These Queer BFFs Just Crushed The Competition On 'Buddy Games' & Are Ready For The Big Win
Have you ever wanted to go back to the care-free days of sleepaway summer camp?
Well, that’s exactly what six teams of friends are doing on the inaugural season of Buddy Games, a reality competition show hosted by Josh Duhamel where contestants are competing in absurd physical and mental challenges, all while living in a lake house à la summer camp.
After seven episodes full of tough camp-inspired challenges, only three teams are left to battle it out in tonight’s finale episode for a chance to win $200,000. Among them are Team Pride, made up of four LGBTQ+ friends who were hoping to have fun together now that they no longer all live in the same city.
Before coming on the show, the four friends on Team Pride—Andrew Shayde, Bekah Telew, Steven Mosier, and drag queen Summer Lynne Seasons—had last seen each other at the funerals for two of their closest friends. “This was an incredible opportunity to reunite and go have a blast and honor our two friends who have passed away, but also add some humor back into our friendship that we’d been missing,” Shayde tells PRIDE.
Although he’s had an amazing time on the show, Shayde also felt “scary pressure” to represent the LGBTQ+ community on national television. “I can only react and respond and behave based on my experience, my background,” he explains. “There’s no way that I can represent the story of a trans woman or the queer community of color. I can’t do that, but what I can do is just go and be me and that’s all we tried to do was just go and have fun with it, give it our best and show that even the weird, goofy queer kid at camp can be tough.”
Shayde, who is no stranger to tough competition shows, having participated in the third season of The Amazing Race and three episodes of Naked and Afraid, is hopeful that the show will bring a little levity to queer viewers. “My hope is that Buddy Games is just this little slice of humor for queer people in a time when politicians are actively attacking us,” he says.
The 42-year-old competitor said that all of the other teams were very accepting and although there was drama, it was all related to the game, not their sexual identities. Team Pride also received an outpouring of love from fellow LGBTQ+ people who sent them messages through social media. Sadly, not everyone on the internet was as supportive. “It’s just one of those reminders that homophobia is still rampant all across the United States of America. Everybody always likes to say, ‘But it’s getting better.’ Sure, but we still get made fun of in the meantime or treated badly. Going on TV opens that door for these hateful people to come at you.”
Despite the hate they received, Shayde says he loved competing on the show, “This was the most insane adventure of a lifetime and we are blessed to have gotten the opportunity to play it. It’s not every day that a group of adult friends get to go back to their childhood and have summer camp all over again and this was that on steroids."
The finale episode of Buddy Games airs on November 2 at 9 p.m. on CBS and will stream live and on-demand for Paramount+ with SHOWTIME subscribers, or on-demand for Paramount+ Essential subscribers the next day.
Watch the trailer for Buddy Games below.
