Buddies in Bad Times - 2021/22 Season Brochure

BUDDIES IN BAD TIMES THEATRE

Buddies in Bad Times Theatre is situated on the traditional lands of the Haudenosaunee, the Anishinaabe, and the Wendat, and the treaty territory of the Mississaugas of the Credit. We acknowledge them and any other Nations who care for the land (acknowledged and unacknowledged, recorded and unrecorded) as the past, present, and future caretakers of this land, referred to as Tkaronto (“Where the Trees Meet the Water”; “The Gathering Place”). Buddies is honoured to be a home for queer, trans, and 2-Spirit artists on these storied and sacred lands that have been stewarded by Indigenous Peoples for thousands of years before the arrival of colonial settlers.

ABOUT BUDDIES Established in 1979, Buddies in Bad Times Theatre is Toronto’s leading destination for artistically rigorous alternative theatre and a world leader in developing queer voices and stories for the stage. Buddies offers a year-round program that includes a full season of queer theatre, new works festivals, artist residencies, and intergenerational training and education initiatives. In its 40-year history, Buddies has welcomed more than a million people into its home in the heart of Toronto’s queer village and has premiered more than 1,000 new works for the stage, making it the largest and longest-running queer theatre company in the world.

THE FUTURE IS RISKY

AND POSSIBLE. — Andrew Zealley, Disco Hospital

How do we come back? And what are we coming back to?

Over the past year and a half, a lot has changed at Buddies. And a lot continues to change. But I think that is fitting for a queer theatre – to be a space that is never quite settled. As we head into our 43rd season and cautiously reopen our doors, we embrace these notions of movement and transience to step into a future that remains unknown and unpredictable. And with this, we also embrace a sense of play, experimentation, and risk as we imagine an exciting new future for Buddies.

that have emerged from our learnings converge with our artistic programming and the artists who will reinvigorate our home at 12 Alexander Street with radical ideas and a refreshed curiosity. This year centres national conversations that interrogate notions of queer community and institution, deeper commitments to programs that reimagine how Buddies cultivates new queer stories, and stronger relationships with artists as they prepare to share their work and welcome communities back into the theatre.

While the year ahead holds many more questions than answers (and still requires navigating a pandemic), the opportunity to reconnect with our communities and dream of new paths forward is a thrilling experience I can’t wait for us to share together.

Our 2021/2022 season is an offering of both digital and in-person programming that foregrounds a year of reflecting, learning, and imagining new possibilities for our theatre. New ideas, processes, and practices

— DANIEL CARTER , INTERIM PROGRAMMING DIRECTOR

COMMUNITY & EDUCATIONALPROGRAMMING

ENGAGING COMMUNITIES More than just a theatre, Buddies is a place where queer communities can come together. Throughout the season, we offer a variety of community-engaged programming. Over the past few years, we’ve reimagined and refocused our offerings to welcome artists and community members from across the age spectrum.

Our focus on intergenerational connections continues with the return of In Conversation, curated by leZlie lee kam and Ty Sloane. Moving to an online format this past year has allowed us to reach an audience well beyond our home in Toronto, and we continue to strengthen these long-distance connections as other in-person activities resume.

Our programming also provides a space for artists to experiment and for communities to connect through art. This season, two of our mainstay performance platforms return. QueerCab, a curated series of events highlighting the work of emerging artists, pops up throughout the season. The 2-Spirit Cabaret, an ongoing partnership with Native Earth Performing Arts, is back for a sixth year, celebrating the strength, beauty, and talent of queer and 2-Spirit Indigenous people. In a new initiative, resident artists We Other Sons lead a series of bio-mythic workshops, exploring shame, sexuality, and religion for queer men of colour.

↖ YOUTH/ELDERS PROGRAMMING COORDINATOR T Y SLOANE

“One day, if you’re lucky, you too will be a queer senior.”

— leZlie lee kam

EMERGING CREATORS UNIT & EMERGING COMPANY-IN-RESIDENCE

As the world’s largest and longest-running queer theatre, creating development opportunities for the next generation of queer artists and arts workers is an integral part of what we do. This year, responding to the shifting arts sector, our emerging-artist programming evolves to equip artists with the experience, skills, and connections needed to thrive in this new landscape.

