I Love You So Much I Could Die (2024) – Play/Musical Review

[Unless Said Otherwise] Spoiler Alert: This summary and review contains spoilers.

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Summary

While Mona has experienced the highs of a good relationship, the past year or more has caused overwhelming grief, and for the hour you spend with her, whether it is through music or a robotic voice, she walks you through what happened and how she is trying to manage, and eventually heal.

Content Information

• Dialog: Cursing (Occasional)
• Violence: N/A
• Sexual Content: N/A
• Miscellaneous: N/A

General Information

Director(s)	Lucas Hnath
Writer(s)	Mona Pirnot
Language	English
Attendance Type	In Person
Event Status	On Schedule
Venue or Network (New York Theatre Workshop)	79 E 4th St, New York, NY 10003
Performance Date	February 2, 2024
First Performance At This Venue	February 1, 2024
Opening Night Performance	February 1, 2024
Last Performance At This Venue	March 9, 2024
Venue URL	https://www.nytw.org/
Tickets Starting At	$45.00
Genre(s)	Play, Solo Show, Comedy, Young Adult, Musical
Duration	1 Hour 5 Minutes
Noted Performers
Mona	Mona Pirnot
Crew
Scene/ Set Design	Mimi Lien
Costume Design	Enver Chakartash
Lighting Design	Oona Curley
Sound Design	Mikhail Fiksel, Noel Nichols
Choreography	N/A

Character Descriptions

Please Note: This character guide is not an exhaustive list of every cast member, and character descriptions may contain what can be considered spoilers.

Mona (Mona Pirnot)

Mona is a 28-year-old creative from Florida who was in LA until she moved to NYC to be with her boyfriend of five years, who is a playwright.

Review

Notable Performances or Moments

The Indie Movie Soundtrack

The four to five songs transport you to an indie movie like “Juno” or “Garden State.” Laced in the tracks, whether it is about missing being a good time girl, professing love, or how Mona wants her remains to be handled, even when there is a darkness to the song, there is either a sense of humor or the expectation of peace.

It all feels like the kind of music used to transition from one location to the next, and as the lights continually dim, you realize we’re on the journey through Mona’s moods and what makes them ebb and flow.

Highlights

Microsoft David

Rather than have Mona speak and sing, she only sings and uses text to speech (this might be the tool) to explain what happened. The use of this technology is comical as the pronunciation or deadpan delivery of the Microsoft David voice somehow makes topics about death, grief, and mourning comical.

Mind you, clearly, Microsoft David was written to take beats and be robotic yet awkwardly natural in their comedy. But there is no denying that, as a narrative tool, this is genius.

Sad, But Not Overbearing

From the title to what Mona left behind in Florida, “I Love You So Much I Could Die” can be seen as depressing. However, it never goes so far as to bring you to Mona’s dark place. The comedy is strategically placed so while enough is revealed to get you emotional and understand what Mona is going through, even Mona sometimes breaks as she pretends to make the sounds of an electric guitar while doing a song.

Because of this, we didn’t find ourselves crying, yet we were able to hold a place of empathy for Mona. With her showing how processing darkness isn’t about quickly finding the light but breaking it up into pieces, storing some in songs, and learning to digest what you can, while there may always be some darkness left, it can eventually be manageable.

Good If You Like

• Dark comedies

Recommendations

If you like this, we recommend:

1. The Coast Starlight

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