The plight of millennial men ill-equipped to navigate modern life has become familiar territory for magazine articles and TV dramas — most notably Adolescence. Stacey Cullen’s Overwhelm thrusts us inside the stagnant world of three friends trapped in a cycle of immobility.
Jake (Sam Bates) hasn’t left his flat in the four years since Covid. He lives with his longtime friend Miles (Louis Martino) in a dingy, unkempt flat where you can almost smell the sour beer and overflowing ashtrays. Their mate Riley (Max Burnett), unseen by the others, snorts cocaine and speaks a stream of pleading voice texts that go unheard, unread and unanswered.
Disconnection and isolation define these men’s lives. There’s no mention of family, community, or any source of guidance to catch them when they fall. Riley tries therapy for a while, but when antidepressants kill his libido, he loses his girlfriend too — abandoned by a system too overstretched to offer any sustainable help or meaning.
Jake and Miles drift purposelessly, fuelled by takeaways, drugs, and alcohol, but unable to move toward connection or self-awareness. Meanwhile, the girlfriends they talk about but don’t actually talk with, are ambitious and thriving, which only makes their inertia feel sharper.
The play opens with a voiceover of the line: “When there’s nothing left to burn, you have to set yourself on fire,” and self-destruction indeed drives these three lost souls, unable to imagine anything beyond their own crippling indolence. The actors give committed and convincing performances, and overall the writing captures the essence of the hopelessness of underachieving youth. Yet the play ultimately feels more like a social diagnosis than a drama — with not enough at stake and insufficient narrative drive to pull us in.
The closing moment, with Jake unable to leave the apartment, lands as a bleak but fitting metaphor for men incapable of stepping into a society that is unable to help or care. It leaves us uneasy — as if their apathy isn’t just theirs, but a symptom of a culture that has forgotten how to reach out.
Overwhelm
Written and directed by: Stacey Cullen
Cast: Sam Bates, Louis Martino, Max Burnett
Photo credit: Lucy Hayes
Run: October 18 and 19 2025
Running time: 80 minutes, without interval