The Last Man, playing at Southwark Playhouse, Elephant, offers London audiences a chance to encounter a social and emotional landscape that may be unfamiliar, yet unexpectedly recognisable. How a story that begins in a semi-basement room in Seoul is understood in London may prove to be one of the production’s most intriguing questions.
Currently playing at Southwark Playhouse Elephant in London, The Last Man is the English-language world premiere of a Korean one-person rock musical set in Seoul, South Korea. The story unfolds in a semi-basement studio in Sillim-dong, a neighbourhood in the south-west of Seoul long associated with students, job seekers and young adults at the start of their careers. With its concentration of small studio flats and semi-basement housing, Sillim-dong has become a symbol of the housing insecurity and economic pressures facing many young Koreans today.
The semi-basement may not be entirely unfamiliar to British audiences. Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite introduced this type of housing to international viewers. However, while Parasite used the space to explore class division and inequality, The Last Man presents it as a site of isolation, inertia and the struggle to endure everyday life alone.
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Written by Jisik Kim with music by Seungyeon Kwon, the musical has been adapted for English-speaking audiences with dramaturgy by Jethro Compton, best known for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. The production brings together South Korea’s NEO Production, director Daljoong Kim and a UK-based creative team.
One aspect that may interest British theatre-goers is the casting. In the Korean musical industry, double and triple casting are common practices, with audiences often returning to see how different performers interpret the same role. The Last Man follows this tradition, with Lex Lee and Nabi Brown alternating as the Survivor. In a one-person musical, where a single performer carries the entire narrative, the contrast between two interpretations becomes part of the experience itself and offers an insight into a distinctive aspect of Korean musical theatre culture.
The origins of The Last Man can be traced back to the Covid-19 pandemic, when theatres were closed, and the future of live performance itself seemed uncertain. The piece began life as a web musical and won the grand prize in a digital musical theatre competition organised by the Seoul Performing Arts Company. Following a staged reading in 2021, it was developed into a full theatrical production, presented at the Welcome Daehakro festival in 2022. Revived in 2024, and returned for its third season in Seoul earlier this year.
In its original web-musical form, zombies appeared more prominently. As the work evolved for the stage, however, the focus gradually shifted away from the zombies themselves and towards loneliness, isolation and survival. The story follows a man who believes he is the sole survivor of a viral outbreak that has devastated the world. He seals himself inside Bunker B-103, stockpiling instant noodles, coffee and other supplies. The bunker, like the semi-basement room from which the story originates, becomes both a shelter and a prison.
The state of emergency and zombie-infested world function less as genre spectacle than as a framework for exploring isolation. The real source of tension is not the threat outside, but the experience of being left completely alone. The musical repeatedly asks what it means to remain human when all meaningful connections to others have disappeared.
In South Korea, The Last Man has often been discussed as a portrait of a generation struggling with uncertainty, isolation and intense social pressure. Its message that “you are not alone” resonated strongly with many audience members. Although the protagonist presents himself as a survivor of a zombie apocalypse, he can also be seen as a young person who has withdrawn from society and lost confidence in his place within it.
This raises an interesting question about how the musical is received in London. Young people in the UK also face housing insecurity, financial pressures and growing concerns around mental health. Yet these experiences are not always understood through the same lens. British society tends to be more accepting of different life paths and timelines, while individual identity is often less closely tied to achieving specific milestones by a particular age. Loneliness and isolation certainly exist, but they are not always experienced as personal failure in the same way.
Rich Lakos/ArenaPAL
It is here that The Last Man creates an intriguing cultural tension. Korean audiences may be more inclined to understand the Survivor’s condition as a reflection of wider social pressures and recognise elements of their own experience in the character. British audiences, by contrast, may be more likely to interpret their situation through the lens of individual psychology. The same story can therefore feel like a social tragedy in one context and a personal collapse in another. For some international audiences, this offers a fascinating glimpse into a specifically Korean emotional landscape; for others, it may provoke a sense of distance and the question: why has this character fallen into such profound despair?
On Broadway, the Korean-born musical Maybe Happy Ending, written by Hue Park, has enjoyed remarkable success, while Korean stories continue to gain international visibility through global platforms such as Netflix. At the same time, an increasing number of Korean theatre and musical productions are seeking audiences beyond Korea, with support from organisations such as Arts Council Korea and the Korea Arts Management Service. The challenge is not simply to translate language, but to discover how distinctly Korean experiences and emotions might resonate with audiences elsewhere.
Theatre offers an opportunity for audiences from different cultural backgrounds to encounter unfamiliar perspectives and ask new questions. Why did a young man isolated in a semi-basement room in Sillim-dong resonate so deeply with Korean audiences? Why do some British viewers recognise something of themselves in the Survivor, while others remain at a distance? The Last Man offers London audiences a chance to encounter a social and emotional landscape that may be unfamiliar, yet unexpectedly recognisable. How a story that begins in a semi-basement room in Seoul is understood in London may prove to be one of the production’s most intriguing questions.
The Last Man is now playing at Southwark Playhouse, Elephant.
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