The Luxurious Time brings a true queer Alzheimer's story to Clapham this June

A true queer love story about Alzheimer's gets its UK premiere at Omnibus Theatre Clapham this June

Theatre North brings The Luxurious Time to London for three nights only before a national tour. It is a real story, told by the man who lived it.

Martin Lewton has written more than forty plays in a career spanning two decades with Theatre North, one of the UK's longest-running queer theatre companies. The Luxurious Time is the most personal thing he has made. It is a true account of his own life with his partner as the man he loved developed Alzheimer's disease. It opens at Omnibus Theatre in Clapham on 4 June 2026, runs for three nights, and then tours nationally.

The play follows the slow progression of the disease through verbatim dialogue drawn from notes Lewton made while his partner was still living at home. He went back to those notes years later and recognised two things. One was that this was a story that deserved to be told as a tribute. The other was that it had a reach beyond his own experience. Dementia does not only happen to queer people, but queer people face it with particular pressures around care, family, legal recognition and visibility. The play holds all of that without making it a lecture.

Nathan Crossan-Smith directs. His credits include Liverpool Everyman, Orange Tree, Graeae and the Southbank Centre. Sound is by Matt Huxley. Running time is 80 minutes.

This is also a good moment to note that Lewton's book Out On Stage, a practical guide to making queer theatre, is published by Nick Hern Books this year. It sits alongside the play as part of the same sustained effort to document and pass on what queer theatre actually is and how it gets made.

The Luxurious Time runs at Omnibus Theatre, 1 Clapham Common Northside, on 4, 5 and 6 June at 7:30pm.

Tickets are £20, £18 concessions, at omnibus-clapham.org.