Rotterdam by Jon Brittain

Rotterdam is a play that is specifically of its time and yet speaks to the issues of our current moment. At its heart it is a play about characters coming to terms with themselves and each other, and centres on identity. Often it presents its themes lightly, comedically and in theatrically interesting ways. In 2016 it won an Oliver award for Outstanding Achievement in an Affiliate Theatre.

Rotterdam starts at a moment of coming out: Alice is poised to email her parents saying that she is a lesbian when her partner Fiona comes out as a trans man. The play progresses from this dramatic point. But it is not a play that frames a trans man as the problem: rather, the moment of coming out in the play offers all the other characters an opportunity to consider their own privileges, identities, and positionalities.