BY SCOTT STIFFLER | If you’re a gay man with access to a shower and a penchant for covering showy show tunes therewithin—a sizable demographic if ever there was one—you’ve likely found yourself belting out the work of Oscar, Golden Globe, and Grammy Award-winner Howard Ashman, lyricist of Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, […]
Whether you believe it’s the work of kismet, karma, or plain old coincidence, one thing is certain: December 2’s Throwback Thursday is a totally tubular time to view 80’s Ladies II: The Mixtape. This live event starring RuPaul’s Drag Race contestants Mrs. Kasha Davis and Darienne lake (Seasons 7 and 6, respectively) is the follow-up […]
BY SCOTT STIFFLER | If life were a library with a room reserved for drag queens whose backstory didn’t have enough conflict, trauma, or excess to merit a Lifetime channel movie pitch meeting, three things are certain: One, it would be a very small room. Two, the reads would be real snoozers. And three, Tina […]
BY SCOTT STIFFLER with PHOTOS COURTESY OF ABRACADABRA | Some work in a world where illusions are created with the skilled use of misdirection—while others work in a world where they work with someone named “Miss Direction.” Now, the seemingly disparate worlds of magic and drag have found common ground in an online form that, […]
Scarlet Envy—the Louisville, KY native, favorite daughter of NYC, and RuPaul’s Drag Race All-Stars Season 6 contestant (whose exit left us feeling very “uncomfortable” with the show’s host)—offers Gothamites an intimate performance made accessible to worldwide audiences, when she brings her solo show ALLSTAR to the comfy confines of Lower East Side venue Caveat. Last seen […]
BY SCOTT STIFFLER | A quarter century ago—a little more than 12 years before a contestant nicknamed “Porkchop” became the first of her kind to “sashay away”—Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood was dotted with well over a dozen gay watering holes. Long gone bars with names like Splash, Rawhide, Champs, and G Lounge were the immobile mobile […]
BY SCOTT STIFFLER When onetime triumphant Shark Tank contestant Brandon Fay chose a decidedly compact Seventh Ave./W. 21st St. storefront as the downtown dispensary for his exceptionally good pizza and pasta, it was another gutsy move that paid off big-time… in due time, that is. Pasta by Hudson’s Chelsea location opened in November 2020—a […]
BY SCOTT STIFFLER | Located in the heart of Greenwich Village, not-so-straight across from The Stonewall Inn, steeped-in-history soul sister The Monster Bar ushers in a new era this weekend, when its Sunday afternoon Tea Dance returns from a long, pandemic-compelled closure. “Join us in the disco for dancing and socializing and bar service and […]
BY MICHAEL MUSTO | Having done a list of “Celebrities I’ve Met” and included some drag performers in it, let me go full feather boa and do a rundown of just the drag queens—creatures who live their dream while enlivening the nightlife on a regular basis. (And yes, there will be nightlife again.) There are […]
BY MICHAEL MUSTO | I love a good drag name because it not only encompasses clever wordplay, but it can also be refreshingly incorrect, because it’s only a name, after all, and drag queens are supposed to shake up societal norms. I’ve written for years about the best drag names, and now I’ve dreamed up […]