Staff

Interim Director of Operations and Programming

Daniel Carter

Daniel Carter (he/him) is a theatre artist and arts manager. He has worked with various cultural organizations including SummerWorks Performance Festival, Theatre Direct, and Visual Arts Mississauga in various administrative capacities. Daniel served as General Manager of Paprika Festival from 2018-2021, where he led the company into a period of unparalleled financial and operational growth. As an artist, Daniel has worked with Buddies in Bad Times, Pandemic Theatre, The AMY Project, DopoLavaro Teatrale, and Shadowtime Productions. He was a member of Factory Theatre’s The Foundry, and House + Body’s Playwrights Initiative. He is a proud member of Humber College’s Arts Administration and Cultural Management Program Advisory Committee. Daniel is currently completing an Executive Program with University of Pennsylvania in Social Innovation Design. What’s a treasured queer artifact of yours?  My friend gifted me a Keith Haring wristwatch that belonged to her gay uncle who passed from HIV/AIDS. She didn’t really know him and so felt okay to give it away; but there was something so impactful about receiving this. Perhaps it was the intrinsic connection queer people share. Perhaps it was the feeling of being responsible for carrying on a legacy of culture, knowledge, and history. Perhaps both. What’s your earliest memory of Buddies? I had just finished a shift at my then-workplace, and was meeting my then-partner outside Buddies (which I thought was just a club at the time). And I was waiting on one of the benches in the park, and overheard one of the clubgoers say “Bitch, you can walk and smoke.” Side note: I really don’t go out much, and my then-partner would always say “I’m going to Church on Church” — and I didn’t know that was a bar, and always thought they were going to mass at 10 PM.

Technical Director

Jacqueline Costa

Jacqueline’s (any pronouns) work and life have largely been centred around figuring stuff out. In theatre, that looks like taking other people’s sometimes bizarre ideas and turning them into realities, and in life that looks pretty much like living. Jacqueline is a tinkerer and a putterer and can’t stand spending entire days at a computer, but at the same time can get lost in crafting CAD drawings for hours, emerging only to eat, drink, and verify the eyeache is in fact still present.

What’s a treasured queer artifact of yours?
A guilty pleasure of mine is that I’ve always been compelled to consume terrible (and sometimes good!) lesbian movies/shows. I mean mostly they’re just awful but some of them know it and I love them for it. I think obviously this comes from a lack of representation in the stuff I consumed growing up, so being able to see two women onscreen just existing together like it’s no big thing was fire for me, and continues to be.

What’s your earliest memory of Buddies?
The Chamber was completely empty and the performance happened on the floor and in the catwalk. I remember being pleasantly surprised by the space as well as the content of the show, and came back some years later to find the space in an entirely different configuration which confused me to no end (my first experience with a true blackbox theatre).

Technical Director

Steph Raposo

steph raposo (they/them) is a queer theatre artist whose job at Buddies revolves around the rental events in the Cabaret space. They are responsible for renter communication, organizing and scheduling incoming events, and operating any technical elements required during said events. Outside of their work at Buddies, steph is a sound designer, lighting designer, and video designer and editor. They enjoy playing guitar, and trying (and failing) to read as many books as their partner. 20/21 will be their fifth season at Buddies.

What’s a treasured queer artifact of yours?
I have this awesome print that photographer Sly Pereira made. It was made in collaboration with Les Femmes Fatales Women of Colour Burlesque Troupe based on their Afrofuturism series, and it features Dainty Smith, Ravyn Wngz, and Zyra Lee. It’s beautiful and also stands as a nice reminder of all of the Les Femmes Fatales shows I’ve worked and have loved watching.

Who is one of your queer icons/heroes?
I don’t know if I have any queer icons or heroes. I do remember growing up and feeling seen when I watched Elliot Page onscreen, even before she came out as gay. And it’s nice to know that those feelings aren’t now something I feel shame or regret for investing in her at a young age, since she’s now quite vocal with her doc series Gaycation and speaking at a conference for the Human Rights Campaign. But I think that there are too many amazing queer people that do work that doesn’t get recognized to the scale that Page and other celebrities do, so it’s hard to choose and I don’t really want to.

