Photography: Courtney Nathan Phillip

Housemates 2026: We Can’t Be Friends

8 September-12 September

As desire collides with devotion, two gay Muslim men are forced to choose: honour their vows to Allah or risk everything for each other.

Brixton House present

Description

By Abir Mohammad

Azhar has built his life on certainty. A devout Muslim training to be a teacher, he is on the cusp of the future he has always been promised: a stable career, a wife, and a life defined by faith and duty.

Then he meets Rahim. Openly gay and estranged from his family, Rahim has already lost everything Azhar is trying to protect.

Certain it is his responsibility to help, Azhar sets out to guide Rahim back to Islam. But what begins as an act of faith slowly becomes something neither of them expected. The lines between guidance and longing begin to blur, pulling them into a connection neither of them can deny between belief and desire, identity and expectation, love and consequence.

Because to choose each other may mean losing everything else.

We Can’t Be Friends is an intimate, urgent story about faith, Queerness, and the cost of living truthfully in a world that demands you choose.

Content warnings: References to homophobia and physical assault

More info coming soon.

Writer Abir Mohammad
Director Melina Namdar

Abir is an East London–based writer crafting comedy-dramas that centre unconventional characters and explore masculinity, queerness, and faith with wit and honesty. A Soho Theatre Writers’ Lab alumnus, his debut play Bhaijaan (Hope Theatre) sold out, earning nominations from Oxford University, Asian Media Awards and Soho Theatre.

Melina is a British-Iranian director working across theatre & film. For over a decade, she has developed new writing that seeks out the humanity within morally complex and emotionally messy worlds. Her credits include Vitamin D (Soho Theatre), All the Happy Things (Theatre503), & Passion Fruit (New Diorama Theatre).

Performances

Tickets: £17
Recommended age: 12+
Duration: 1 hours 10 minutes
Tue 08 Sep 8:00pm
Wed 09 Sep 8:00pm
Thu 10 Sep 8:00pm
Fri 11 Sep 8:00pm
Sat 12 Sep 3:00pm
Sat 12 Sep 8:00pm