Sex, Grief & Diabetes… Sugar Daddy by Sam Morrison
- Apr 13
- 3 min read
Produced by Billy Porter, Alan Cumming, Drag Race UK's SallyTM and GB Olympian Gus Kenworthy
Sitting in the audience, I was laughing - full, deep, belly laughs… and then sharp stinging tears. I didn’t expect that.
I went in completely blind on press night, which only made it better… What unfolds is Sam Morrison Heath’s raw, slightly feral, deeply honest portrait of queer grief during COVID, with the occasional nod to the necessity of whipped cream during sex to avoid a diabetic crash. It’s not subtle. It’s not polished. It’s alive.And it works. “I was just doing stand-up,” Sam tells me. “And then my boyfriend died.” He shrugs, like it’s simple yet heavy. “Suddenly that was everything I was thinking about. It felt weirder not to share it?”
There’s something about the way he performs grief that makes it feel… almost touchable. Not easier - but less abstract. And then wildly funny. “I think that’s just grief,” he says. “It’s messy. It’s absurd. It’s humiliating. And it’s funny - even when it shouldn’t be.” He says with a wry smile and little shine in his eyes. The play revolves around Sam meeting Jonathan - his partner, his person. The story of how they met at a Spooky Bear ranch in the middle of a hurricane, Sam needing to seek shelter in the storm… nowhere to stay aside from his hammock, and then suddenly - love, and an Airbnb. From meeting Jonathan, the “Hottest Daddy in all of P-Town,” at “Spiritus Pizza,” what followed was a COVID love affair and the unexpected. “You don’t get to choose how grief shows up.” He pauses.
From there, you’re moving with him - going to grief counseling, where he is the youngest person there by 30+ years, and then a diagnosis of diabetes according to his doctor due to his emotional state. Clearly not a neat arc. He explains his grieving process as, at first, angsty - but now something else. “It’s a way to stay connected,” he says. “To Jonathan.” The show lives somewhere between stand-up and theatre and just… him. There’s a bit involving motorboating between bears and managing a blood sugar crash that is completely insane - but also weirdly grounded? There’s also a kind of playful cruelty to it. He leans into the audience - makes you laugh, makes you squirm, makes you complicit… “I don’t think people want perfection,” he says. “They want something real. They can tell when it’s real.”
He likes that tension. “I like pushing it,” he says. “Getting people involved. Making them a bit uncomfortable.” It works. You’re never just watching - you’re in it with him. And when he finishes, he’s just there, greeting people outside the West End Theatre.
His last speech, shouting that he’s selling stickers he made on Canva: my favourite one was a big pink sticker of a big hairy belly, a nod to his Spooky Bear Jonathan and his devotion to bellies. It’s funny, sweet, and unhinged. For a show co-produced by Billy Porter and Alan Cumming, there’s something almost disarming about that one-on-one moment with the artist… Yet it snaps you back into reality: this isn’t just a performance. It’s his life. Sam’s final statement to me was “I don’t think grief ever really leaves,” he says. “It just changes shape.”... It’s funny, it’s camp, it’s devastating but more than anything, it just makes grief feel real.
I ask what’s next. “I thought I was done talking about grief,” Sam says. “But it keeps coming back.”
So hints of grief - but his next work leans more into science meets stand-up, but with a twist “I got really into animal sex," he laughs. "The weird ways animals do it. Like, do you know ducks have spiral anti-rape vaginas?!... "It's...very me". Sam’s next show is at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, but knowing him, I’m sure he’ll be doing a Broadway and West End run again soon. Sam's Fringe details are: Duck, Gilded Balloon Teviot (Billiard Room), 5-31 Aug (not 17), 17:30 (60 mins). Tickets on sale May. Keep an eye on Sam's socials (@samuelhmorrison on Insta) for ticket link.
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