Will Your Anchor Hold? is a play starring David G. Lees.
First performed 13 May 2016. Photography by Justinas Vilutis.
“Hello, you must be Robot. Please come in…”
People deal with break-ups differently. David’s process: lots of sex and buy an organ.
In the seven years he’s lived in London, David has owned six organs. These are Victorian Bellow organs, they’re huge.
“I love my organ! And no, that isn’t a euphemism…”
After the most recent break-up, David moved to a flat in Bethnal Green on Voss Street.
A backstreet, pitch black by night, Voss Street was perfect for pissing, kissing, shooting up, leading to possibly more.
What it must have inspired in those men approaching David’s flat!
To then be buzzed through to a steep concrete staircase. Which led to a doorway. Where David would be waiting. Backlit. Ready to lead his date into…not so much a flat as a room in a flat which had been sliced into four further partitions to create a London home. One filled mostly with organ.
The ingredients were all there for theatre.
“I have Brewdog Punk IPAs chilling in the fridge…”
I had wanted for some time to make an original play with David and I knew it was in here but was wary of producing a sketch, some Grindr the Play kind of thing. I need something more from art.
When eventually I found that something, David had only gone and exited the inter-relationship zone, selling his organ, deleting Grindr and leaving Voss Street.
Fortunately he moved to an even more terrifying new home. Because David’s bedroom is the setting for the play. Positioning the viewer as his date, audiences watch from David’s bed.
The fear, uncertainty, excitement of going to a stranger’s house for sex – I want a theatre that shares these. Will Your Anchor Hold? must thrill from the moment you arrive at David’s flat and push the doorbell.
“Santiago was neither quiet nor discreet...”
Here are photos of some of our audiences. Note the happy, smiling expressions.