I wonder what it says about western society that the once-dominant home makeover show has been transformed into the all-encompassing life makeover show? Whereas we once had a lick of paint and some bold decisions about stencilling, now TV of a similar ilk offers to perform a complete inventory of one’s existence. Joining Queer Eye, Sort Your Life Out, Tidying Up With Marie Kondo and so on in the overhaul genre is The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning. It’s a similarly lovely intervention, with a little more culture-clash thrown in for good measure.
Amy Poehler tempers the sweetness slightly with an occasionally spiky voiceover – at one point, she credits Swedish efficiency to the availability of free healthcare, an unexpectedly socialist interlude – but this is feelgood TV designed to expand the heart. Poehler explains that death cleaning is “basically getting your shit together before you die, so that others don’t have to do it when you’re gone”. It was the subject of a bestselling book by Margareta Magnusson – and here it is now, in the form of an applied demonstration.
The death cleaners – which sounds like a new wave band signed to Rough Trade in 1984 – comprise three multitalented Swedes. Johan Svenson is a designer, Katarina Blom is a psychologist and Ella Engström is a professional organiser. Each brings their own skills, and a certain bluntness, to the lives of Americans who wish to, as one says, “declutter the soul”.
They begin in Kansas City with the fabulously larger-than-life Suzi, a gravel-voiced former singing waitress and lifelong showgirl, who, at 75, is starting to think about what might happen to her stuff when she dies. Swedish people talking about death is normal, Poehler explains, but it “freaks out” Americans.
Suzi’s life has been rich and varied. She was a teacher, then a singer at a resort in Aspen, Colorado. Halfway through the episode we learn, in a woefully underexplored aside, that, in her 50s, she was a standup comedian. It seems very American that, at 75, she isn’t enjoying her retirement, but rather working two jobs, as a travel agent and a real estate broker.
Suzi describes herself as a vagabond and her house is filled with mementoes from her travels and performing days. They offer her memories, but they don’t seem to bring happiness, or spark joy, as another expert might put it. “I am a prisoner of my possessions,” she says. How many people can relate? Most of us, I suspect.
The task of sorting through a loved one’s possessions after their death can be challenging and emotionally wrenching. The idea of sparing family and friends the labour of sorting through a lifetime’s worth of accumulated stuff is appealing. Suzi and the death cleaners approach it with gusto.
These shows live or die, so to speak, by the characters at the heart of the makeovers – and Suzi is a gift. She is sequined, bespangled and beglittered. She refers to herself as a “turkey vulture” – older than a cougar and can’t catch prey. She is not ready to die yet, she insists: “I’m still trying to get laid.” But underneath her gregarious facade is a woman who is starting to get lonely. She lost 38 of her friends last year, she says; she is at 17 so far this year. Katarina observes that, in her museum-like home, she is stuck in the past, unable to face or imagine her future.
The art of death cleaning is moving, although not particularly delicate. Johan, reaching for an English translation of a Swedish concept, settles on describing Suzi’s home as “a kingdom of death”. Our sentimental attachments to objects are held up to the light and examined like rare gemstones. What is the point of looking at something old and remembering what it once meant to us? The bouncy tone disguises this philosophical mood. It would be hard to walk away from it without a second glance at your own shelves, without reconsidering whether there is a case for hanging on to that festival wristband from 2014.
But it is also funny and practical. Getting rid of your stuff doesn’t mean simply chucking it in the bin. They visit a “creative reuse centre”, which favours repurposing existing things and discouraging the acquisition of more things over attempting to recycle them. The episode ends with what may be the most innovative creative reuse of all, as the death cleaners find a way for others to enjoy Suzi’s immaculate wardrobe. It is a moment that is aptly, profoundly, full of life.
• The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning airs on W and is available to stream on UKTV Play in the UK, and on SBS and SBS On Demand in Australia.
