Francis Bacon (Alistair Hall) and George Dyer (Peter Clements) stand in the middle of Pleasance Courtyard, staring at each other before bursting into hysterical laughter.

Hall’s one hour queer drama Buggers opens with the first night the pair met, when the famous tragic story of the gay couple begins. We see the sex they had, the strange and detailed rules Francis had about eggs, and the dances and kisses they shared. Francis, the successful artist, and George, a petty criminal from London’s East End who only knew Van Gogh but not Monet, already have a striking difference between them.

As the play moves non-linearly through the years they spent together, that difference becomes increasingly destructive. George’s drinking problem, and more notably Francis’s masochism and contempt for George’s crude understanding of art, gradually poison the relationship. Eventually, after arguments and perhaps something worse, indifference takes over. Hall and Clements seem to be having a conversation, but soon begin talking to themselves instead, performing long monologues in which they appear to speak to each other while the other person is no longer listening.

Lucy Adams’s brilliant surrealist lighting helps the play move through time, creating a recurring sense of hangover, overdose and unconsciousness. Hall and Clements give energetic and engaging performances, portraying a relationship whose power dynamic repeatedly turns itself upside down. Francis is the submissive one, wanting to be ‘raped’, yet he becomes the one who abuses George financially, intellectually and emotionally. George, meanwhile, is the dominant one sexually, expected to satisfy Francis’s desires while being repeatedly degraded by him. This reversal is what makes their relationship so disturbing. The fragmented scenes portray it with force, but they also leave you wanting to see more of how this dynamic developed and how the two came to occupy these roles.

Buggers is at Patrick Bone Productions in association with Pleasance until Sun 30 Aug 2026