5 Guys Chillin’ – Player’s Theatre – DIGTF – Review by Fran Winston

Players Theatre, Trinity College, Dublin 2, until May 14th.

9pm nightly. Matinee 4pm Saturday 14th – Tickets €15/13

Running as part of the DIGTF

If the title of this play made you think it was a nice, sweet fluffy piece then walking into the venue and finding a condom and lube on your seat would quickly dispel that feeling. For the uninitiated the “chillin’” of the title refers to the chill parties that have sprung up on the gay scene where guests indulge in drugs, sex and more drugs with mostly wild abandon. In case you were in any doubt within minutes of the play starting all the characters have stripped down to shorts or bondage gear and are recounting their experiences.

As the title suggests there are five of them and although four are acquainted to different degrees there is a new guy in the mix. A Pakistani who longs to be an openly gay man but struggles with the traditional roles foisted upon him by his family. His introduction to the group is the catalyst for a lot of soul searching and sharing on the part of the group and over the course of the hour they recount their best and worst sex party experiences and stories of love and betrayal and in doing so they realise how much their experiences have affected them.

The dialogue is taken from over 50 hours of interviews from guys they found through Grindr and other social media so has an undeniable ring of truth to it and the actors convey it with conviction. There are some truly touching moments as well as some humorous ones and a couple that will make you question if you heard them right! With a huge range of experiences recounted this gives a very good overview of the chemsex scene and the variety of different relationships and wants and needs people have. Throughout the show the men are partying – taking drugs, having sex, dancing – meaning that the energy never wavers and the intimacy of the venue makes you feel more like a voyeur who is intruding on this intimate soiree rather than an audience member.

While the stories are compiled well and there is a nice pacing to them I found that by recounting these experiences – which are basically snapshots of other people’s lives shoehorned into a character – there was no real conclusion. With good drama there is usually a sense of catharsis. You feel that either the protagonists have learned a lesson or that you have. You don’t get that here. The stories are very much left hanging in the air like the stale smell of sweat that must surely permeate spaces after one of these sex parties. While the play raises important issues about sexual safety (three of the characters are HIV positive) and the dangers of the chemsex scene you feel that the characters don’t care about any of that and that they are not going to start caring any time soon. This makes it difficult to have any real empathy for them.

This aside the performances are great, the staging is spot on and the stories are truly eye opening and if they do get one person thinking about taking more precautions then they have done their work. Extremely entertaining and with a serious underlying message this only lets itself down at the finish line but is still an enjoyable watch.