Theatre review: Jock Night

Not quite a verbatim play but apparently based on interviews with Manchester's LGBTQ+ community (well... Manchester's G community, anyway,) Adam Zane's Jock Night takes place over six months in the bedroom of 45-year-old Ben (David Paisley,) who's been a fixture of the city's gay village for decades and is still very popular on the scene - he's entered his Daddy phase, although he's not particularly happy with people calling him that. He, the acidic Kam (Sam Goodchild) and muscle jock Russ (Matthew Gent) have been fuck-buddies for a while, usually finding others on the apps to join them. On the night we meet them, they're joined by two new faces: At the start of the evening likeable and naïve AJ (Levi Payne) has to duck out early after the cocktail of drugs the older men are used to proves too much for him.

Theatre review: Gypsy Queen

Writer/performer Rob Ward seems to have found a niche for himself with plays about gay sportsmen; a few years ago he co-wrote and acted in monologue Away From Home, about a gay footballer in a secret relationship, and now he takes on solo writing duties while sharing the acting with Ryan Clayton in a story where the relationship is still secret, but the sport’s much more up-front about its aggressive side. In Gypsy Queen Clayton plays Dane “The Pain” Samson, a promising boxer, openly gay in his father’s gym where he trains, and where everyone pretty much accepts this; but wary about his sexuality being known more generally, and worried that one sports reporter in particular keeps sniffing around it. Ward is “Gorgeous” George O’Connell, from an Irish traveller background, who bare-knuckle boxes in pub car parks until Dane’s father talent-spots him and invites him to turn professional.