chronic fatigue when he pushes himself too hard, and his fear that he would not be able to remember his lines. He also talks candidly about how angry he felt at first (especially when he is summoned to court because a camera caught him doing a rolling stop, yet there was no footage of the man that hit him), but that by looking to his faith, he managed to find some good from the situation. As he points out, the play wouldn’t exist if the accident hadn’t happened. On paper, it might sound preachy and overly sentimental, but in practice, it feels like a very natural and uplifting place to end on.
Marcus Is Alive is a heartfelt and entertaining play that I’m surprised hasn’t gained more traction this Fringe. It has everything you could possibly ask for in a one-man show: an interesting story brought alive by an incredibly talented performer, funny jokes, well-executed songs and strong messages. Freed is a joy to watch and I really hope he returns to the Fringe in years to come.
Marcus Is Alive was performed at Hill Street – Muse as part of Edinburgh Fringe.
Words by Ellen Leslie
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