A Little More Than You Wanted to Spend

Written and Performed by Chris Clavelli

Director : John Hickok
Writer's Notes

In 2003 I lost my six year old son to a sudden illness. Four years later I attempted to make sense of this tragedy by writing a play. The result is a 75 minute solo theatre piece: A Little More Than You Wanted to Spend. Since 2007 it has been seen in venues across the country. Western debut was at The Off Square Theatre Company in Jackson Hole Wyoming. It's also been show-cased at The Bricolage Theatre in Pittsburgh, The Youngstown Playhouse, The University of South Carolina, The Depot Theatre and The Florida Repertory Theatre. It is slated for an Off Broadway production in the fall of 2012.

Here is a short blurb that may help you to understand the play.

We all know shit happens. Even to kids – you get knocked around, you grow up, learn to cope, get tough. But what's the worst that can happen? Can you handle that, and go on, waking up each day, doing the work, laughing at yourself? Maybe you could even get to a place where you turn the worst into a sort of gift. Almost. To yourself, to a very special boy, and to us. Now that's tough.

Spend Buzz

I'm in awe. As I was about to prepare for class I thought I'd take a peek at the first page of your play. And then I read the whole thing. I feel like bowing to you. It's brilliant. It's a searing, extraordinary ride, never stopping, never stopping; we care about you, The Mightiest Mighty Mite, the son of your father, left in Sears. I've rarely read such honesty and then…and then…in the moment when your life changes, we stay with you through the horror from the airport to the thread and never looking away. It's intimate and funny and cruel and, I want to say triumphant, but that's too simple. Yes, you have created a beautiful piece of art and more.Thank You. Patty Dann
Author: The Goldfish Went on Vacation
'A riveting human experience lived out fully by the urgent and compelling Chris Clavelli.' Dennis Cunningham
Channel 2, CBS Evening News
If you have made other plans - consider changing them. I saw this show last night and it is truly amazing. It is funny, moving, meaningful, and one of the best nights of theatre I've had
anywhere. It's riveting. Only one night left - If you have ever lost someone you love, you will be moved and maybe changed by this piece. Mary Ruth Lynn, Producing Artistic Director.
The Youngstown Playhouse
Chris Clavelli runs, stomps, howls and grieves during "A Little More Than You Wanted To Spend," a deeply personal, moving and unexpectedly humorous one-man show about the loss of his young son eight years ago. The two-night special engagement at Florida Repertory Theatre's studio space continues tonight. Clavelli, Florida Rep's associate artistic director, wrote the 70-minute piece about four years ago. His 6-year-old son Jess (the boy would be 13 now) died suddenly from a bacterial infection in New York while Clavelli was directing a play in Fort Myers. Beyond exploring any parent's worst nightmare.
A Little More Than You Wanted to Spend attempts to put the entire grieving process into perspective. What emerges - not unexpectedly - is a bit of a fast-paced, entertaining and cathartic therapy session. Clavelli acknowledged as much in a half-hour talkback after Sunday's performance, noting that it becomes easier for him to perform the piece as time passes. Clavelli's talent for storytelling lifts the piece far beyond simple recounting into a powerful piece of theater. The emotion he pours into the work makes it a far different experience than even the gut-wrenching and acclaimed David Lindsay-Abaire play "Rabbit Hole,"
which explores the same "loss of a child" experience. Director John Hickok also intersperses moments from Clavelli's childhood (he grew up in rough-and-tumble middle-class Catholic household in New Castle, Pennsylvania) to give perspective to the tender father-son relationship and Clavelli's troubled relationship to his own parents and siblings. These moments (Clavelli imitating his chain-smoking mother) provide much of the surprising moments of humor throughout the night and provide a welcome leavening of levity for some of the heady, serious subject matter that's discussed. Religion pops up; no
play about death would be complete without it, although there's very little talk of the afterlife. Clavelli married a Jewish wife and during the play's most interesting sequences he describes the practice of "sitting" shiva. In shiva, visitors go to the home of the deceased to pay respects to the family. While there are many traditions to shiva, Clavelli's description makes the event seem more akin to an Irish wake - a celebration instead of a solemn affair. The text of the show jokingly referred to the event more than once as a "shiksa shiva" - meaning it probably wasn't precisely a strict Orthodox Jewish event.
It was hard to miss the possibly unintended symbolism that the audience finds itself sitting an impromptu shiva. Either that, or we're mourners listening to a eulogy - and that analogy never truly flies because "Spend" refuses to wallow in unhappiness - it grieves and moves on. Clavelli openly mocks counselors and their suggestion "try to remember to just breath." He also takes savage aim at support groups and their trite "God needed another angel" mantras. "Spend" makes no pretense of plucking heartstrings with visions of apple-cheeked little boys gamboling with puppies on fields of sunflowers.
The work isn't about the dead - it's about the living (specifically Clavelli) and how he copes with the loss of his child. That subtle distinction - while never made overt - gives the show its bite and separates it from being just a vanity project. "Spend" tries to show how one man made (or at least tries to make) it through the loss of a child. The show touches on moments of blackness - including the collapse of Clavelli's marriage - and moments of light, like when a man at a Queens copy shop spoke of his son as a "high soul." "A Little More Than You Wanted to Spend" offers an honest,
soul-baring look at one man's journey through one of the worst things any parent could experience. While there are no great truths to be found - the show offers a glimpse of the healing process without seeming morbid, tragic or wallowing in pity. The evening zips by as Chris Clavelli lifts the curtain on grief in honest, emotional and bittersweet fashion.
Chris Silk
Naples Daily News