Wild Abandon

Three couples, one anonymous hotel room and a whole lot of unspoken desires. Wild Abandon is bringing a bold, funny and unexpectedly tender new theatre experience to Brisbane as part of MELT Festival 2026.

Created by Seán Dowling, Ian Lawson and Merlynn Tong, Wild Abandon explores sex, intimacy and the rules we make to feel safe, in a multi-narrative drama that promises to challenge perspectives and spark conversation.

Set over a single night in an unremarkable hotel room, the play follows three couples arriving with three very different agendas, all chasing the same thing: permission. Permission to want what they want, break their own rules and be seen without being consumed by shame, expectations or someone else's fantasies.

As the night unfolds, the hotel room becomes a pressure cooker where anonymity, desire and vulnerability collide. It's a space where people can briefly become someone else, take a risk or explore parts of themselves they might otherwise keep hidden.

But Wild Abandon isn't just a play about sex. It delves into the bigger questions that come with intimacy, including identity, control, fantasy, racism, shame, love and truth. At its heart, the production explores who gets to want, who gets to be seen and what we're entitled to take from one another.

Described as a daring and emotionally vulnerable work, Wild Abandon balances humour and tenderness with an unflinching look at human connection, treating intimacy as both a source of pleasure and power.

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