In comedy, they say timing is everything. But for Sam Morrison's one-man show SUGAR DADDY, timing became something far more sacred: the way he survived. Before sold-out houses and rave reviews, there was a Provincetown summer, a silver-haired dreamboat, and a love story so joyful it felt cinematic. That is, until the world shifted, and grief arrived like an unwelcome punchline. In between pandemic-era fear, which gripped Sam's partner, Jonathan, and a diabetes diagnosis, he turned pain into something outrageous, romantic, and defiantly alive. Part stand-up confession, part emotional archeology, SUGAR DADDY is a reclamation and reminder that queer joy and queer grief often live in the same room. And that sometimes the bravest thing you can do is turn the unbearable into a laugh big enough to hold all the truth you're still learning to speak. I had the chance to speak with Sam and queer Hollywood legend Alan Cumming, one of the show's co-producers, about the show and the lessons it offers. Sugar Daddy is all about turning grief into giggles. Sam, how has your diabetes diagnosis reshaped not just your outlook on life but the way you care for your body while asking audiences to care for their hearts?I got diagnosed 6 months after Jonathan passed, and it actually kind of saved me. It snapped me out of my depression by forcing me to focus on my body. Type 1 diabetes is kind of like a video game of fluctuating insulin and blood sugar that you can't win, but you can definitely lose. When I first got diagnosed, it felt like going to med school cause it forces you to learn so much about nutrition (low key under death penalty). But more specifically, how things affect your body. Seemingly, no matter how much insulin I give myself, Cacio e Pepe ruins my blood sugar for the entire day. And packing a suitcase quickly I swear, just sort of shuffling around desperately searching for my travel dildo - plummets my blood sugar faster than a 5K. And some days, for reasons I'll never understand, the cacio does nothingand I'll go low because I gave myself too much insulin. Diabetes is one of the most researched and understood diseases on earth, yet still completely personal and just inexplicably weird. And I have the data to back it up! Grief is, similarly, weird. I thought grief was something you do, but it's really something that happens to you. It's not up to you when, where, or how those pangs of emotion hit. Both grief and diabetes have beaten the illusion of control out of me. And if you can accept that, you surrender. Once you surrender, all that's left to do is listen. Close your eyes and feel what you're feeling, try your best to respond, and take care of your body. But forgive yourself when you inevitably do it all wrong. You've managed to take the heaviest season of your life and somehow lace it with punchlines. How do you strike that balance between honoring pain and still giving people permission to laugh their way through the darkness?I actually see them very hand in hand. Pain and humor, tragedy and comedy, are similar. Those with the most lively and wicked senses of humor are the ones who've really been through it. It may be one of the reasons GriefTok is blowing up. One of my favorite quotes is from Khalil Gibran: "The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain." I recently hooked up with a daddy in Seattle. As we cuddled, he shared that he became known in the 90s for giving eulogies to gay men who died during the AIDS crisis because he was able to bring in humor and strike that balance. I'll never forget that. If only I could remember his name. Seattle Daddy, hit me up if you see this. As a comedian, my impulse is to make the audience laugh as hard as possible. The tension of the darkness can lead to some of the biggest punchlines, but solo shows let you live in the in-between a little longer. Most of Sugar Daddy is tightly constructed to make you laugh or feel at specific times. But there are a few moments that ask the audience to sit in that strange middle ground between laughing and crying. I do my best to surrender control and respond wherever they land. Those are usually my favorite - and sometimes the most magical moments of the show. Alan, you've long been a champion of queer storytelling and community care. With World AIDS Day approaching and reminding us of both our history and resilience, what made Sugar Daddy feel like a story you needed to help bring into the world right now?I'm always interested in stories that we haven't heard. I mean, I think all stories are valid, all queer stories especially are valid. We have been a sort of silenced community and ignored throughout history. But for me, it's always important to tell the stories that we wouldn't otherwise hear.When I saw this show, it's about an intergenerational queer relationship. But also, it has grief in it, and it has illness in it. And I just felt it was a lot of new components to a queer story that we hadn't seen before.And so that was, you know, aside from Sam being so enchanting, that was the reason, those were the reasons that I wanted to be a part of it.It's often said joy is, Sam, a form of survival. As someone navigating diabetes every day, what little rituals, hacks, or humor-infused coping mechanisms have become part of your regimen?I mean, I'm insane; I'll just talk (scream) to my glucose monitor like it's a sibling, "Whyyyyy?" and "How is that possible?" There aren't many diseases that mandate you eat sweets, so you gotta take advantage of them. I keep a rotating cast of my favorite candies on hand. My boyfriend likes to hold my hand when I insert my insulin pump; I absolutely milk it for extra sympathy. What's really fun is connecting with other type 1s and just complaining. When we spot each other in the wild, we get obnoxiously excited and suddenly have a million inside jokes with a complete stranger. Alan, how do you see Sugar Daddy fitting into the larger lineage of art that has helped our community process collective grief?You know, we contain multitudes. I feel like the best kind of storytelling is always bobbing back and forward between so many different emotions. I feel like the most exciting kind of performers are the ones who are vulnerable, who are making themselves vulnerable, and who are kind of lurching between drama and comedy and pain and joy all the time. So I feel that's what makes a really exciting performer and a really beautiful story is this spectrum. What's exciting about this show is that the basic tenets of the show are those different parts of the spectrum. They're not normally so blatant. And I love that. I think in a funny way also,Being Scottish, I'm really attracted to this show because we have a very sort of dark sense of humour and we have a saying in Scotland which is you have to laugh or you'd greet...which means you have to laugh or you'd cry. And I think that really epitomises what Sam is doing in this show.Alan, as a producer on this project and someone who's witnessed decades of shifts in queer representation, what do you hope queer audiencesespecially those still living in the long shadow of the AIDS crisistake away from Sam's story?We think we know Sam's character and actually, we find out so much more about him on so many more levels...It's a [show] about layers, and about maybe misapprehension and misrepresentation, and we go away kind of with a better understanding of humanity.The show returns to London in Spring 2026 at Underbelly Boulevard and will return to New York City for a Pride Month run in June 2026. Tickets for the London performances are available at underbellyboulevard.com/tickets beginning December 2nd.