Stageworthy

About This Episode: This week on Stageworthy, host Phil Rickaby welcomes ted witzel, Artistic Director of Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, to discuss the company’s 2025–2026 season and the vital role Buddies plays locally and globally. In this wide-ranging and passionate conversation, ted talks about the curatorial ethos behind the season, how queerness informs both aesthetic and practice, and why Buddies remains a radical, necessary space in an increasingly conservative climate. This episode explores: The inspiration and process behind curating the 2025–2026 Buddies season Why queerness is more than representation—it's a creative methodology The value of festivals (Rhubarb, Nuit Blanche, Queer Pride) in Buddies' identity Longing as a theme: desire, intimacy, revolution, and more Highlights from the season including The Green Line, Make Banana Cry, The Herald, and The Begging Brown Bitch Plays The importance of unruliness, disobedience, and disrespectability in queer theatre The enduring legacy and global uniqu