Everything and Anything…and a bit gay Podcast Zachary Randles-Friedman

On Election Day 2026, Zach drops the usual lighter tone of Everything & Anything…and a Bit Gay for an urgent, deeply personal plea to the LGBTQ+ community and its allies: vote. With every House seat, 35 Senate seats, 36 governorships and thousands of state and local offices on the ballot, he explains what’s at stake. He walks through what has happened to LGBTQ+ people over the past two years: federal rules recognizing only two sexes, the end of the X marker on passports, Kansas cancelling trans residents’ driver’s licenses, hospitals stopping gender-affirming care even in Massachusetts, the trans military ban, and hundreds of anti-LGBTQ+ bills introduced in 2026 alone. He ties it all back to everyday costs, including gas, groceries, tariffs and struggling farmers.

Zach also looks at the races the community was watching, especially James Talarico’s U.S. Senate run against Ken Paxton in Texas. He holds up Andy Beshear and Laura Kelly as leaders who stood their ground in red states and points to a record number of out LGBTQ+ candidates. He reminds listeners to vote the entire ballot, down to local questions like Massachusetts’ marijuana measure. It’s raw, frustrated and hopeful, and a snapshot of where things stood the day the country went to the polls.

Podcast song by SIXFOOT 5: https://www.sixfoot5prod.com

Apple: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/sixfoot-5/1551774977

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5rHMzoU0G0fLhaBsrQiOOY?si=laSZ5hiKTYubJJyhrzf2JQ

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Matt Rodin has spent nearly a decade with Beau the Musical, starting at the first table reads, before the script or score was finished. The show ran off-Broadway, and now its cast album is coming out. Matt plays Ace, a queer singer-songwriter from Tennessee who gets to know the grandfather he thought was dead. Matt calls it a love story, though not between two lovers. It’s about a grandfather and grandson, a mother and son, a boy and his music, and a boy and himself. The role has him singing nine of eleven songs, playing guitar and hosting the evening. He says it’s the hardest thing he’s ever done, and the thing that finally made him believe he’s capable.

Matt and Zach talk about growing up as the kid who was “good for my neighborhood” and not knowing how that would hold up nationally. They also cover the national tour of Company, the move from New York to Los Angeles, and being patient while you build a community in your mid-thirties. Matt explains why he writes a weekly newsletter when everyone else is making videos. He talks about meeting audience members from the South who’d never seen a queer character from their hometown on stage. And when Zach asks who he’d most want to see in the audience, Matt doesn’t pick a celebrity. He picks the grandparents he lost as a small child.

There’s also plenty of fun along the way: Zach choosing Gucci shoes over a baby, $3 off-Broadway tickets, Boston “townies,” and Theater Games, the free daily puzzle app Matt co-created that’s close to a million plays.

Links:

• Beau singles “Crush” and “It Couldn’t Be” on Spotify and Apple Music: 

  https://open.spotify.com/artist/2AEin5PUjyzx0ZXWt9sVbR?si=GNMnmYvHT-KsALjFFjtGsQ 

  https://music.apple.com/us/artist/matt-rodin/1189224082

   

• Fourth Wall newsletter: https://www.fourthwall.news/ 
• Theater Games: theater.games (also in the app stores) https://theater.games/ 
• Follow Matt on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/whoismattrodin/ 

Podcast song by SIXFOOT 5: https://www.sixfoot5prod.com

Apple: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/sixfoot-5/1551774977

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5rHMzoU0G0fLhaBsrQiOOY?si=laSZ5hiKTYubJJyhrzf2JQ

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Zach is sick, raspy, and fully in his complaining era — and it turns into the therapy session we all needed. In this week’s Gay Bit, he recaps a wild night out in Boston the day before Halloween, from close talkers and crowded dance floors to a 3 a.m. pizza-and-burger run with a new friend named Tom. He makes the case for why bears are the nicest men in any bar (Bear Week in P-Town converted him), shares how his collab with Paul from Paul’s Shed Talk brought a wave of bear followers, and admits it might be time to find a new bar now that the regulars know his name.

Then it’s family time: Mom is planning every minute of Thanksgiving, including eyelash extensions and meeting a cousin Zach never knew existed. Plus, the Wegmans vs. Market Basket banana war, why Andrew can’t stay quiet through a single scene of The Gilded Age, his Chewbacca yawn, the 4:30 a.m. “clog dancing,” and whether this is finally the year Zach gets Christmassy.

Podcast song by SIXFOOT 5: https://www.sixfoot5prod.com

Apple: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/sixfoot-5/1551774977

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5rHMzoU0G0fLhaBsrQiOOY?si=laSZ5hiKTYubJJyhrzf2JQ

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Dr. Stephen Paul Edwards spent most of his life running. After a traumatic, controlling childhood in Blackpool, England, a psychiatric hospitalization at 16, and four marriages, he found himself at rock bottom just as he met a woman who would turn his life upside down. Their relationship, full of luxury, chaos, false accusations, and police standoffs, became the basis for his book The Venus Fly Trap.

In this conversation, Stephen explains how he came to see that relationship as a gift: the experience that finally forced him to face his patterns and heal. He talks about trauma bonds and borderline personality disorder, why we keep attracting “the same person in a different body,” how forgiving his father changed everything, and his REAL method for breaking the cycle. He and Zach close with a big question: could stepping away from religion and toward spirituality solve some of these problems?

Learn more about Stephen: 
https://vft23.com/dr-stephen-paul-edwards-speaker/ 

Buy Stephen's books: 
https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0FRY7HLSD?ccs_id=3ee1d169-5072-4d41-9fb5-5f00caa28b1f 

Podcast song by SIXFOOT 5: https://www.sixfoot5prod.com

Apple: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/sixfoot-5/1551774977

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5rHMzoU0G0fLhaBsrQiOOY?si=laSZ5hiKTYubJJyhrzf2JQ

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

On Election Day 2026, Zach Randles-Friedman delivers an unfiltered call to action for LGBTQ+ listeners and allies. In this solo This Is Everything episode, he walks through the policies that have hit the community hardest over the past two years: the federal two-sex definition, the loss of the X gender marker on passports, pressure on hospitals providing gender-affirming care, the trans military ban, prison placement rules, and cuts to LGBTQ+ health programs at home and abroad. He connects those fights to the everyday costs voters are feeling, from gas and groceries to tariffs and the war in Iran.

Zach also spotlights the races and candidates he’s watching, including James Talarico’s Senate run against Ken Paxton in Texas, the false rumor campaign launched against Talarico, and Democratic governors Andy Beshear and Laura Kelly, who have held on in red states. He shares data on the wave of anti-LGBTQ+ bills, the record number of out candidates on the ballot, and the share of LGBTQ+ adults considering leaving their states. His message is simple: polls don’t vote, people do. Vote the whole ballot, bring someone with you, and if you don’t vote, don’t complain.

Podcast song by SIXFOOT 5: https://www.sixfoot5prod.com

Apple: https://music.apple.com/us/artist/sixfoot-5/1551774977

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/5rHMzoU0G0fLhaBsrQiOOY?si=laSZ5hiKTYubJJyhrzf2JQ

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.