TEMPING
Edinburgh Festival Fringe - August 2024
Somewhere in a filing cabinet in Delaware or Indiana, there is a table that shows how long we’re expected to live. Most of us will never see it. But what if your job was to update these tables, to record the beginnings and ends of thousands of lives? What if you found the formula to predict your own lifespan?
Sarah Jane Tully, a 53-year-old actuary, is taking her first vacation in years, and you’ve been hired to cover for her. TEMPING, the strange and comic tale of an employee’s inner life, is performed for an audience of one by a Windows PC, a corporate phone, a laser printer, and the Microsoft Office Suite. Filling in at Sarah Jane’s cubicle, you’ll update client records, send emails, and eavesdrop on intra-office romance. Each performance is unique, depending on which tasks you accomplish and which of your co- workers you decide to trust.
Congratulations, you’re the new temp! Get ready to work. With no live performers, the peice interacts with the single audience member and challenges them with themes of human interaction through technology, isolation, and death. Contrasting the anonymity of an Excel spreadsheet with furtive moments of human intimacy, TEMPING brings you deep into the heart of corporate America.