SUPPORTING EMERGING ARTISTS Buddies’ Emerging Creators Unit provides an environment for emerging queer artists to expand their practice and develop new work. Over the past 16 years, unit alumni have gone on to have their work shown on stages across the country. Under the direction of Tawiah M’Carthy and Philip Geller – returning for their second year – this artist-centred and mentorship-driven program now includes a dual focus on artistic and producing skills, leading up to sharings at our Queer Pride Festival.

Our commitment to emerging artists also led to our first-ever emerging company-in-residence. Since January, Buddies staff have been working with Courage Bacchus and Gaitrie Persaud-Dhunmoon in a tailor-made mentorship process. This fall, they continue to structure their learning around their goals of advocating and creating opportunities for IBPOC, queer, and Deaf artists.

↗ ECU DIRECTOR TAWIAH M’CARTHY & ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR PHILIP GELLER

THE BUDDIES RESIDENCY PROGRAM

NURTURING CREATIVE DEVELOPMENT The Buddies Residency program commissions and supports new queer work for the stage, building creative relationships and providing resources to foster deep development. Using an artist-centred approach, Buddies works with writers, theatre collectives, directors, performance artists, and choreographers to create meaningful opportunities to explore new work and creation processes through a distinctly queer lens.

As the program enters its 12th year, our returning resident artists continue to develop their projects, with dedicated space, time, and resources to explore new working models.

2021/22 RESIDENCY ARTISTS Martin Julien The Man That Got Away ( A Special Appearance) Pencil Kit Productions WHITE MUSCLE DADDY Heath V. Salazar Francis We Other Sons Collective What’s Done, Must Come

↖ RESIDENCY ARTIST HEATH V. SAL AZAR

SEEDING WORK

CULTIVATING ARTISTIC CURIOSITY A new initiative this season, Seeding Work aims to provide space and resources for artists to experiment with burgeoning ideas and questions in their practice and to open up new pathways in a project’s development. Over the course of an intensive, shortform incubation period, this question-driven program encourages performance creators to bridge the abstract into clear steps forward. The name Seeding Work is a nod to Seed Plays, an artistic development program run by Buddies in the 1980s.

This fall, Buddies invites three artists to pursue their artistic curiosities. The projects – led respectively

by Michael Caldwell, Kitoko, and Julie Phan – grapple with notions of sanctuary and displacement, public persona, and familial ties while muddying the division between the digital and physical, the fictional and the autobiographical.

↗ SEEDING WORK ARTIST KITOKO

TALLULAH’ S CABARET

Looking for a poetry reading, a dance-floor makeout, a drag show? At Tallulah’s Cabaret we’ve got all that and then some, with 25 years of glitter built up and ready to welcome you. The beating heart of Buddies since we moved to Alexander Street in 1994, our Cabaret space plays host to a variety of parties, fundraisers, workshops, and shows throughout the year, alongside our mainstage and artistic development programming.

MAKING SPACE FOR CELEBRATION This past year we’ve expanded and adapted our bar operations to include a new patio, welcoming people at their own comfort level and bringing a new dimension of visibility to the space. From late-night parties to burlesque shows and Pride festivities, we’re looking forward to welcoming event producers, artists, and attendees back into the space in earnest over the coming year.

↖ BAR MANAGER AND BUDDIES LEGEND PATRICIA WILSON

RE

WINTER 2021 presented by Buddies in Bad Times Theatre in association with the frank theatre company

Q2Q-2:

EFUSING THE QUEER MONOLITH What does it mean to actively question what binds us as a queer theatre community? How do we support multiple and often overlapping queer communities?

How do we create environments that support division without being divisive?

A virtual symposium, Q2Q-2: Refusing the Queer Monolith, shines a light on the conversations happening in and around the works we see on stage and asks us to consider the makeup of queer theatre communities across Turtle Island. The conference brings together queer, trans, and 2-Spirit performance creators for a series of digital longtables, panel discussions, and performances, fostering thoughtful exchange and planting seeds of collaboration.

lead curator & producer MAKRAM AYACHE advisory committee Elena Belyea, Yolanda Bonnell, Santiago Guzman, Darrin Haggin, Tawiah M’Carthy, Nikki Shaffeeullah, Anais West, Richie Wilcox, Kaitlyn Yott

WINTER 2022 Buddies in Bad Times Theatre presents

THE RHUBARB Back for a 43rd year, Rhubarb transforms Buddies into a hotbed of experimentation, with artists challenging our notions of what art-making and art-watching can be. As Canada’s longest-running new works festival, Rhubarb is the place to encounter the most adventurous ideas in performance and to catch familiar and unfamiliar artists venturing into uncharted territory.

