Soho Theatre will welcome Miriam Battye’s Strategic Love Play as part of its UK tour this autumn.
So they’ve both swiped right. Now they’re meeting for the first time. Facing each other. As if that’s a normal thing to do. But she’s being uncomfortable, and he’s a total bore. The vibe is horrific and the banter is even worse. But something is keeping them in their seats. Something is making them stay. Welcome to your hot date.
Directed by Paines Plough co-artistic director Katie Posner, Strategic Love Play takes place on an awkward first date, speaking uncomfortable truths about modern dating and romance with acid wit.
Letty Thomas and Archie Backhouse star in the production, which is a coproduction between Soho Theatre and Belgrade Theatre in association with Landmark Theatres. The tour will launch after a full run at the Edinburgh Fringe.
Writer Battye (Dead Ringers, Succession) said: “A first date is a fascinating place for a play. There’s simultaneously massive stakes and no stakes at all, depending on how you will it. It’s brutal and it’s trivial in equal measure. There’s a lot of theory and analysis and assistance swirling around the project of coupledom. But at the end of the day, it starts, or it ends, with two people sitting across from each other with no guidance. We’re all alone out here. We always have to do that bit. I wanted to write about that bit.”
The production will feature set and costume design by Rhys Jarman, lighting design by Rajiv Pattani, sound design by Beth Duke, intimacy direction by Robbie Taylor Hunt, movement direction by Gabrielle Nimo, dramaturgy by Gillian Greer and the casting director is Jacob Sparrow. The production manager will be Josephine Tremelling and the company stage manager will be Simon Perkins.
Strategic Love Play will run at Soho Theatre from September 6-23, 2023.
For more information: painesplough.com/productions/strategic-love-play/