Boys and Their Dresses

Drag has always been about beautiful costumes, colour and movement but recently there has been a tremor in the force. A new ingredient has been added to the mix. Drag is under going a revival. I’m amazed, and that’s no easy thing these days, by the number of boys who like to “frock” up. If I had been asked in the early 90’s did I think Drag would survive? I would have shaken my head and knowingly pontificated that, “The young ‘Gaylings’ have moved on and Drag has had its day, like the rotary dial telephone”.

How wrong I would have been.

A potted history - Drag came of age in Sydney in the 60’s and flourished through until the early 90’s. Most of the performers, especially in the 80’s were “professional” full time live in a frock and grow your hair long kind of DQ’s. When Drag moved off the revolve and out of the proscenium arch of Cap’s and onto the bar of The Albury I was convinced that this was the beginning of the end of “the Show”. The great production shows of Mitchell and Penfold that had theme and story were now replaced with a succession of spot numbers. Oh sure a few of the shows were still held together with a storyline, like The Priscilla Show, but mainly they became a pastiche of star turns.

With the closure of The Albury, Oxford Street lost some of its glitter and Drag seemed to disappear and for a while it went into a form of stasis, waiting for the next wave of gender bending, in-your face entertainers that we have today. Little did Miss 3D and Cindy Pastel know what they had begun or perhaps they did.

Drag is back, bigger and better than anything we’ve seen for a long time.

These days it seems as if every pretty and some not so pretty boy is tarting up his visage with taffeta, toile, mascara and makeup, then hitting the boards and the bars to dance, mime and even sing LIVE. The world has gone brilliantly mad.

Sequins and glamour are back and it’s wonderful to see. Choreography is queen and high heels are “strutting” their stuff up and down the tiles of a battered and bruised Oxford Street. Whether it is a career choice or a casual dalliance Drag is wowing them again in the bars of Sydney. Performers like Prada Clutch, Tora Hymenand Trevor Ashleyare the Aeysha, Rose and Michael Michelle of the new generation.

Heading this pantheon of impersonators is the wonderful and very talented Courtney Act, a former contestant on Australian Idol, who now also spruiks make up to a frightened and confused Larry Emdur on breakfast television. Courtney has made Drag fashionable, fantastic and feminine again. Courtney by night and Shane by day is leading a parade of “glamazons” who are proud to embrace the history of Drag gone by and create the myths of tomorrow.

As post party Sydney drags it’s aching head reluctantly into recession and winter, isn’t it great to see splashes of rainbow colour reflecting from the sequins and once again lighting up the pavement of Oxford Street.

The Golden Mile is getting a little of its glitter back.