Kento the Clown restages his Okinawan grandmother’s funeral—with the audience as his family—in this joyful, participatory ritual about grief, culture, and learning to ask for help. Speaking of asking for help, this performance is also a fundraiser supporting the show’s upcoming Edinburgh Fringe run.

Kento the Clown missed his Okinawan grandmother’s funeral, so he’s creating a new one—with the audience cast as his entire family—in this intimate, participatory clown ritual. This performance also serves as a fundraiser to support the show’s upcoming run at the Edinburgh Fringe.

Audience members are invited into gentle, joyful participation: performing a candy version of hashiwatashi (the bone-passing ritual), holding cue cards while Kento performs Macbeth for his grandmother (a former high-school drama teacher), and joining small communal gestures throughout the ceremony.

Beneath the playful clowning is a deeply human story about a boy raised to be “strong and independent,” so much so that he never learned how to ask for help. In this imagined funeral, Obaachan teaches him her final lesson: strength doesn’t mean doing everything alone.

While it deals with death and family, audiences leave feeling warm, included, and unexpectedly buoyed.

Kento the Clown is played by Kento Morita, a Japanese American actor, clown, and writer. He originated the role of Actor 5 in Akira Kurosawa Explains His Movies and Yogurt at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, and has provided voice work for Marty Supreme and Get Jiro!. Kento is a contributor to The Onion, and regularly performs at Upright Citizens Brigade, The Second City, and other performance spaces around New York.