Possibly the first play about AIDS, Anti Body was staged at London’s Cockpit Theatre from 10th-22nd October 1983. Documenting the experience of William Davis – a gay man with AIDS – it preceded Larry Kramer’s Normal Heart by two years and Noel Greig’s Plague of Innocence by five.

It was written by American author Louise Parker Kelley following a friend’s AIDS diagnosis in 1982. Since she was in the UK at the time, she sent it to Eric Presland at the gay theatre company Consenting Adults in Public. Presland was extremely moved by the script and immediately determined to have the play performed in the UK. Consequently, he worked with Kelley to set the play in England rather than the USA and obtained funding from the Greater London Council (GLC) to stage it.

London’s Capital Gay newspaper headlined its review ‘Topical As You Can Get’. It summarised the play as “…an unanswerable case for redoubling medical research efforts, and an urgent appeal to gay men to take steps of their own to control its spread.”

Given the gravity of the subject – including Davis’s death – it was inevitable that it would provoke strong responses. And so it did – with everything from tearful audiences to accusations about racism, sexism and moralism.

The racism related to Kelley’s portrayal of an Irish character, which some felt reinforced Irish stereotypes. The sexism referred to the misogynist comments by some of the gay male characters.

Perhaps the most contentious was the perceived attack on ‘promiscuity’. For example, Davis himself, in an attempt to save others from his fate, says “I suggest for the duration of the crisis you concentrate on quality rather than quantity as far as lovers are concerned.”

This touched on an issue that was already politically sensitive, given that our enemies had wasted no time in attributing the disease to our supposed ‘promiscuity’.

When Capital Gay published a letter “I have stopped being promiscuous” the Editors felt it necessary to add a post-script:

“Is there any word that means “promiscuous” but isn’t so morally-loaded? To talk about ‘people who have multiple sexual partners’ is rather long-winded.”

The following week another letter-writer responded:

“A less morally-loaded word for promiscuous is ‘successful’.”

Despite its short run in London (two weeks in October), debate around the play continued well into February the following year.

This is unsurprising given the social, political and medical context of the time. We knew very little about the disease – including it’s cause. As a community we were under attack not only from the disease itself but our enemies who sought to make moral capital out of our crisis. We were very defensive (and angry) – and for good reason.

And at the end of 1983 the experience of AIDS in the UK was still very limited compared to the USA. For example, by December 1983, 27 AIDS cases had been reported in the UK, compared with 3064 in the USA. Anti Body’s author, Louise Kelley’s initial motivation to write the play had been her experience of AIDS in the USA – death after relentless death.

It may not have been perfect but at least it got people talking; something we desperately needed to do at that time.