Queerbait

Josh Middleton on the LGBTQ scene

by Josh Middleton

John Donges (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

The current late-night presentation from Quince Productions twists your thoughts, tickles your funny bone and will possibly titillate your nether regions. Written in the mid-'80s by gay playwright Alan Bowne, the sexually charged script exaggerates a time when AIDS transformed the way we lived and generated a stigma around those infected. The succinct storyline surrounds a virus-negative woman (Jessica Snow) who sneaks into a quarantine area to persuade her reluctant positive partner (Michael Tomasetti) that she's willing to risk infection to be with him. The intimate venue allows you to get right in the center of their sexually explicit debacle, which isn't so bad considering the two cuties play the whole thing out in their undies. Totally recommended. Every Fri. and Sat. through Aug. 28, 10:15 p.m., $15, Shubin Theatre, 407 Bainbridge St., 215-627-1088, quinceproductions. com.

There has never been a more behooving reason to get shit-faced than Bar AIDS, an event that provides ammunition to four of Philadelphia's HIV/AIDS-blasting superheroes. A mass of bars and coffeeshops across the Delaware Valley, including Woody's and Tabu, will provide a percentage of their day's earnings to ActionAIDS, the AIDS Law Project of Pennsylvania, Mazzoni Center and Philadelphia FIGHT. This is Philly's inaugural run, and timely considering recent statistics from the World Health Organization placing our region sixth in the nation with citizens infected. So take this chance to sip something from the top shelf and don't be afraid to buy your friends another round or two. The hangover will be much more forgiving if it derives from such a stellar cause. Thu., Aug. 26, various locations, 215-981-3328, facebook.com/BarAIDSPhiladelphia.

(joshua.middleton@citypaper.net)