A (drag) queen is born

Men in evening gowns and women in suits and ties strutted under the moonlight Saturday night as part of the first All-Ivy Drag Competition.

"Drag taps into peoples' souls and allows them to live vicariously through me for a moment," said drag queen Hedda Lettuce, one of the event's two emcees. "For the students here tonight, drag is a diversion from their lives of studying. I'm sure they're all thinking, 'I wish I could be like Hedda, performing so freely, instead of studying.'"

Lettuce and Luster, a drag king, stepped in front of a black backdrop draped with a rainbow gay pride flag just after 11 p.m. Hedda, a blond-wigged drag queen, wore a floor-length black faux fur coat over a long-sleeve avocado-green dress. Luster, a black drag king with short dreadlocks, wore a bright orange suit, an orange hat rimmed with a red and green ribbon and red alligator shoes.

On her pointy Lucite heels, Hedda towered over Luster as they sang and made jokes before introducing the event's judges and outlining the criteria on which competitors would be judged.

To the cheers of hundreds of audience members, President Tilghman, wearing her typical gray suit with a red handbag, stepped onstage and sat down at the judges' table.

Tilghman and the other judges — LGBT Student Services Coordinator Debbie Bazarsky, Associate Dean of Undergraduate Students Thomas Dunne, Butler College Director of Studies Darryl Peterkin and Associate Director for Programs at Frist Campus Center Laurie Hall — were instructed to score contestants on their performances, costumes and entertainment value and talent.

The first two performers were drag queens from Columbia and Penn who stripped to reveal their underwear, which betrayed their masculinity.

Phyllis Dutchess, the queen from Penn, said she was scheduled to do a magic trick, but instead chose to strip. As she peeled off her clothes, students in the audience screamed "Yeah Shirley," hoping to elicit reaction from Tilghman, who barely cracked a smile as she watched the performance.

Support nonprofit student journalism. Donate to the ‘Prince.’ Donate now »

Drag king Jennifer Ruskey '07, dressed as a detective, sprinted across the stage with a magnifying glass and a gun in hand. Impressed by the performance, Hedda said, "In New York City you'd have to pay for this, but here in Princeton you get it for free."

First-time drag queen and Berkeley College design student Tina Broom lip-synched and danced to "Proud Mary" in a shimmering silver dress covered in rhinestones and sequins. She engaged the audience, and was heralded with loud cheers.

The Yale competitors were Bodacia Mambo and Sir Gets-a-Lot, a queen and king who comedically danced to Sir Mix-a-Lot's "Baby Got Back."

They were followed by Olive Bush from Penn, a drag queen who performed a standup comedy act as a trash-talking lesbian comedienne. "I just wanted to come out here and shock people," she said.

Get the best of the ‘Prince’ delivered to your doorstep or inbox. Subscribe now »

Bush elicited looks of disgust from audience members stunned by the vulgarity of her language and discussion of genitalia. Others applauded the act, which was borrowed from the Vagina Monologues and feminist comediennes.

The final performer of the night was Honey Loquacious, a Princeton sophomore. She performed a lap dance for Ruskey and impressed the audience with her flare for walking in white lace-up boots with five-inch heels and two-inch platforms, eliciting a standing ovation from the Princeton audience.

"Everyone's a winner," Tilghman said backstage before leaving the event. "There are no losers."

Two competitors were honored for their performances, though.

Tina Broom was selected as the runner-up drag queen and crowned with a rhinestone tiara and a bouquet of violet roses.

When Honey Loquacious was announced as the winner, the crowd erupted with the excitement of seeing a homegrown winner. "Am I sexy or what?" she asked the crowd, which has watched her win the drag queen competitions at the last two Terrace drag balls.

Honey Loquatious's alter ego, Rachman Blake '07, is a 5'10", 175-pound varsity soccer player and member of Cottage Club.

Blake first dressed in drag in middle school for a traditional drag prank at his New Jersey prep school. But it was not until Princeton and Terrace's drag balls that he realized his flare for drag. "The best reaction I get is when people say, 'You're better off as a woman than as a man,'" he said.

But he said occasional Saturday-night drag on campus is as far as he will go. "This is where I draw the line. I'm looking toward a career in finance and I want to be able to get job," he said.

He added, "A lot of people are so self-conscious that they don't do what they want and get out in front of a crowd. But I overcome that and make the crowd go wild."

Sponsored by LGBT Student Services, the Pride Alliance and the Alcohol Initiative, the event was aimed at making "drag very visible on campus," Bazarsky said.

Terrace Club holds an annual drag ball, but Bazarsky and Pride Alliance Co-Vice President Paul Pawlowski '07 wanted to increase awareness of drag by reaching beyond the University's immediate environs with a competition open to students from other schools. "I was thinking about athletics and the competition and the Ivy League came to mind," Bazarsky said. "It just made sense to make this an Ivy event."