The subject of two famous British plays—Betrayal and Closer— is, of course, infidelity. Closer, Patrick Marber's third play, examines the subject in the context of four Londoners in the middle of the '90s; Betrayal, the most famous of Harold Pinter's "memory plays," examines the subject in the context of three Londoners in the late '60s and '70s. Though the plays have much in common (they have the same social setting—what Richard Florida calls "the creative class"), the nature and meaning of the infidelity in Closer is vastly different from the nature and meaning of it in Betrayal.

In Closer—worth seeing for its strong direction by Lisa Confehr, simple but effective triphop period set, and performances, particularly by Mike Dooly, who plays Larry—the infidelity is the narrative mechanism that propels a lover's journey from uncertainty to the stable state (or stasis) of a true relationship. The four characters—Larry the doctor, Alice the stripper, Dan the novelist, Anna the photographer—are each seeking that one person who will be the foundation for a final and complete relationship; and the way to find that person, and to know for certain that you indeed have the right person, is through cheating. Cheating gets you closer to the ideal relationship. This is why the defining event in Closer is the collapse of Larry and Anna's marriage. After a long affair, Anna leaves Larry for Dan, who is in a relationship with Alice. But when Anna meets Larry to sign divorce papers, she realizes the truth: Her heart belongs to Larry, who is distressed about losing her. She leaves Dan and returns to her husband. She would never have known how much she loved Larry if she had been faithful to him.

In Betrayal—which, like Closer, is worth seeing for its direction, by Braden Abraham; elegantly modern set, by Etta Lilienthal; and nearly flawless performances, by Cheyenne Casebier, Alex Podulke, and David Christopher Wells—the infidelity is static and even lacks passion. In fact, it's hard to call Jerry's relationship with his best friend's wife, Emma, an affair, since it lacks those hot, volcanic, sexual pressures that force two people to smash their marriage vows into small and irreparable pieces. Even when the affair begins, they are cool about it. The two rent an apartment, meet regularly, talk about family life, have sex, and return to family life. The affair is barely a break in the boredom of a middle-class existence of vacations to Italy, business trips to America, dinners at Mediterranean restaurants, drinks in pubs, parties at home. The only hot moment in the entire play (and this is very telling) is when Emma's husband, Robert, finds out about the affair four years after it began (Betrayal moves back in time, from 1977 to 1968—the affair lasts the first seven of those years). Because Robert's moment of rage has an exact double in Closer (Larry's moment of rage), we must determine its function and value.

When a person discovers that a lover has been unfaithful, that person wants details. And not just about the length of the affair, but about locations, positions, the intensity of the sex. As if it will make up for all the lies he/she has heard, the cheated lover demands to hear nothing but the exact truth. In Closer, Larry wants to know if his wife and Dan had sex in his house (Anna reluctantly tells the truth—they did); he then wants to know the exact location, the precise spot they had sex (Anna reluctantly points to a place on the stage); he then wants to know in what position they had sex (Anna admits that Dan fucked her from behind); he then wants to know if she enjoyed it, and if she had an orgasm, and if that orgasm was better than the ones she has had with him (yes, yes, yes). The same mania grips Robert in Betrayal. He wants to know where Emma fucked Jerry, and how many times she fucked him, and if fucking Jerry was better than fucking him?

Because the interrogation sequence is the most intense scene in both plays, we can conclude that it is the most theatrical aspect of infidelity. In cinema, the hot sex itself has the highest dramatic value (because it's visual: in Damage, for example). Onstage, the interrogation is the thing.