J. Paul Halferty: Queer and Now: the Queer Signifier at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre

In a 1995 essay, Robert Wallace suggests that Buddies in Bad Times Theatre is an “imaginative construction” whose “theatrical subjectivity,” like its mandate, is not fixed, but has been constantly evolving since the company began to produce work in 1979. Using Wallace’s assertions as a point of departure, this essay will examine what it means to be a “queer theatre” today. Examining Buddies’ programming, marketing, and the public statements made by the company’s various spokespeople, this essay will explore how Buddies’ “queer theatrical subjectivity” has been affected by the acquisition of 12 Alexander Street in 1994, Gilbert’s resignation in 1997, subsequent artistic directors, and the shifting meaning of the queer signifier within related theoretical discourses. It is my argument that over the last decade Buddies’ queer theatrical subjectivity has shifted from an ideology that challenged essentialist understandings of homo/heterosexual subjectivity, to one that affirms conceptions of fixed sexual identity, and uses queer as a strategy for fostering inclusiveness within its programming.