Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/John Carafo/Courtesy of Sam Morrison
In his show Sugar Daddy, Sam Morrison recalls first meeting his boyfriend Jonathan Kreissman after closing time at Spiritus Pizza in Provincetown, Mass. during “Bear Week” in 2018. “People think it’s weird I’m into thighs and bellies,” Morrison tells the audience of his liking for older, larger men. “I think it’s weird you’re into tibulas and fibulas… We skinnies as a people, we’re always shivering or getting kidnapped! I’m not into you if your arch nemesis is the wind.” Instead, he yearns for a man like Jonathan whose belly is the perfect pillow for laying one’s head on while watching Bridgerton.
Sugar Daddy—which premiered at last summer’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival—this week returned for an encore engagement through April 1 at New York City’s SoHo Playhouse. Its title is a multiple play on words, referring to 28-year-old Morrison managing diabetes, his attraction to older, larger men, and the ongoing grief he feels over the death from COVID in February 2021 of 52-year-old Kreissman (who was yes, a “daddy,” but far from rich, Morrison emphasizes). His delightful funeral notice made clear PR executive Kreissman’s love of fun and life.
“People have had such different reactions to this show,” Morrison told The Daily Beast in a recent Zoom call from a hotel room in Los Angeles, dressed in a lovely colorful sweater. “I have learned to let it be whatever people’s experience of it is. It’s such a personal story, whatever people take away from it, I’m thrilled with.”