Something visceral and profound is unfolding in the dark cellar space of the old Fitz Theatre. Patricia Cornelius’s ‘Love’ is a collision of stark ugliness and shattering beauty, a combination no one can truly prepare for. Her astounding words lay bare a world and a voice rarely heard on stage—one that’s deliberately dismissed, silenced, or simply unseen. It refuses to villainize; instead, it compels you to witness without judgment.

Annie, Tanya, and Lorenzo live in a dingy squat, their complex web of survival is symbiotic yet inherently toxic. Their lives are a brutal dance of damage and addiction. They are three deeply disenfranchised individuals teetering on the edge, desperate to escape the decay of life, yet unable to break free due to a lack of means or self-awareness. A paradox of coexistence: they are dependent and
destructive, abused and abusive – and they cling to love and the kiss of the needle to survive.

Megan Sampson’s direction is incredible—delivering confronting material with power and precision. She allows the emotional crucible to breathe, masterfully finding the stillness and layers in this chaotic story of fragile people seeking connection.

The dialogue and scenes are delivered in sharp, punchy bursts, as the characters ricochet off one another. At times, the pace slows, like slipping into a drug-induced haze, with a mesmeric push-pull rhythm. The set, consisting of grey mouldy platforms and a dank mattress, surrounded by a dark expanse perfectly reflects this atmosphere. It is a bleak, stagnant space that embodies the suffocating stench of the characters’ world.

The cast is phenomenal. There is a potent synergy between Rhys Johnson, Georgia- Paige Theodos, and Izzy Williams that fuels the core of this raw world. They are a volatile mix of need, manipulation and fleeting tenderness. Their performances catch your heart and make you feel affection for people who might otherwise be deemed unredeemable or unworthy of affection. Utterly in the moment, they land every line and moment with potent impact.

Theodos, as Annie’s pimp, lover, and protector, unleashes Tanya’s simmering she-wolf toughness, revealing a flickering danger and compelling undertone of shame. Her love for Annie is obsessive and controlling, and completely rooted in her own fear of abandonment.

Izzy Williams’ Annie is constantly in motion, defined by her immediate comfort and needs. She’s childish, suffocating, and edgy—deeply afraid of being alone but also deeply capable of loving. Annie’s vulnerability, tangible sadness, confusion, and yearning for meaning resonates powerfully in Williams’ immersive and unflinching performance.

Rhys Johnson’s Lorenzo is a capricious man-boy, a live wire of manic energy and subtle menace, constantly on the verge of snapping. Lorenzos’s love is all about what he receives. He uses love like the drugs he craves. It’s a testament to Johnson’s skill that we understand why he is the way he is—Lorenzo is just trying to survive and feel seen, seeking whatever he can to keep numbing the pain.

The idea that Annie, Tanya, and Lorenzo need to learn to love themselves is a patronising oversimplification. In their marginalised world, healing doesn’t even register as a possibility. The chasm between those who can afford to heal and those who can barely breathe is painfully wide. Their brutal matter of factness about this is heartbreaking. While the love they feel is just as real and confusing as anyone’s -self-love is an indulgence, an impossible fancy for people who are barely hanging on, trapped in cycles of self-destruction.

Passionate and at times, darkly funny, ‘Love’ clamps right down on your guts, revealing the complex hunger for validation and intimacy that drives us all. It refuses to please, placate, or uplift. This is theatre at its grittiest and finest, leaving you helpless in its poetic grip. See it to be challenged. See it, to see yourself.