Competition pits Ivies in a battle of the drag

Drag queens and kings from across the Northeast will compete for laurels in Saturday night's first-ever All-Ivy Drag Competition, held on campus and judged by President Tilghman and other administrators.

"Having never attended such a competition, I have no expectations, just interest and curiosity," Tilghman said.

The event, organized by Pride Alliance co-Vice President Paul Pawlowski '07, will feature up to 10 students from Yale University, the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University, Berkeley College in New Jersey.

The contestants will perform for five minutes in cross-gendered apparel on Frist South Lawn, and then answer questions in the style of a Miss America pageant.

Judges include LGBT Student Services Coordinator Debbie Bazarsky, who is helping to plan the event, as well as Tilghman, Associate Dean of Undergraduate Students Thomas Dunne, Associate Director for Programs at Frist Campus Center Laurie Hall and Butler College Director of Studies Darryl Peterkin.

The night will be emceed by professional cross-dressers Luster, a drag king from Ohio, and Hedda Lettuce, who is, according to her website, "the premiere drag comedienne/singer in the country." The duo will perform the opening and closing acts of the event.

Princeton's representatives — drag queen Rachman Blake '07, or "Honey Loquacious," and drag king Jennifer Ruskey '07 — earned their spots after winning the drag ball held at Terrace Club in October.

Blake "is an amazing dancer and just has the body of a goddess and is an amazing performer," Pawlowski said. "And Jenn really was able to embody the male gender identity amazingly well and was a great performer as well."

Blake vowed that his outfit would "redefine what it means to be scandalous."

"It's going to be a valiant return of the new and improved Honey Loquacious," he said.

Dressing up in drag can be a form of escape, Blake said.

"I love the attention," he said. "It's not very often you get to show your curves off. I love to dance also, and people say that I usually dance very provocatively and sexually, and I get to do that more when I dress as a woman."

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Ruskey is more intrigued by the concept of drag as a means of reinventing herself — not only her look, but her entire character as well.

"I'm just a big dresser-upper anyways, and it's like the pinnacle of dressing up, of costumes, of changing your identity," she said. "I'm always interested in creating characters and creating narratives."

Ruskey emphasized the ill-defined nature of the drag king as compared with the drag queen.

"There's not so much of a template for the drag king to follow," she said. As a result, "you have to come up with your own idea of what a drag king is and what that looks like."

Looking ahead to Saturday's competition, Ruskey is eager to see the identities that other drag kings have constructed.

"I'm most looking forward to seeing the competitors from the other schools. I'm really excited," she said.

The event coincides with the April Hosting Weekend, and Pawlowski said he hopes it will help prefrosh "understand and realize that there's an active queer community on campus."

He anticipates that the competition will "bring people from all walks of life to come and enjoy a great show by some amazing performers."