Drag king stories #9

I’m back to performing, after a 5 year hiatus. “Adam Andro-matic” was last seen at a small bar downtown doing drag-aoke as a wind-up-doll to the song “Blue Monday” by New Order. And then the pandemic hit, and I haven’t been back to that bar since. A new opportunity came up recently! An acquaintance put on a show at a small theater in November that we attended, and they asked me if I wanted to perform in the next one.

I decided that since it was a theater that hosts mostly comedy shows and improv, I would try to lean into that. To tell a humorous story from a past drag experience. It ended up going really well! After telling the story, I did a dramatic reenactment of the event, and then in the 2nd show later that night, I twisted the reenactment into an alternate reality, and did a bizarro-world version.

Here’s the story:
Spring of 2006 – I was a drag baby, a baby king, with 5 whole shows under my belt. The belt was silvery-shimmery, sequined and studded, thick and gaudy and I was so ready to tuck away a bunch more shows. I had weaseled my way into a huge show at the U of R, through a tenuous connection, a last-minute addition. I really had no business being there; it was a bunch of drag queens (who I didn’t know) and Stratus – local drag king legend!  He and I were going to be sharing a dressing room!

I decided to do a song I had already done – I could afford to by now, and I’d feel less nervous if it was a little bit familiar. And by that, I mean to me, not to anyone else; I was going with an obscure song by 90’s Britpop bedroom navel-gazing darlings The London Suede. It was having a moment in my mind. Get this:  they had a lyric that went, “We kissed in his room / to a popular tune” and it was amazing because the singer was a man! This wasn’t some overt queer anthem, but it was in there, subtle.

I had bubblegum pink corduroy bell bottoms (exhibit A: these are the exact same ones – can’t believe they still fit) and a sheer zebra striped women’s blouse. Sideburns that thrilled me to no end and eyeliner that really made my eyeballs pop out. I was going for that vacant deep-stare-at-nothing look.

Stratus and I didn’t talk much, if at all. We had pre-show jitters. I didn’t know how this venue worked – how to get out to the stage, how I had gotten back stage, what it would feel like to be out there. Didn’t matter; I was about to go on and here we go!

And… The wrong song was totally playing. Booming, actually, ricocheting all over this huge cavernous party room.  It was just so painful in my skull.  …A stupid silly song by Oingo Boingo, and I was mortified by the incongruence. I was gonna have to run with it; no one to tell, sound person tucked away back in a secret locale. I kinda knew this song right?  Had done it, but was going to have to improvise. I bounced out onto this huge stage, trying to use the entirety of the space, which was much different than the little hole-in-the-wall gay dive bar I was starting to get used to.

I was cringing on the inside – this song did not match this outfit, and everyone could obviously tell! That’s what I told myself anyway; the students were staring blankly.  And then, I noticed the catwalk. It felt like an abyss, but I did go out there.  At the very end, one dollar bill stuck up straight in the air like a buoy, right when I was starting to feel like maybe I was drowning.

I reached for it and, and realized it was my flamboyant rockabilly friend Sarah, and hanging off her was my fellow drag buddy, Johnny. I didn’t even know they were coming! They had surged through the crowd to deliver this crisp dollar bill, and I was forever grateful. But that was it and I had to keep going and this song was just so long and totally wrong for this crowd!  I did a little song and dance, a little of this, little of that.  Turned around and before I knew it…

Backstage again with Stratus, my adrenaline has surged and oxytocin was hitting my bloodstream hard and we were now a bonded pair. I blurted out, “Oh man, that was so fun! What are you doing now, do you want to come out to Vertex [local goth night club] with me?!” He was polite, soft-spoken, saying, “That sounds fun and I totally would. But I’m going out with my girlfriend and a bunch of people to this lesbian club.” I didn’t say anything, but of course she was. Stratus was a woman, performing as a man, who was now transforming back into her life, going out with her people. I was neither man nor woman, performing as I’m-not-sure, who was now heading out to my misfit happy place, by myself yet again.