Production Manager

Rebecca Vandevelde

Rebecca Vandevelde (she/they) is an arts worker based in Toronto; working as a freelance lighting designer and production manager; often taking small indie shows on tour; and sometimes making/curating events, spaces and installation-based experiments with Art is Hard. Rebecca is a member of Means of Production, a collective of Production Managers and Technical Directors. Some highlights include: lighting/touring for Pandemic x Rumble x Theatre Passe Muraille Take D Milk, Nah?, PM/producer for Suvendrini Lena’s Theatre Centre Residency Project Here Are The Fragments., PM for Soundstreams x Signal Two Odysseys, lighting for Aluna Solitudes; PM/SM/touring for Quote Unquote x Why Not Theatre Mouthpiece; curator/lead artist for Theatre Passe Muraille’s Crapshoot Series; PM for the Fringe and Next Stage Theatre Festivals

Rhubarb Festival Director

Clayton Lee

Clayton (he/him) is a Toronto-based performance artist. Previous performances include (◕‿◕✿) at The Performance Arcade in Wellington, New Zealand and Chapter’s EXPERIMENTICA in Cardiff, Wales; Duets for Beginners (SummerWorks); Chew, Chew, Swallow, Spit (Rhubarb Festival); and Informal Beginnings (Katzman Contemporary’s Duration & Dialogue II). His publication Brandy, the Virgin Slayer – Missed Connections appears as part of the BOOK MACHINE Project at Centre Pompidou in Paris, now part of its permanent Kandinsky Collection. Clayton is also the Managing Producer of Selfconscious Productions, which presents the annual CanadaHub at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

What’s a treasured queer artifact of yours?
I’m anti-object (but I accept gifts).

What’s your favourite spot in the city?
A tie between my bed and my couch (my bed normally wins, though).

Communications and Outreach Manager

Aidan Morishita-Miki

Aidan (he/him) is an arts administrator, stage manager, and plant dad. He’s worked in various capacities with companies including Red Dress Productions, Boys in Chairs Collective, Re:Current Theatre, Ars Mechanica, Hart House Theatre, and SummerWorks. Recently he also worked as a managing producer for FIXT POINT Arts and Media, coordinating various aspects of the company’s The Tale of a Town project. He started volunteering at Buddies in 2012 and has stuck around since.

What’s your favourite spot in the city?
There are lots but one is the east side of Riverdale Park up on Broadview. It’s been the site of first dates, a last date, and I also got baptized on the church at the top of the hill. Riverdale’s where my dad’s family first lived when they moved to Toronto, so it’s got a special place in my heart. It’s also one of the best views of the city skyline. Honourable mentions go to the capybara pen at High Park Zoo and Nirvana (RIP) at College and Bathurst.

What’s your earliest memory of Buddies
I think the first time I came to Buddies was at a club night as a hardly-out gay in my undergrads, with a couple of girls I was in a musical with. Mostly what I remember is that partway through the night, they asked me to point out “the type of guy I was into”. I pointed out a tall, handsome guy, and before I knew it they had brought him over to me. I was mortified. I don’t think I went back to Buddies as a club until after I started working here.

Patron Services Coordinator

Julia Lewis

Julia (she/her) is continually surprised at just how long she’s been working in theatre. She started as a Front of House volunteer in Ottawa in 2004 and hasn’t looked back since! Some highlights of her career include 8 years in Patron Services for the Canadian Opera Company and National Ballet of Canada, 7 years managing venues with Toronto Fringe, 5 years coordinating entry with TIFF, and one whirlwind tour down under as a Box Office Supervisor for Adelaide Fringe 2019. Julia also fills her time working as a stage manager or ‘kittening’ at various drag and burlesque shows around the city, and enjoys singing in a community choir.

What’s your favourite spot in the city?
Honestly probably my couch. At the end of the day, I’m a pretty big homebody and love curling up in front of the TV with my kitty (Kendra, ginger tabby) and a special someone.

What’s your earliest memory of Buddies?
Probably volunteering for ArtAttack! in 2012. I had moved to the city the year prior and was already immersed in the world of queer burlesque, volunteering at shows to cover my ticket price – one of the burlesque babes also happened to be the Special Event Assistant at Buddies at the time. Mostly I remember a whirlwind night of glitter and glam, and the feeling that I was where I was supposed to be.

