Dale Carter Sings The Song of the Cicada

Dale Carter, subject of new documentary Song of the Cicada

There's no missing Dale Carter when he enters a room. Sashaying in to the afterparty for Song of the Cicada, twirling a silver cane, there's a Truman Capote panache to the spritely Texas gentleman (a comparison that may make him blush with modesty and appreciation). A cape and fedora over an elegant suit and brown-and-white leather wingtips.

The ensemble is distinctly different to his work attire of a crisp white apron. Similarly, while the room lights up as Carter enters, his clients show no such response. For Carter is the final minister and friend to the dead, a mortician working in Galveston. In 40 years, he has tended to the corpses of over 30,000 people.

Maybe that explains the vivacity, the impish charm, the erudite nature, the passion for things and people - and above all, the kindness. "We are caregivers," he said. "You are entrusting us with the most precious thing in the world - your family."

Morticians, Carter said, are "a shadow people," a pivotal part of society but never acknowledged until they become necessary. That's what makes Song of the Cicada a rare documentary, in that it actually talks about death: the constant in life about which Americans are seemingly unwilling to or incapable of discussing. Carter said, "You've seen Oprah. You've seen Maury Povich. All the talkshow hosts. Name me one that had an embalmer on to talk about what they do. Never happens. But you have everything. You have the Ku Klux Klan. You have the Nazis. You have skinheads. You have everything, and nothing is taboo except death." By contrast, he noted that German anatomist Gunther von Hagens had performed an autopsy in public: "Now that's daring. That would never happen here."

Carter said he observed a philosophical kinship with von Hagens. "We see the body as art, as beauty, as something wonderful."

Art is how he first connected with Robert Weiss, introduced by a mutual friend on Halloween eve 2012 at the Witches Ball in Galveston. Robert said, "I was teaching at the time, anatomy and figure drawing, and he's also involved in anatomy in a different way." Carter invited him to attend an embalming, "with a very clear warning."

Carter recalled, "I said, 'If you see this, you will never be the same, so you better be certain." He was considering talking Robert on as a student, "until he got an experience with it, and he changed his mind."

"It was actually pretty traumatic," said Weiss, but that didn't mean it wasn't fascinating, so he talked to his cousin, Aaron Weiss, "and Aaron and I agreed it would be a great idea to make a documentary about."

"We shot two days," Aaron added, "and were able to put together a 12-minute film that we thought was compelling, but then we started showing it to people." Immediately, they realized that there was so much more that needed to be told: about death, about the funeral industry, but mostly about Dale and his extraordinary life. "So we started going to Galveston once or twice a year, then it was three times a year, then we got a grant from the Austin Film Society along the way, and that gave us the confidence to turn it into a feature film." The result, Song of the Cicada is a decade-long portrait of Carter, through the pandemic, personal loss, his efforts to restore a collapsing historic house in Galveston, and his endless dedication to caring for the dead: the wealthy and the homeless, saints and sinners, all treated equally.

It's an oath Carter has taken, to treat everyone equally. One of his contracts is with Harris County, to handle cremations for the indigent poor: at his estimate, he handles 30 to 40 such funerals a month. He's also taken in and done restoration work on both crime victims and criminals, pulling shattered bodies back together to give their families on last moment with their loved ones. During the height of the AIDS epidemic, he was one of a very few morticians who would work at a Catholic-run hospice for people with an HIV diagnosis. "I used to wear an amethyst ring on my pinkie, and this one boy would say, 'When you die, Dale, can I have that ring?' I said, 'Honey, yes, I'll make sure you get it.' He didn't live two more months, and I had to go get him.'"

Amid the tragedy, there's also a certain humor to the funeral industry, with workplace incidents like any other trade. Like the time his teacher fell in a grave during a burial, or when he was handling the funeral of a double amputee in West Texas. "None of us thought to put pillows down there, or phone books, or anything. So we're going through the desert, we get to the graveyard and - we're not not supposed to open the casket, but the family member said, 'We've gotta see my aunt.' Well, we open the casket, not thinking that she's all the way down. There's no face. She slid from the viewing part to the bottom because she had no legs, and we couldn't just pull her back up. We just had to open the other end."

It's not that people fear morticians, but that they shun them for representing death. But then, what is to fear from death? Having seen so much, Carter compared it to an episode of The Twilight Zone, "Nothing in the Dark," in which an old woman (Gladys Cooper) is visited by Death (a young Robert Redford). "He explained, 'If you just take my hand, it'll be that easy.'"

But what about what comes next? Carter cited the great philosopher, Betty White. "She said, 'Well, if there's nothing after this, it's a win situation, and if there is it's a win situation.'"