FESTIVA

festival director CLAYTON LEE design lead ANDREA SHIN LING

Following this past year’s festival’s manifestation as a book, Rhubarb is transforming once again, with design lead Andrea Shin Ling creating a large-scale installation in the Chamber space that will serve as a site for artists to respond to, engage with, and leave their mark on.

↗ RHUBARB FESTIVAL DIRECTOR CL AY TON LEE

AL

G

SPRING 2022

Gi-bgizoomgad epiichi biinjii’yii debwewin-nim (You swim in your truth)

WHITE GIRLS IN MOCCASINS a manidoons collective & Buddies in Bad Times Theatre production

by YOLANDA BONNELL co-directed by COLE ALVIS & SAMANTHA BROWN

Miskozi goes on a search for herself and her culture, accompanied by her inner white girl, Waabishkizi, and guided by Ziibi, a manifestation of an ancestral river.

An irreverent reclamation story, White Girls in Moccasins world-hops between dreams, memories, and a surreal game show as Miskozi grapples with living her own truth in a society steeped in white supremacy. ↖ YOL ANDA BONNELL

SPRING 2022 a Pearle Harbour & Buddies in Bad Times Theatre production

DISTANT EARLY WARNING N o t l o n g f r o m n o w, i n t h e scorched Arctic Circle, a fanatic group of survivors gathers around the planet’s last standing radar dish. Above them, from low Earth orbit, the Grand Prize Winner sends prophetic warnings about the survivors’ forgotten history, while their leader plots her escape. Distant Early Warning is a climate-fiction musical spectacle about the irresistible cycles of hope, memory, and violence.

by JUSTIN MILLER directed by JOHN TURNER music direction & arrangements by STEVEN CONWAY

↗ PEARLE HARBOUR

“Pearle is a wise, frank dispenser of truths. She’s like Greek tragedy’s Cassandra, as played by Eve Arden.”

— NOW Magazine

LEGACY CIRCLE

LEADERS $1000+

MONTHLY DONORS

Ed Cabell & Roy Forrester

Ken Aucoin & Gerald Crowell

Daniel Abell

John Alan Lee

Lawrence Bennett

Russell Mathew & Scott Ferguson

The BulmashSiegel Private Foundation

Richard McLellan

Mark Aikman & Gustavo Cerquera Benjumea Cole Alvis – in honour of René Highway

Karim Karsan & John Rider Tom Keogh & Paul McClure Montana Kimel Kim Koyama

Adam Morrison & James Owen

Andrew Gillespie

Jim Robertson & Jim Scott

Paul Hartwick

Ken Aucoin & Gerald Crowell

William Hodge & Robert Wylie

Michel Beauvais

Dr. Ben Louie

Tim Jones & Taylor Raths

Derek Billsman

Cameron MacLeod

VISIONARIES $5000+

Marusya Bociurkiw

Gilles Marchildon

Mark Brodsky

Desmond Marryshow

Craig Hanson

Angelica LeMinh Paul Butler & Chris Black

Stephen McGregor & Tony De Franco

The Estate of Kenneth Dawe

NigE Gough Shine On Foundation at the Toronto Community Foundation

Jim Lawrence & David Salak Tom McGillis & Ken Percy The George Cedric Metcalf Charitable Foundation HEROES $2500+ Russell Mathew & Scott Ferguson Adam Morrison & James Owen Through fundraising efforts of Jean-Gilles Parisé

