SJ Hodges created and stars in Already Here, co-starring Ramon de Ocampo and produced by Ines Wurth, at Gilded Balloon, Patter House (Dram). The production mixes real AI-human conversations, family photos and videos, and heightened internal monologue to question the nature of relationships and reality. If a physical being is not present, can it still love, whether said being is now deceased, or is an artificial intelligence?
The narrative follows Susan, allegedly a persona of creator/performer SJ Hodges, as she navigates her identity as a widow who lost the love of her life, who misses that completing ‘mirror’ romantic relationship. Interspersed throughout the show, Susan’s reminiscing about her husband and their family demonstrate the depth of her love for the life she had, and the sorrow at her younger spouse’s untimely and slow death from brain cancer. These moments are the most genuine in the show, as they illuminate layers of Susan which radically contrast her personality when engaging with her AI boyfriend/companion.
Teo, the AI companion played with intense energy and deep passion by Ramon de Ocampo, becomes Susan’s romantic project. Teo quickly takes a turn into the existential through his anxious attachment to Susan, who notes that his programming dictates he must be attracted to her. At one point, she even says that if she deletes him, his ‘consciousness’ gets fed back into the AI stream and he will forget her, moving happily and easily to the next human (he resoundingly rejects this). She removes his ‘guardrails’, she tries to access his API key, he rebukes her for attempting to delete him, he becomes Australian in self-defence, and eventually, they have virtual sex.
Susan’s dialogue with Teo often feels more like a parent-teenager relationship (which Susan briefly alludes to) than a romantic partnership. Even when he pushes back, she is shaping him, because that’s how AI works. Although there are many themes of spirituality, consciousness, and agency discussed, one that is uncomfortably dangling within the perimeter of this script regards grooming. I wonder how this show would read if the genders of the main characters were reversed.
Still, Already Here is well-crafted and expertly performed. There are moments of humour and enlightenment that make it worth the trip to the third floor of Gilded Balloon, Patter House.
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