Jesse Monteagudo: This review was originally published in Gay Today (Vol. VII Issue 162). It is reprinted with permission from www.gaytoday.com online. Jesse Monteagudo is a freelance writer who lives in South Florida with his life partner. He has had the pleasure of visiting Key West many times. His e-mail address is jessemonteagudo@aol.com online.
Drag Queens at the 801 Cabaret is Leila J. Rupp and Verta Taylor's study of, and homage to, the female impersonators who work at the Bourbon Street Pub in Key West, Florida. Rupp and Taylor, themselves a lesbian couple, wrote what could very well be the definite book about (mostly) gay male female impersonators: their lives in and out of drag, their shows, their politics and, of course, their fabulous gowns. The women even got up in to-die-for wigs, heels and dresses, just so they could experience life as a drag queen.
Though the book follows the 801 Cabaret to the present, it is largely a study of the drag queens who performed there between 1998 and 1999: Sushi, Kylie Jean, Inga, Milla, Margo, RV Beaumont, Scabola Feces, Gugi Gomez and Desiray.
But there is more to the 801 Cabaret than a good show, of course. In Drag Queens at the 801 Cabaret, Rupp and Taylor “suggest that drag as performed at the 801 should be understood not only as a commercial performance but as a political event in which identity is used to contest conventional thinking about gender and sexuality. The drag queens intentionally throw out this challenge, and their performances both create solidarity among gay audience members and draw straight viewers into a world they seldom experience. . . . [D]rag can serve as a catalyst for changes in values, ideas, and identities in twenty-first-century American society.”
The fact that the 801 Cabaret is popular with heterosexuals puts them in the position of minority members in a largely gay venue. And if the straights in the audience don't know they are in a gay bar, the 801 Girls are sure to remind them: “it's a big commitment to go through what clearly is a gay bar downstairs and go up the stairs to the cabaret. . . . Mama, the Brazilian drag queen who hangs out at the 801, insists that straight visitors to Key West are guests on a ‘gay island' and the 801 is ‘not their place,' so they should respect the rules of the game.”
Writers have enjoyed writing about Key West ever since there was a Key West, and queer authors are no different. Songs of the Blind Snowbird and Drag Queens at the 801 Cabaret are worthy additions to this exciting genre. Reading about Key West, though not as good as being there, will whet your appetite and prepare you for the real thing.
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