Irreverence and death don’t mix. Unless you’re the Cassity brothers, who bring a show-biz sensibility to the staid funeral business.
By Bill Barol, CNN Money.com (FORTUNE Small Business)
It’s a bright clear winter morning in Los Angeles. A windstorm blew in the night before, scattering huge palm fronds across the green expanse of Hollywood Forever cemetery, but grounds crews are already piling them into neat stacks by the grave of Mel Blanc, the voice of Bugs Bunny and Porky Pig, whose headstone reads simply THAT’S ALL FOLKS. The real action, though, is inside the cemetery’s main office building, a converted Masonic temple dating to the 1920s. In a small screening room off the main lobby, funeral arranger Eliza Sultan stabs at a touchscreen. “I want to show you the Schaffers,” she says. Lester and Dorothy Schaffer are a couple in their 80s who have made pre-need cremation arrangements with Forever Network. Onscreen, however, in a slickly produced audiovisual presentation that has still photos, a musical score, and interviews, they are ageless and immortal.