We sat down for an exclusive interview with Natalie Ekberg, the playwright behind HIM. HIM is an intimate and deliberately morally complicated play about a contemporary LGBTQ+ family and the consequences of the decisions we make for the people we love.
HIM runs until 30 October 2026 at Union Theatre – Tickets here
HIM centres on a morally complicated LGBTQ+ family formed by an unexpected pregnancy, so what first drew you to this story, and why did it feel urgent to tell now?
I was initially commissioned to write a play by a gay couple who were both producers. It was many years ago, but even back then we called it HIM. It was a different story, but a gay couple raising a child was always at its centre.
Later, they left the industry and told me I could use the play “as I saw fit”. I was busy with other projects, but after my first play, Diversifications, became quite successful, I returned to HIM and redeveloped it.
Through multiple workshops, I introduced a female point of view, which made the questions around parenthood, love and responsibility much more complex and, I believe, interesting for a modern audience. At its heart, HIM is about a family that appears to function perfectly well, while underneath there are secrets, compromises and bold decisions made years ago that are still shaping their lives.
You are known for emotionally complex, female-led characters, and Jane sits at the heart of this play, so how did you approach writing her alongside Charlie and Osmond without casting anyone as a villain?
I am primarily a TV writer, and what we are seeing with audiences today is that they get bored easily, mainly due to the sheer amount of content available to them. So, as a personal rule, I always aim to ‘subvert expectations’.
That is particularly important in HIM. We form opinions about our characters very early on – who has behaved well, who has behaved badly, even whose side we are on – and then the ground keeps shifting. And surprises keep coming!
I don’t want to tell an audience what to think. I want them to make a judgement and then question it. None of us is entirely good or bad – we all are complicated and contradictory. For our characters to be relatable, they have to be the same.
The play asks who gets to define parenthood, responsibility and family, and what do you hope audiences, whatever their own family structure, will take from it?
I think there are still many preconceptions in society about what a ‘proper family’ is supposed to look like. HIM shows that a loving family can come in almost any form. Biology alone doesn’t necessarily make somebody a parent, and an unconventional family certainly isn’t necessarily a dysfunctional one.
At the same time, the opposite is also true. A family that survives through pretence, secrets and things left unsaid is standing on very shaky ground, however settled it may appear from the outside.
Ultimately, I think HIM is about the importance of honesty in our communication. Sometimes we keep secrets because we believe we are protecting somebody. The play asks what happens when those secrets finally come out – and whether love is enough for a family to survive the truth.
Having worked across film, television and theatre, including That Girl Peugeot on Prime Video, how does writing for the stage differ for you, and what does an intimate venue like the Union Theatre offer this material?
Writing for theatre is very special to me. With film or TV, script is just the beginning and then many other layers enter the process, whereas in theatre, as a writer, you can remain very close to your work. The creative process is also much more fluid and collaborative. Changes can happen quickly, sometimes simply because you experience the play with an audience and realise that a moment lands differently than you intended.
There is nothing quite like hearing the laughter, feeling the silence and sensing when an audience is completely with you. With TV and film, you often have to wait a very long time – if ever – to see your projects realised, whereas theatre is much more immediate.
I think Union Theatre is wonderfully intimate, but at the same time technically very well equipped, so it allowed us to make the production very colourful and full of music.
With Simon Fielding directing from his own personal experience of parenthood and Niall Sheehy joining the cast as Charlie, how has the collaboration shaped the play as it has moved from page to rehearsal room?
I had an inkling that the play was special because I received very positive feedback throughout its development. But Simon took that ‘something special’ and elevated it into a highly visual, entertaining piece of theatre.
I feel very lucky: not only is he a supremely talented and experienced theatre professional, he is also my biggest supporter, and we work extremely well together. We even chose exactly the same actors during casting, and tend to agree instinctively on what will make the play stronger. Our cast are generous, hard-working and have wonderful chemistry together.
My objective has always been to give audiences the best possible experience. I want them to laugh, be surprised, change their minds about the characters several times and, most importantly, still be talking about HIM long after the play is over.