Event write up: Dragmanity

Bryant Lake Bowl was host to “Dragmanity: Divalicious Night!” on October 16th at 10:00 pm. We got there around 9:30, and there was quite a long line for tickets. My friend and I got the last 2. Before this I had only seen drag kings, never drag queens, and I was wildly impressed with the level o talent. All of the acts would have been impressive if women had performed them, and the fact that it was men who were doing the splits, hanging from chains, and dancing around, made it incredibly amazing.
The idea of objectification is interesting when talking about drag. With women, seductive dances while wearing a skimpy outfit for an audience can be construed as demeaning, but with drag, maybe partially because society tends to view it as more of a choice-driven rather than necessity-driven activity, the skimpier and sexier they are the more impressive it is, and it never really seems demeaning, only fun and sometimes a bit silly.
At first I was trying to see what the tips were based on, and if different clothes produced different amount of tips, but it seemed fairly arbitrary. The one performer who was a little heavier did seem to get fewer tips than the skinny queen dressed in lingerie, but then other thin acts also received less money. I suppose it just totally depended on how much the audience liked the act.
It’s hard to analyze this performance or really articulate my reaction, other than my astonishment. The lip-synching was some of the best I’ve ever seen, there were a few times when I couldn’t tell whether they were singing or lip-synching, because they did switch back and forth.
Seeing which aspects of the opposite sex drag performers highlight is interesting. For the most part, all of the wigs were long (except in 2 acts), there was tons of makeup, glitter, and jewelry, and also, unless I missed one, all of the in all of the acts the performers wore heels. When the performer was wearing something other than lingerie, they were usually dresses, but there were a few other hot girly outfits as well, including a one-piece sparkly blue suit. Most of the performers were very thin, too. This confirmation of stereotypical “girl” clothes and accessories makes sense, because it is easiest to replicate that which is most widely apparent. But, do drag queens reinforce societal beauty standards by conforming to them in their performance of the female gender, or do they challenge them by positioning themselves as male within the standards?