About the Play:

I Have AIDS! is a full-length comedy by Sky Gilbert. A gay stand-up comic nonchalantly tells his partner he has HIV over dinner in their Toronto condo. His partner's response is equally urbane, unruffled and unlikely. A black comedy like no other, I Have AIDS! will inspire audiences to think about what it means for a gay man to have AIDS today.

I Have AIDS! is an examination of modern AIDS politics and the way it operates not only as a disease but as a cultural force in today's socio-political scene. When stand-up comic Prodon Slamzeck tells his lover Vidor that he has AIDS, it barely interrupts their dinner. And why should it? What was once a death sentence is now no more than a chronic condition, and most gay men deal with AIDS with much less melodrama than they did years ago. Following Prodon through the five stages of acceptance – Denial, Partying, Loss of Control, Religious Conversion, and Acceptance – the play pops in and out of monologues with Prodon and into scenes with Lady Booty, an outrageous drag queen, Ron, a man who has made AIDS his personal religion, and the ever supportive Vidor, each giving their own advice on how to take the news. I Have AIDS! is a play about gay men who are neither tragic nor sad, and we are led to laugh with them, not at them.

I Have AIDS! premiered in 2009 at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre by The Cabaret Company in Toronto.

Cast: 7 male (alternate casting 5 male with doubling)

What people say:

"Nobody in Canadian theatre writes more fluent, speakable dialogue than Gilbert." — National Post

"...thought-provoking, anger-provoking and often hilarious." — Globe and Mail

"I Have AIDS! is Sky Gilbert's black comedy examination of modern AIDS politics and the way it operates not only as a disease but as a cultural force in today's socio-political scene." — Toronto Star

About the Playwright:

Sky Gilbert is a Canadian teacher, writer, director, filmmaker, and he was co-founder and artistic director of Buddies in Bad Times Theatre (North America's largest gay and lesbian theatre company) for 18 years. He has had nearly 40 plays produced and written six critically acclaimed novels and three award-winning poetry collections. Since 1997, he has worked at The School of English and Theatre Studies at Guelph University where he is now a Professor.