Buff at Tobacco Factory Theatres

Edinburgh Festival hit Buff, is on UK tour which will be coming to Tobacco Factory Theatres this June.

The one-man play, performed by Jamal Franklin, follows a plus-sized, gay primary school teacher. He decides to sublet his flat to a ‘buff’ Instagram model after a bad break-up from a six-year relationship.

Buff is described as both ‘funny yet poignant’, exploring LGBTQ themes with hook-up culture and the challenge of body image pressures, social media jealousy leading to self-acceptance.

Writer Ben Fensome says: “BUFF came out of a discussion Scott and I had about contemporary LGBTQ theatre and who usually gets featured in those stories, which actors get cast, what marketing usually looks like etc. We wanted to explore a character that we hadn’t seen be centred before and out of that discussion our character in BUFF was born. We’ve been really blown away by the response from LGBTQ audiences who have related to us how they haven’t really seen a character be centred like this particularly in queer theatre. I hope it is a call out for the community to look out for each other more, and the centre point of that is of course, the ability to love and accept ourselves.”

Cast and Creatives
Man – Jamal Franklin
Director – Scott Le Crass
Writer – Ben Fensome
Producer – Emmerson And Ward Productions

Buff will be a Tobacco Factory Theatres on 07 June 2025

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