British-Iraqi writer and director Amrou Al-Kadhi will direct a newly reimagined staging of Sam Morrison’s acclaimed solo show Sugar Daddy, produced by Edgewood Entertainment.
Sugar Daddy has a five-week Off-West End run at Underbelly Boulevard Soho, opening March 2026. Tickets are on sale now. The Edgewood Entertainment production is co-produced by Alan Cumming and Billy Porter.
Raised between the Gulf and London, Al-Kadhi works across theatre, film, and television, with a practice rooted in character-driven storytelling marked by clarity, pace, and emotional intelligence. Their work is known for its wit, emotional precision, and ability to hold complexity without smoothing its edges—an approach that brings a fresh theatrical lens to this new staging of Morrison’s deeply personal story.
Al-Kadhi is the author of the award-winning memoir Life as a Unicorn, which received both the Polari First Book Prize and a Somerset Maugham Award. In theatre, they have headlined Soho Theatre and toured internationally with solo shows including From Qur’an to Queen and Drag Mother, performed under the name Glamrou—using drag not as spectacle, but as memoir: a form of storytelling that explores family, faith, shame, desire, and belonging with candour and humour.
Their screen work continues to gain international attention, including their feature-film debut Layla, which premiered in competition at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival. Al-Kadhi currently has multiple film and television projects in development in the UK and the United States.
Amrou Al-Kadhi commented:
“I am so excited to be directing Sam and this gorgeous piece of work - equal parts hilarious, heartbreaking, original and surprising, this show intersects fascinating themes of faith, grief, sexuality and downright absurdity in ways that are going to enlighten audiences. I can't wait to get going!”
Sugar Daddy tells the remarkable true story Morrison never expected—or wanted—to share. One summer in Provincetown, he fell in love with the "silver zaddy" of his dreams. Months later, during the pandemic, he lost that partner to COVID. What follows is not a conventional grief narrative, but a sharp, unruly, and deeply human piece of theatre—taking in seagull attacks, New York muggings, encounters with Jehovah’s Witnesses, and a surprise diagnosis of Type 1 diabetes. This is emphatically not a show about illness or death alone.
Drawing on Morrison’s background in stand-up (Late Night with Seth Meyers, The Drew Barrymore Show, Comedy Central; NBC Stand-Up Finalist, Just for Laughs' One To Watch), Sugar Daddy distils that comic precision into a tightly crafted 75-minute piece of storytelling. As Billy Porter has put it: “It’s BAWDY.”
Under Al-Kadhi’s direction, this new staging will deeply examine how grief reshapes us—and how creativity, performance, and survival can emerge from loss.
Sam Morrison commented:
“It’s such a blessing to be in a rehearsal room with Amrou and this incredible creative team! I can’t wait to discover new depths of the show together, with a fresh eye for British audiences.”
Dale A. Mott, founder and producer of Edgewood Entertainment, added:
“Amrou brings so much warmth, intelligence and heart to their work. They’re exactly the kind of collaborator you want on a show like Sugar Daddy."
Sugar Daddy returns in 2026 with a bold new presentation—reminding audiences, as Morrison quips, that “what is trauma if not un-monetised content?”