LY #120 Drag at Disneyland

When I told him I was going to Disneyland, my young colleague Justin Borowsky asked if I was going to do the usual academic "thing:"  go to Disneyland and then write an article deconstructing it.  I told him, "no, I'm not planning to write about Disneyland.   It's been overdone."  It's too easy to write about the links between the Kingdom of the Mouse, capitalism, and post-modernity.  The best known work, of course, is Jean Baudrillard's work on hyper-reality. 

But I have to diverge from my plan to say nothing thoughtful about the magic kingdom because I saw something there that really amazed me:  a drag act!

Drag Daughter and cute young guy

Much has been written about drag, of course, and its contested sphere of performance.  Is it transgressive, as argued by writers from Esther Newton's 1979 Mother Camp to David Halperin's 2012 How to Be Gay?  Or is it just another example of masculine misogyny, as argued by many feminists?  Recent discussions of Ru Paul's Drag Race articulate many people's concerns over the political meaning of drag.  I'll direct those interested to Sarah Tucker Jenkin's master's thesis, Hegemonic "Realness"? An Intersectional Feminist Analysis of RuPaul's Drag Race, and a Slate article by Jordan Alexander Stein, "'Drag Race': Reality TV Feminism."  

But whether it was transgressive or misogynistic or both, it was certainly surprising to witness a drag act at Disneyland.

The act was a short (15 or 20 minute) performance at The Golden Horseshoe in Frontierland.  I was tempted into the theatre by the barker at the door who let passers by know that a show would be starting soon.  I drifted in after hearing that a food purchase wasn't required in order to see the show.  The day and hour I attended the show was performed by The Laughing Stock Company, a Disneyland acting group.  Here is what their website has to say about their shows:

"The Laughing Stock Company is a Frontierland comedy show that performs that performs inside the Golden Horseshoe Saloon on days when Billy Hill is not on the stage, and outside the building (sometimes on the second floor!) when he is. Each show is different and includes a set of zany Wild Western-style characters. A particular favorite of ours is the "find a suitor," where three unsuspecting members of the crowd are selected to answer questions from the Mayor of Frontierland's less-than-handsome daughter (played by a man)."


The performance I saw had that Dating Game structure.  The story is that the Sheriff has decided that he doesn't want to marry the Mayor's ugly daughter so the Mayor and Sheriff grab three men from the audience and encourage the daughter to choose among them.  Many jokes are made about the ugliness of this woman before we see her.  I was getting ready to leave when the "daughter" appeared and I realized I was watching a drag act.   A Youtube video from February 2013 shows that the same set-up as the version I saw but with different actors taking the main roles.   In the version I saw the "daughter of the mayor" was performed by the shorter, more slender actor.  I was also lucky enough to see a version of the act with three very good looking "members of the audience."  In fact, one of the young men was so good looking I wondered if all three were "plants."

Now, I wouldn't have considered this show in any way transgressive but for some of the signs used to indicate the masculinity of the drag character.  These moments are typical in drag shows targeting largely queer audiences.  In the "find a suitor" version that I watched the signifiers included the following:

• the Daughter's voice dropped an octave at one point while stage whispering in the ear of one of the male volunteers.
• when the very good looking volunteer said that his favorite song was "Buffalo Gals," the Daughter said, "I'd come out tonight for you, Sweetie."
• the Daughter stopped a moment as center stage and purposefully adjusted her bust.
• when the youngest volunteer said that his favorite food was chicken the daughter said something like, "Mine too and I could just eat you up."

  In one of the online videed versions of this scene I also heard these references to the "reality" of the daughter's undisplayed gender.  As the mayor talks with one of the audience members he says "Your big burly manly tattooed arms nestling up against her big burly manly tattooed arms."

So, what is the meaning of this Disneyland drag?  Transgressive?  Conservative?  Misogynistic?  A cross-eyed containment of gender identity confusion in late consumer capitalism?

Whatever its meaning, it was funny work by funny men.  I laughed.