Twink Death - Fringe World 2026

Reviewed by Paul Treasure

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“Twink Death”. If there are two words that strike fear, panic, or trigger long-repressed trauma in a gay man it is these two words. Little known outside of the Gay Community, it is a very real and terrifying point in the development of many gay men. Benjamin Quirk’s latest show, which recently played at The Court, begins with a very brief faux nature documentary explaining the various tribes within the modern gay community: bears, cubs, otters, pups, and various other tribes. But chief of them all are the twinks: young, slender, smooth gay men, with indefatigable energy, a consummate sense of their own desirability, the ability to entrance members of all the other tribes, but also, and most importantly, a limited life span. For unlike other tribes within the community, you cannot be a twink forever. The day will inevitably come where other men will stop seeing you as a twink, and you have to reinvent yourself and work out where you will now fit in for the rest of your life. This moment is called ‘Twink Death’.

Quirk does present as a quintessential twink. He is young, attractive, with a flat stomach and a glorious crop of air. Which all adds a sense of veracity to the piece, that we truly believe that what he is about to tell us comes from his own personal truth. The work is a one person show, detailing his personal journey, his observations of his own impending twink death, and what this means for his identity and his sense of self and self-worth. At various points in the show, Quirk stops talking to the audience to have conversations with ‘God”. If we all have our own sense of what ‘God’ is like, Quirk’s personal vision is of someone like Carrie Bradshaw from Sex and the City. ‘God’ is not a spoken character but appears as projected text on a screen at the rear of the performance space. This conceit works quite well, as it means we are able to supply our own voice for our own version of ‘God’, and it feels like Quirk is having a genuine conversation. The projections are cleverly done, utilising size and placement of text to help with emphasis and land certain beats. But it also comes with a minor, if very annoying downfall. When projected large upon the screen, the font chosen revealed a weird and disjointed kerning issue. The spaces between letters within words were uneven enough to draw attention and often made the words appear visually clumsy. This, unfortunately, would be enough to distract some viewers from an otherwise clever idea.

The Red Room at The Court was an interesting venue for the piece. A perfect location in many ways, it was impossible to fully soundproof the space from the dance floor only metres behind. While this may have been a drawback for most shows, it actually became a positive feature, as we could continually hear the doof-doof and became a subtle and ever present reminder of the world that Quirk is talking about, and the possibility that his relationship with it will rapidly change.

The work itself was engaging, but there was a very real sense that it didn’t quite know what it wanted to be. Part stand-up, part TED Talk, part comic monologue, but falling awkwardly between all three. There was a lot of material here to be mined, and it did feel that we barely scratched the surface. Easy topics were talked about at length, whereas harder, potentially more profound themes were glanced at but then left. The theme of change and its inevitability was a recurring motif, but we never really get a glimpse of what Quirk thinks that change may be.

Quirk is a talented writer and a very engaging performer, his observations are witty, but repeatedly stepping back from real self-reflection that would have made this the truly memorable piece it could have been. Ultimately, it is an attractive and engaging show, but a little bit shallow and self-absorbed, just like the stereotypical twink of its subject matter.

Reviewer Note: Tickets for this review were provided by the theatre company.