Stages of Death
Life lessons from the mortuary to the theatre
If you’re a Central Texan, chances are fairly good that you’ve seen Bernie, the dark Richard Linklater comedy starring Jack Black in the title role. I saw it with a friend a few weeks after the movie’s release and remember vividly the opening scene of Bernie’s return to his alma mater as a guest lecturer … on the process of embalming. My fellow audience members shifted uncomfortably in their seats and let out gasps of “eeew!” I, however, smiled quietly, for I knew what many of them did not: that the onscreen depiction of the process of preparing a body for viewing was spot-on.
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