#Sparkle tights ass plus

Do you plan to write more?Įlsa: I’m waiting for some people to die before I can safely write my memoirs, darling. I see that you also have written a book, Urban Etiquette: Marvelous Manners for the Modern Metropolis.

In other words, t ip your drag performers, LOL! And go out and support queer venues and artists! Or they’ll all disappear. Darling, even Ru Paul is out here fracking to make ends meet! So you know local drag artists are struggling! Look around: Queer nightlife venues are struggling! Queer performance venues are struggling! Things are expensive. I am a co-host and co-producer of a popular weekly bar show, the Monster Show, but there are occasional very slow nights when I’m going into my own pocket to pay our performers. But I still do occasional gigs where if I factor in the cost of my Lyft and supplies, I realize I spent more than I made, honey.

Seriously, I think from the outside, maybe it may seem like drag performers make more than they actually do … because one element of some drag performance is making the cheap look fabulous - creating a diva fantasy with a borrowed wig, a dress from a thrift store, and $15 worth of costume jewelry. And, you know, like most other drag performers, I have a sick and unquenchable thirst for attention of any kind! No one should get into doing drag in the hopes that it will make them a lot of money! And that’s not why I do it. And those above-average gigs are available only on the weekends, and the competition for them is fierce - and even if you get the gig, that $300 includes tips, and those aren’t guaranteed.

#Sparkle tights ass plus

Plus you spent $30 on your Lyft to and from the club, and you have to use supplies that need to be purchased or that take time to make: wigs, costumes, makeup, hairspray, tights, and so on. You may also have to practice the number for at least a couple of hours, so say the gig took a minimum of six hours of your life. But that gig requires being at the club for two hours, and you spent at least two hours getting into drag.

Let’s talk about it: $300 is a decent amount to take home from a nightclub gig: that’s booking fee plus tips … I’ll say $300 is an above-average night at the club for a local drag artist like me. And drag takes a lot of time - we get paid for performing, but when I factor in the two to three hours it takes me to get into drag, the hourly rate isn’t always great. The typical nightlife gigs are not lucrative or frequent enough, when you factor in the expense of doing drag. And I do really enjoy those gigs! But that’s only two months of the year. If every month were as booked for me as June and December are, I could keep the lights on solely with drag - I do a good business in corporate Pride parties in June and then holiday parties in December, as well as private parties. River Joy, Robby Kendall and Elsa at the trailer viewing party of Robbie’s newest film Sweet Nothing which Elsa also acted in.ĭo you have a day job or are you able to do this full-time?Įlsa: I t’s very difficult to make a full-time living from drag! I wish I could. Where the feminine, faggy parts of my spirit are celebrated. And I spent the next 15 years of my adult life dealing with and discarding all that bullshit and baggage that society had put on me, and dealing with the misogyny and femme-phobia of the gay community as well, before I even got to drag. And I’d heard this all my life I’d always been the “class sissy.” So then I heard it from a director in San Francisco, of all places… at a time when I hadn’t worked through my own self-hatred, my own internal homophobia - the poison that so many queer people absorb from their environments. (Which may have been a lot of the appeal, for me, actually.) And, side note, meanwhile I was going off and doing LSD in the woods with my friends every weekend, so I doubt that those little plays had much effect on anyone.īut then as a young man, I was discouraged from pursuing acting this was the 1990s, and I had someone tell me that, in short, I was just too gay to be believable on stage as, like, a human man. There may have been green tights involved. I cringe to imagine: We were called the Harlequins. I was part of a high school “improv” group that went around to elementary schools and did - excruciating I am sure - little plays about, like, the joys of saying no to drugs. I wanted to be an actor when I was young. What is your background in acting?Įlsa: Well, thank you. Elsa Touche gazes out the window at The Lookout.īAS: Your shows are really funny and I love that Elsa has the ability to create humor out of any situation.