Genetic Sexual Attraction is a hot topic

Mother, wife and son/husband in Night Is A Room--photo does not convey the supposed age discrepancy; the acting does. 

Incest and adoption are themes that run deep and wide in drama, starting with Sophocles' Oedipus plays. And they are going strong on the New York stage.

Lorraine

Night Is A Room is about a birth mother/son reunion, orchestrated by the husband's wife for his 40th birthday. The review in the New York Times darkly hinted of a surprise plot twist sure to bring gasps at the end of the first act.

Okay, I thought: either a) son murders mother or b) son and mother have sex. Both seemed plausible; I had no inkling of the playwright Naomi Wallace's background. Did her first-hand knowledge of affairs adoption enter into this drama? Or was it just a topic she read about somewhere?

Is it incest? Genetic sexual attraction between adoptees and first parents

Jane

Romantic attraction between parents and their children or between siblings separated by adoption is almost unheard of outside the adoption-reunion community, but it's more common than many think. According to the online The Independent, a study by University College London found "half  of reunions were accompanied by anything from temporary attraction to obsessive sexual obsession."

I had tender, nostalgic feelings for my 31-year-old daughter Rebecca when we first reunited in 1997. Like someone who is newly infatuated, I couldn't get her off my mind. I was anxious about every phone call and every email. Eventually, the intensity of those feelings subsided. Other mothers have talked about the desire to stroke and touch their newly found children, as if they were still babies we could fondle and pat their hair.