Queer Sci-fi Epic Welcome Home by Willy Hudson is Magical.

Soho Theatre | Seen February 2, 2023

Welcome Home is an exemplary model of what true queer theatre is; a blurring of the binaries of genre, medium, form, beauty, heaven, hell, right and wrong.

I had the pleasure of seeing Willy Hudson’s second solo show at Soho Theatre this week. The autobiographical piece is described as “a big queer sci-fi epic feat. Robbie Williams’s bum,” and all of those things are true! With only a two week run, this production cannot be missed.  

Welcome Home is an account of Willy Hudson’s childhood as a young gay man growing up in a devoutly religious, and homophobic, family and community. After a bad break up, Willy returns home and seizes the opportunity to both give audiences a glimpse into his sexual awakening and his Christian upbringing, and to slay the monsters of his past. The piece uses various mediums including the traditional direct address monologue, alongside film, movement, song and dance. It also riffs on multiple genres in order to tell its epic but simple story including fantasy, scifi, horror and erotica. And in the final five minutes of the play, Hudson shocked me with one of the most unexpected and moving twists I’ve ever seen in live performance.

I say that this is a “simple” story because it's one we’ve all heard before: a young gay man faces the prejudices of his own religious community and family, leaving him to reckon with the truths of his upbringing and redefine his relationship with “home.” Most of us know at least one, if not many people whose life is this story, or maybe your life is this story. What’s remarkable is the way this story is told in a completely unapologetic, in-yer-face nature. Welcome Home also proves the power of the solo show; undiluted by any perspective but his own, Hudson reclaims his voice with complete agency, which he uses to his complete advantage and in some cases, takes to the extreme. This is not a play for the faint of heart and it is a play that is almost certain to make you uncomfortable; but discomfort, gore, sex, moments of joyous humor and moments of heartbreak are necessary in this piece of theatre as they are all a part of the queer experience itself.

Hudson’s performance and storytelling are enchanting; I found myself eating up every last one of his words. I felt personally taken care of and cherished as an audience member throughout. Anna Orton’s sci-fi/fantasy inspired set was brilliantly designed and ingeniously utilized by Hudson, including a platform of six or seven television screens of various sizes to display the filmed accompaniments to the show. Despite being primarily a one-man effort in a small black box theatre, this play makes full use of one of the live theatre’s best tools: spectacle. With flashing lights, musical numbers, a sock puppet show, buckets of fake blood, and even video footage of penises, the production is a feast of total theatre. Albeit at times overstimulating, it is always exciting. It’s big, camp, queer, kitsch and magical, and everything is done with purpose. 

At different times throughout Welcome Home, I clapped along to music, held my hands like I was in church, gasping, laughing, and reveling in the remarkable creativity and resilience of the human spirit.