Two Memorable Drag Queen Movies from the 90’s

[Meghan Brandice]

Who here remembers the two very popular Drag Queen movies of the mid 90’s

To Woo Fong, Thanks for Everything- Julie Newmar; and Priscilla Queen of The Desert?

I went to one en-femme with another CD from my local CD club, and the other one ‘dressed’ with my wife (which I also dressed to see Bird Cage.)

[Anonymous]

A gentile correction Meghan, the title is ‘To Wong Foo…’. Very funny! I never saw the Priscilla Queen movie, yet.

A remake of La Cage aux Folles, Bird Cage is one of the best.

[Alison Anderson]

I’ve seen both at our crossdressing groups. I heard that the release of To Wong Foo was put off a year because of the similarities to Priscilla.

I went dressed to Broadway to see Casa Valentina, a play about crossdressers in the 1960’s in the Catskills, a resort area north of New York City (based on a photo book Casa Sussana).  I also went dressed to see Kinky Boots on Broadway.

[Meghan Brandice]

A crossdresser friend from our CD club used to attend that all weekend resort event at that resort i the Catskills with his wife and two other couples for several years. They had a whole list of events and runway fashion show for attendees

[gloria mundi]

Don’t forget  “Just like a Woman”a 1992 film. Julie Walters and  Adrian Pasdar are charming Thanks for the trip down memory lane , Gloria

[Peggy Sue Williams]

If my memory serves me correctly, there have been a few discussions and at least one article written on CDH about Casa Susanna.

Virginia Prince was known to stay there on weekends in the 1960s.  I have read the lengthy history of Casa Susanna and viewed the photos, and it is a fascinating glimpse into some of the early history our sisters.

[Camryn Occasionnel]

Hi Peggy Sue, I’ve been fascinated by the Casa Susanna story ever since you wrote about it in an article here at CDH. Shortly after, I bought the picture book “Casa Susanna” from Amazon. Of course, as you know, the book is only a collection of photos of the ladies, with no real history.

You say that you’ve read a lengthy history of Casa Susanna. I’d love to read it. Do you remember where you saw it?

— Camryn

[Peggy Sue Williams]

Hi Camryn,

I don’t believe there was ever a detailed “history” ever written, other than the hardback photo book, which, as you know, contains the collection of photos from Casa Susanna.

Nevertheless, there is a significant amount of history on Casa Susanna which is available to research on the internet.  It would probably be a good idea to use three or four different types of search engines and not just limit searching to using Google.  More than likely, this is what I was thinking, when I commented about reading a lengthy history of Casa Susanna.   I apologize if I led you on to any type of misunderstanding.

I had no idea there is a documentary movie out on Casa Susanna.  I don’t have the details, but it appears to be foreign made (2022).

[Camryn Occasionnel]

Thanks, Peggy Sue, I was able to find quite a bit about the documentary movie which came out this year. I hope it finds its way to Amazon one day so I can buy it. If anyone’s interested, I searched Google with “documentary movie about Casa Susanna (2022)” and got some trailers on Youtube, something from hollywoodreporter.com, and tiff.net, whatever that is.

[Amy Catrelle]

The best thing about To Wong Foo… is John Leguizamo going all ‘Rosie Perez’, but I think The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert is a far better film. It has an emotional weight as well as humour, great performances too.

[Anonymous]

Apparently there is a 2022 release of a documentary of Casa Susanna.

[Camryn Occasionnel]

Hi Katie, do you have any details about said 2022 release of a documentary of Casa Susanna?

[Anonymous]

[postquote quote=683624]

Camryn, here is the link. It doesn’t say much.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt21875250/

[Camryn Occasionnel]

Thanks, Katie, also see my reply to Peggy Sue (below).

[Marg Produe]

Hi Meghan,  My wife and I have seen both of the films and have a little different order of preference for viewing.  We usually watch these films on DVD a few times during the year.  Our first pick is always Connie and Carla.  Next is To Wong Foo and then lastly is Priscilla Queen of the Desert.  We also saw Kinky Boots on Broadway like Alison did and it’s very common to hear the sound track playing on my wife’s daily mix.  Thanks for bringing up these great performances.   Marg 

[ChloeC]

Hi Meghan,

Yes, I’ve seen both of those movies, each several times.  I liked Priscilla a little better as has been mentioned here, it seemed a little more nuanced besides, in my opinion a least, exploring three different takes – A full fledged drag queen (Hugo Weaving) who is either attired in drag costumes or genderfluid wear; a transgender, who besides being in drag queen wear, also dresses in fairly feminine clothing at other times and who eventually has (or decides to have) the operation (Terrance Stamp), and a young drag queen (Guy Pearce) who also wears gender fluid attire at other times, besides definite gg clothing and appearance when flirting with those men on that dark street. I’m not sure why that was in there as in many cases situations like that, it can, too often, lead to very bad results.  Perhaps to give him a story as Weaving’s story was trying to reconnect with his son, and Stamp’s story of aging and deciding what his/her future would be.

My concern with To Wong Foo was that the drag queens maintained feminine personas even when they weren’t dressing in drag.  If Ru Paul’s Drag Race is to be taken even slightly seriously that usually isn’t the case.  I do remember one ‘all-star’ show where he interviewed the queens on stage and one acknowledged that they were planning on transitioning. I don’t think many others have done so.

Hugs ChloëC

[Anonymous]

I remember both and have watched each countless times. Another great movie was The Crying Game. If you haven’t seen it it’s worth the watch XOXO

[Author]

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