BACON SIZZLES
If you’re in search of a play that simmers with tension before scorching the stage with raw, emotional fire, English playwright Sophie Swithinbank’s Bacon, currently searing audiences at the tiny Henry Murray Stage upstairs at the Matrix, will leave you thoroughly singed—and perhaps a little brittle. Bacon is less a coming-of-age story and more a brutal autopsy of adolescent desire. Where others might offer tender nostalgia, Swithinbank serves up a narrative as sharp and unforgiving as a butcher’s knife.
Once again, Rogue Machine stakes its claim as the indispensable haunt for discerning theatergoers—those restless souls craving not just diversion, but the kind of emotional and intellectual provocation that leaves you shifting in your seat long after the lights go down. This is theater that doesn’t just entertain; it needles, it prods, it dares you to engage.
When the lights rise, we meet Mark (Wesley Guimarães), a nineteen-year-old café worker whose demeanor is all nervous energy and unresolved tension. Addressing the audience with a jittery mix of confession and compulsion, he recounts his torrid history with Darren (Jack Lancaster), a former classmate who’s just wandered into Mark’s café and ordered a bacon roll—a seemingly innocuous request that cracks open a vault of memories too volatile to contain.
Flashing back four years, we’re plunged into the grim hallways of St. Michael’s, a Catholic school where Mark’s intellectual shyness contrasts sharply with Darren’s knife-wielding bravado. Mark, who lives quietly with his supportive single mother and a Labrador named Barney, is the very picture of awkward adolescence. Darren, on the other hand, is a powder keg of aggression and vulnerability, shaped by an abusive father and a lifetime of suspensions. Their unlikely bond begins with teasing and innuendo but quickly spirals into obsession, coercion, and violent confrontation.
Swithinbank doesn’t shy away from the savagery simmering beneath teenage skin. One particularly harrowing scene—a madcap adventure on a stolen bike—escalates into an act of unspeakable brutality, leaving the audience reeling. And yet, the play resists the temptation to soften its blows with easy sentiment. Unlike the sweet ache of Beautiful Thing or the heartwarming glow of Heartstopper, Bacon offers little in the way of emotional refuge. This is adolescent love stripped of its rosy hues, presented in stark, unflinching detail.
Director Michael Matthews, the former artistic director of the queer Celebration Theatre, navigates this volatile material with a steady hand, allowing the actors to oscillate between moments of precarious balance and emotional freefall. In the intimate confines, the actors glide through Stephen Gifford’s spare, cunningly mutable set, where a simple shift of a chair or table conjures the fluid transition from classroom to kitchen to office and back again. His design embraces the play’s inherent theatricality, allowing the performers’ raw, unfiltered energy to command center stage, as if the walls themselves are leaning in to listen. Christopher Moscatiello’s sound design surges with the whoosh of water, an auditory undertow that mirrors the characters’ own psychic riptides. Drenched in the rising tide of hormones and the murky swirl of sexual ambiguity, they flail and drift, their inner turbulence given voice in every swell and retreat of the soundscape.
Guimarães delivers a heartbreaking performance as Mark, embodying the awkward innocence of a fifteen-year-old on the brink of self-discovery and the older, more jaded narrator who’s still grappling with the scars of his past. Lancaster, as Darren, is a revelation—his portrayal of cruelty tempered with glimpses of aching vulnerability is so compelling, you almost find yourself sympathizing with him…almost. Together, the actors create a dynamic that’s as combustible as it is captivating.
The play’s refusal to offer glimmers of tenderness might leave some audiences feeling emotionally detached. Unlike other tales of doomed romance, Bacon doesn’t coax us into rooting for the protagonists. Instead, it holds us at arm’s length, forcing us to confront the ugly realities of love’s darker impulses. Perhaps that’s the point. But it also means that when the final moments arrive, the emotional payoff feels more like a gut punch than a cathartic release.
Despite these minor quibbles, Bacon remains a powerful theatrical experience. The two actors inhabit their roles with a conviction that borders on the unnerving. Their ability to switch between personas and voices, populating the world of the play with an array of characters, is nothing short of masterful
Ultimately, Bacon is less about finding resolution and more about laying bare the raw, messy entrails of adolescent desire. Swithinbank’s writing cuts deep, and the performances—unflinching, brutal, and occasionally tender—make sure the wounds stay fresh. It’s not an easy play to watch, nor is it meant to be. But in a theatrical and streaming landscape often saturated with saccharine tales of young love, Bacon stands out as a blistering, unforgettable reminder of passion’s darker side.
So, if you’re prepared to confront the red-hot heat of youth’s most destructive impulses, Bacon is a dish worth savoring—even if it leaves you burnt around the edges.
photos by Jeff Lorch
Bacon
A Rogue Machine Production
Matrix Theatre, upstairs on the Henry Murray Stage, 7657 Melrose Ave
80 minutes, no intermission; adult content 16+
Fri and Mon at 8; Sat and Sun at 5
ends on March 30, 2025
for tickets ($20-$60), call 855.585.5185 visit Rogue Machine
for more shows, visit Theatre in LA