Assistant Bar Manager

Devin Reid

Devin (he/him) is a relative newbie to Toronto, having moved from Sudbury, Ontario just over 3 years ago. Having graduated with his BFA in Performance Theatre, he took the dive and moved to the Big(ger) city. Since then, he’s worked a variety of serving jobs (most recently at Cineplex’s Rec Room across from the CN Tower) and has done a couple of small theatre productions with his friends at Open Heart Productions. You can catch him serving up drinks every Friday, Saturday and Sunday with Patricia and Charlee behind the Buddies Bar.

What’s your favourite spot in the city?
I have a soft spot for The Junction/High Park/Roncy area. Great big park to walk through, quiet neighbourhoods if you want to get out and just go for a stroll, and some awesome locally owned businesses to support.

Who is one of your queer icons/heroes?
Having grown up in a small city, I wasn’t exposed to a lot of queer content until much later in my life. So my icon is not a big name. Dr. Ian Maclennan was my prof for four years at Laurentian University and is really the one who helped dig me out of that queerless hole I was in, and I learned a lot of queer history and it’s relation to theatre from him. He also happens to be the first person to get me in a dress on stage for our production of Drag Queens on Trial!

House Technician

Samira Banihashemi

Samira Banihashemi (she/her) is a theatre and live music technician and an aspiring multidisciplinary theatre designer, with a focus on Lighting, Projection and Sound Design.  She graduated from the Humber College Theatre Production program with an Academic Award of Excellence. Samira is continuing her professional development in Lighting Design through the Design Incubator Pilot Project. 

Credits: Take Me to Your Garden, Third Wheel Theatre Co., Lighting Designer; You Can’t Get There From Here, Factory Theatre, Apprentice Sound Designer; A Tonic for Desperate Times, Theatre Gargantua, Assistant Lighting Designer; An evening of miniature solos and music, tiger princess dance projects, Producer

What’s your favourite spot in the city? 
Café Pamenar in Kensington market is my favourite spot in the city. Pamenar’s doors are always open to lost and confused newcomers like me who are looking for a community. 

Who is one of your queer icons/heroes?
Fereydoun Farrokhzad was an Iranian queer singer, actor, poet, TV and radio host, writer, humanitarian, and political opposition figure. He’s been bravely an openly queer activist in a mainly conservative society, he has made a huge influence in breaking stereotypes in Iran. Farrokhzad was brutally murdered in his home in 1992.

Events + Administrative Assistant

Natasha Ramondino

Natasha Ramondino (she/her) is a queer actor, creator, and arts worker. She has performed with companies such as Convergence Theatre, fu-GEN Theatre, Shakespeare BASH’d, and 4th Line Theatre (to name a few), as well as in productions at the Toronto Fringe/Next Stage Festivals and the Paprika Festival. Driven by a discussion of feminist and 2SLGBTQ+ themes, her artistic focus has more recently been on fostering community and care. She is an alumni of Nightwood Theatre’s Young Innovators Program and a graduate of the Theatre and Drama Studies Program at Sheridan College and the University of Toronto Mississauga. 

What’s a treasured queer artifact of yours?

I own a copy of the recent reprinting of JEB’s “Eye to Eye: Portraits of Lesbians”. It’s a groundbreaking collection of photographs first self published in 1979 at a time when publishing a book with this content was incredibly risky for everyone involved. To me, it’s exposure I didn’t have growing up- a glimpse into the stories and lives of queer women from all sorts of backgrounds and life experience. It’s proof of our existence, specifically during a time of little to no visibility.

What’s your favourite place in the city?

Such a tough question, but probably the Toronto Islands. I love Hanlan’s Point, and walking the boardwalk from Centre Island beach to Ward’s. Honourable mentions go to Riverdale Park (favourite skyline view), Kensington Market, and the Glad Day Bookshop.

Paul Therrien

Paul is a freelance musician, playing drums and percussion as an accompanist. With the advent of MP3’s, file sharing and the demise of CDs, he continues to play part time, but has shifted into work in building renovations, expanded into building technologies via George Brown College training and then into property management. He has spent the last fifteen years at Artscape supporting over a thousand artists by providing them with safe and affordable housing and creative spaces. Paul does volunteer work for some local Tenant Advocacy groups and, as a hobby, does tropical plant maintenance for himself and friends.