“Sugar Daddy is an invitation to laugh at death and life in equal measure”
Sam Morrison’s laugh-out-loud solo show Sugar Daddy has officially opened at Underbelly Boulevard Soho. Sugar Daddy, like grief, is full of contradictions. It is wholesome and edgy; sardonic and poignant; delightful and grave; intelligent and silly; thoughtful and spontaneous. Most of all, it is tragedy and comedy. With a production team including Alan Cumming and Billy Porter along with Sally™ of Drag Race UK and Olympian Gus Kenworth, Sugar Daddy promises 75-minutes of laughter with a chance of tears.
Sugar Daddy is a meta story of finding humor in grief. Morrison began writing what would eventually become Sugar Daddy following the devastating loss of his long-term partner to COVID-19 in 2021 and a subsequent Type 1 diabetes diagnosis the same year. As a comedian, Morrison was moved to process his grief through writing and ultimately telling his story on stage. Sugar Daddy offers an emotional outlet for both him and his audience. Morrison serves as a trusted and humorous guide in a collective search for meaning in loss.
I must confess that I was uniquely predisposed to love Sugar Daddy. Sam and I, it turns out, are both Americans who spent our recent twenties in Brooklyn and have passed late nights in Provincetown. There is, admittedly, a particular intimacy with performance that reflects the world you know. That said, there is no prerequisite for loving Sugar Daddy. Morrison takes his audience through the halls of his mind and memories, pausing to give comedic context and definitions as needed. Sugar Daddy reflects elements of the human experiences far more original and meaningful than living in Brooklyn. It’s hard to imagine any audience member could exit the theatre without recognizing something of themself on stage. Morrison’s story is singular, but deeply human. Anyone who has lived with anxiety, navigated heartache, experienced loss, endured the pandemic, heard of Judaism, been gay or been to the beach can relate. Death and diabetes are integral, as are the realities of navigating sex, love, age-gap relationships, and Provincetown. The world of Sugar Daddy is honest, vivid, and expansive.
Vulnerability is a central tension in Sugar Daddy. The performance is inherently confessional. Morrison’s choice to sit quietly on stage as the audience enters is the first acknowledgement that, despite the controlled confidence of his performance, he has located himself in a vulnerable position. The performance is punctuated by intermittent interjections from the voice in Morrison’s head. These interjections are not random; his inner-voice disrupts moments it deems inauthentic, moments when Morrison tries hardest to obfuscate his pain by transmuting it into humor. On-stage Morrison, acknowledging the voyeuristic cultural desire to mine trauma for content, responds by refusing to give his audience a coveted “death scene”.
The ongoing argument in Morrison’s head is existential. He is at war with himself regarding the appropriate response to death. Should he confront it with sadness? Laughter? Denial? Sex? Sugar Daddy underscores the power of mind-body connection. Morrison’s inner-monologue, while hilarious, reminds him that grief will not be ignored. Sooner or later, Morrison advises, we must confront sadness before it confronts us. Trauma is a somatic experience.
The Underbelly Boulevard Soho production marks Sugar Daddy’s return to London following a brief 2023 stint at Soho Theatre. The show returns to the UK on the heels of an off-Broadway run and performances across North America. Sugar Daddy makes its comeback with fresh direction from Amrou Al-Khadi. Al-Khadi has toured multiple solo shows internationally including From Qur’an to Queen and Drag Mother under the performance name Glamour. They are also known for their memoir Life as a Unicorn and their debut film Layla,which premiered at The Sundance Film Festival in 2024.
Between Morrison and Al-Khadi, the audience is in excellent hands. The Sugar Daddy script includes masterful callbacks and has been updated to include British in-jokes. Despite minimal use of props, discrete scenes and moments are remarkably vivid. The set is spare, allowing Morrison to use his words and body to set scenes. Morrison indeed makes use of his entire space, coolly commanding the stage with a practiced precision while, like any good comedian, making us feel he’s sharing it all for the first time.
Sugar Daddy is an invitation to laugh at death and life in equal measure. It’s Morrison’s story situated in the context of the human condition. It is a meditation on grief as much as it is 75-minutes of rapid-fire jokes. Despite its short run time, Sugar Daddy has something for everyone, even if it’s just a desire to laugh in dark times.
Sugar Daddy is on at The Underbelly Boulevard Soho through 4th April. Tickets are available at sugardaddyshow.com.