VICE - THE BUSINESS OF DRAG

Ahead of the Soho Premiere of Dressed as a Girl this Sunday, hipsters VICE met up with two of the stars to discuss the business of drag. 

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"I'm going on holiday and I'm happy to say there's no drag in the bag," says East London DJ and drag queen John Sizzle, who is finally giving himself a week off. We're sitting in The Glory, a gay pub in east London co-run by John and fellow performer Jonny Woo. It's lunchtime, and the bar is empty. I was here last Friday night, though, and the room was wall to wall with gays. At a time when London's drag pubs are rapidly closing, The Glory is a success story. But then, that's to be expected – John and Jonny are hard working queens; they might do drag for fun, but they've also built decade-long careers out of it.

These careers are documented in a new film about their lives called Dressed As a Girl. The "frockumentary" – directed by Colin Rothbart – follows six London drag queens: Jonny and John, along with Holestar, Pia, Amber and the controversial (he once spat a milkshake on Nick Grimshaw) Scottee. With a reality TV aesthetic and episodic structure, it ploughs through personal stories of John's HIV diagnosis, Holestar's clinical depression and Jonny's alcoholism, through to their individual "coming out" moments and Amber's gender transition. It does leave you with the feeling that all drag queens' lives are plagued with negative drama, but despite that, it's still a brilliantly camp and amusing documentary, which captures a critical moment in London's drag history on camera.

READ THE FULL STORY HERE