EDINBURGH 2026 Review: GOODBYE DANDELION, Underbelly Cowgate
Runs until 30 August.
People die all the time. When 37-year-old Maddie shows up at 87-year-old Darcy’s door after signing up for an elderly companionship program to fix her existential ennui, her trajectory takes a turn. As she learns more about the adventurous story of this cantankerous old lady, she gains a different perspective. Maddie and Marcus Rice write an invigorating celebration of life. Goodbye Dandelion is affirming, uplifting, and wistfully moving.
As Maddie spends her Wednesdays sipping wine and trying to contain Darcy’s sassiness, she comes to her own epiphanic realisations. Stuck with an insufferable boyfriend in a precarious job in the arts, she feels lost. Having such a galvanising presence next to her changes her (and our) mindset on what death means, reframing it entirely.
The show is not quite a musical, not quite a play with music. Marcus accompanies Maddie on the piano, adding a dreamy aura to her prose when he isn’t suspending the narrative action altogether with facts about aging or other adjacent conversations. The result is a blithe, sentimental, almost romantic brand of storytelling. The monologues are descriptive, full of Darcy-made aphorisms and musings on loneliness, affection, and more. It’s an evocative, contemplative little piece of theatre with a big heart.
Mind you, Goodbye Dandelion is sad. The witticism, tender sarcasm, and loving bullying in it smooth out the harrowing reality of it: Darcy wants to die. She’s lived a life she’s proud of, loved the people she wanted to love, made the art she wanted to make. The Rice siblings indirectly urge us to do the same with a tear and a smile.
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