From 1,000 Bed Hops to the Stage: OnlyFans-Inspired Play ‘Body Count’ Hits Edinburgh
Look, I don’t want to rain on anybody’s parade, but apparently our collective obsession with viral OnlyFans stunts wasn’t gauche enough—now it’s a full-blown theater production. British writer Issy Knowles has crafted Body Count, a one-woman play loosely based on the headline-grabbing sex challenges of creators like Lily Phillips and Bonnie Blue. Deadline broke the news on June 13, and sure enough, Pollie—the play’s hapless Edinburgh consultant—decides her big career pivot is sleeping with 1,000 men for OnlyFans cash. I told you so: this is what happens when you monetize attention spans.
Knowles insists she’s not mocking these creators—instead, she’s spotlighting how easy it is to objectify “women we know,” as she put it to Deadline. But let’s not pretend the inspiration is subtle. Last December, 23-year-old Lily Phillips stunned followers by claiming 100 men in a single day; a month later, 25-year-old Bonnie Blue outdid her with 1,057 partners in 12 hours. And just to keep the race alive, Aussie model Annie Knight tallied 583 hookups in six hours earlier this year—proof that viral fame trumps basic discretion. If you still wonder why many of us prefer Netflix binges over real-life intimacy, this play doubles as a cautionary tale.
Body Count runs at Edinburgh’s Pleasance Courtyard from July 30 to August 25, and Knowles promises it’s “theatrical” more than salacious. She wants sex workers across platforms to feel seen, not sidestepped. Fair enough—there’s a real need to stop othering these women, she argues, since we’re all complicit in the spectacle. Meanwhile, OnlyFans itself has come a long way since its quiet 2016 launch. The pandemic fueled a content explosion, and not even Bella Thorne’s splashy debut in 2020 was immune to backlash. The former Disney star claimed $2 million in a week (Los Angeles Times), only to be accused by veteran creators of raiding their income. Thorne said she joined to research a movie, then publicly apologized for stirring drama and promising nudes that never materialized.
In the legal oddities corner, Singapore’s Titus Low took on obscenity laws after flaunting adult content, claiming government bias (BBC). He fought colonial-era statutes against gay sex—even as authorities smeared him for daring to profit from virtual fans. All of which begs the question: when does art imitate internet lunacy, and when do we just shrug and move on?
So there it is: a one-person show born from rampant bed-hopping and digital fame seeking legitimacy under stage lights. Did anyone expect a different outcome? No? Thought so. And that, dear reader, is why we can’t have nice things.
Sources: Celebrity Storm and E! News, Deadline, Los Angeles Times, BBC News
Attribution: Creative Commons Licensed
