The Royal Court Theatre sponsors a series called "Playwrights' Playwrights," in which dramatists are asked to choose a play to direct in a one-shot afternoon staged reading. The distinguished playwright Caryl Churchill selected Wallace Shawn's Our Late Night, never done in Britain although its premiere at the New York Shakespeare Festival earned it an Obie in 1975. Churchill said she likes "the unexpectedness of the detail and his use of words, just the way his writing sounds....It's upsetting and it makes me laugh."
Annette (Annabelle Apsion) and Lewis (Danny Webb) are a couple preparing to host a party. They indulge in mildly startling chitchat, until five guests arrive. The conversation gets weirder and raunchier. Tony (Paul Jesson, in a remarkable performance) announces, "My wife sucked me for an hour," and launches into a lengthy satirical monologue about sex, after which he noisily vomits. The guests depart, and the hosts, alone again, have an utterly unpredictable exchange. Churchill is right: the play is upsetting and funny.
