JERKER
Play Reading
JR and BERT are San Francisco f*ggots. They have never met. They don’t know each other’s names, what they look like or where they live. They do know how to turn each other on.
JERKER begins with a dirty phone call. But, over the many nights that follow, as their friends and lovers fall sick and die, the men come to share their fantasies, hopes and fears about an increasingly uncertain and frightening future.
Robert Chesley was a San Franciscan playwright, critic, and gay rights activist who used his theatre to celebrate sexual liberation and dramatise the toll of HIV/AIDS on the queer community. ‘Jerker, or the Helping Hand’, written in 1986, is his masterpiece.
Syrus Lowe, Adam Silver and Ms Sharon Le Grand star in this intimate rehearsed reading, directed by Alastair Curtis with costume by Max Allen and Elliott Adcock and music by Helen Noir.
→ You can now listen online to the play here
This event was organised by Alastair Curtis, as part of the Associate Artists Programme.
About
Alastair Curtis (he/him) is a writer, critic, director and founder of The AIDS Plays Project. His writing has been published in Frieze, AnOther, The Economist, Prospect and The Observer amongst others and his debut short film Sweetheart, starring Ian Gelder and Kadiff Kirwan, will be released in late 2024.
08/03
09/03