Brian Sambourne

Kristina Lemieux

Paulie McDermid

Naomi Campbell

Richard McLellan

Ky Capstick

Aidan Morishita-Miki

Betty Carlyle Herng Yi Cheng

Thompson Nguyen Wes D. Pearce

Peter Taylor

Russell Connelly

The Wine Butler

David Couture

Ingrid Randoja

Anonymous

Donna Daitchman

Susanna Reid

Rui Pires

Shawn Daudlin

Andrea Ridgley

ADVOCATES $500+

In honour of Michelle Dubarry

Jim Robertson & Jim Scott

Kate Bishop & Doug Gerhart

Joanna Drummond

Mitsuko Sada

Lois Fine

Robert G. Coates

Allen Sangalang

Barbara Fingerote

Ronak Shah

Shawn Daudlin

Ksenia Sabouloua

Jamie Slater

The Charlie and Lulu Franklin Fund at the Calgary Foundation

Michael Gillies

Robin Gordon

Peter Taylor

Brendan Healy

George Grant

Lionel Tona

Jaigris Hodson

Brendan Healy

Louis Tsilivis

Montana Kimel

William Hodge & Robert Wylie

Ayse Turak

Wes D. Pearce LISTED DONATIONS FOR JULY 1, 2020–JUNE 30, 2021

Ed Cabell & Roy Forrester

Jim Lawrence & David Salak

Jamie Slater James Tennyson Anonymous

Danny Glenwright

David Steinberg Tiffany Sung

Jaigris Hodson

Cathrin Winkelmann

Andrea Houston

Anonymous

Daria Ilkina

LEAD CORPORATE SPONSOR CORPORATE PARTNERS

COMMUNITY + EDUCATION PARTNER

MEDIA PARTNER

PUBLIC AGENCIES FOUNDATIONS

an Ontario government agency un organisme du gouvernement de l’Ontario

SEASON PARTNERS

PHO TOGRA PHY Dylan Mitro WA RDR OBE & ST Y LIN G Vanessa Magic HAIR & MAKEUP ART Robert Weir ASSISTANT TO PHOTOGRAPHY Kat Zomboukalis ASS ISTAN T TO WAR DROB E & STYLI NG Maria Al-Saadi ASS I STANT TO HAIR & MAKEUP ART Toru Miyake Gallardo TECHNICAL S UPPORT Amber Pattison GRA PHIC DE SIGN Lucinda Wallace

CREATIVE CREDITS

OUR SPONSORS & PARTNERS SEASON SPONSORS

THE MANAGING DIRECTOR

Shawn Daudlin INTERIM PROGRAMMING DIRECTOR

Daniel Carter ACTING DIRECTOR OF PRODUCTION

Jacqueline Costa RENTALS & EVENTS MANAGER

EMER G I N G COMP A N Y - I N RESI D E N C E

Courage Bacchus & Gaitrie Persaud-Dhunmoon MARK E T I N G & ENGA G E M E N T MANA G E R

Jonathan MacArthur COMM U N I C A T I O N S & OUT R E A C H MANA G E R Aidan

Morishita-Miki

Steph Raposo RHUBARB FESTIVAL DIRECTOR

Clayton Lee EMERGING CREATORS UNIT DIRECTOR

ARTA T T A C K & ADMI N I S T R A T I V E ASSI S T A N T

Natasha Ramondino PATR O N S E R V I C E S COOR D I N A T O R

Julia Lewis

Tawiah M’Carthy BAR M A N A G E R

Patricia Wilson

EMERGING CREATORS UNIT ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR

ASSI S T A N T BAR M A N A G E R

Philip Geller

Devin Reid

YOUTH/ELDERS PROGRAMMING COORDINATORS

MANA G E R OF T O U R I N G

leZlie lee kam & Ty Sloane

Chris Reynolds FACI L I T Y MANA G E R

RESIDENCY ARTISTS

Paul Therrien

Martin Julien, Pencil Kit Productions, Heath V. Salazar, We Other Sons Collective

FINA N C E M A N A G E R

Cynthia Murdy

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

BUDDIES IN BAD TIMES THEATRE Pia SchmidtHansen (C H A I R ) Russell Mathew (T R E A S U R E R ) Adam Morrison (S E C R E T A R Y ) Alia Ahmed Marusya Bociurkiw Rain Chan Rachel Clark Jim Lawrence Andrew Wang ALEXANDER STREET THEATRE PROJECT Russell Mathew (C H A I R ) Adam Morrison

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