Drag King Beauty Is Ready to Take Center Stage
When it comes to historical royalty, kings take up a considerable amount of space. But if we're talking about drag royalty, more often than not it's all about the queens. Drag kings have occupied modern queer spaces just as long as the former, taking part in the 1969 Stonewall riots and becoming mainstays in the club scenes at historic lesbian bars like Cubby Hole and Henrietta Hudson throughout the '80s and '90s. You may have even seen them on television, with "The L Word" character Ivan Aycock appearing opposite Pam Grier in the early 2000s. Nonetheless, despite devoting decades to drag excellence, kings seldom earn the same praises — both in mainstream media, online, or in the drag community — as their sisters.
If you assumed drag kings receive less attention because they're not as fabulous as their queen counterparts, you'd be mistaken. The transformation also involves artistry, imagination, and makeup, but it's not one in the same. Whether they're drawing on a contour or painting on a beard, the kings of today are defying convention across the board. Here's how.
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"Who's to say what's typically masculine or feminine anyway?" says HercuSleaze, a Montreal-based drag king. "You can recognize the fluidity of all of this when you start to deconstruct the gender norms. Kings of today, as well as drag creatures, drag clowns, drag queens, and everyone else are having a lot of fun going between these realms."