[Music] from underground clubs and theater shows to global superstardom drag has been around for centuries every era and every new iteration of the art form has been crucial to the shape and success of drag today however if we want to learn about drag's current unprecedented visibility and acceptance rupaul's drag race it's important to look at where it came from and to do so we also need to be looking into queer and racial contexts drag history goes all the way back to ancient egypt where artifacts of reliefs and carvings depict cleopatra dressed as a male pharaoh with the male double crown queen hatshepsut was also often represented without breasts in male clothing and with a full beard many historians believe that this early form of cross-dressing was a way for these queens to assert their power and claim to the throne then in ancient greece we see the birth of early theatre where female roles were performed by men as women were classed as inferior and therefore unfit for the stage plato and socrates were even worried about the damaging effects of male actors degrading themselves by representing female emotions and characteristics then during the middle ages in europe the christian church continued the tradition of banning women on stage and so acting was still exclusively reserved for men who would also play female roles even when western theatre became less religious women were still banned from the stage and to find a woman acting in public would have been shocking and defensive in 17th century japan the art form of kabuki became popular which featured female impersonators showcasing intricate makeup falsetto voices and feminine movement at this time shakespeare was also rising to prominence and the first appearances of his most iconic female characters like lady macbeth and juliet were all believed to be first portrayed by men in fact it is from the theater that the term drag is believed to have originated this is because when men played female parts they observed how their costume dresses would drag across the floor in the roaring 20s drag shifted from an ensemble performance to an individual form of entertainment known as vaudeville the genre involved female impersonation combined with comedy music dance and burlesque to create an offbeat type of live entertainment it was through vaudeville that the first official well-known drag queen came to exist julian l tinge who became the highest paid actor in the world at the time surpassing even charlie chaplin eltinged fought against the homosexual panic by removing his wig to reveal his gender to the crowd as to not full audiences ladies and gentlemen well here i am back in hollywood making my first talking picture this led to the famous pansy craze when the united states entered the prohibition era which abolished alcohol production and consumption from 1920 until 1933 gay men used the underground clubs and speak easies as an opportunity to express and enjoy themselves out of the sight of the law gay men and women felt free to be themselves in the underground prohibition scene alcohol brought people together but prohibition gathered them in new combinations suddenly when everyone was on the search for newly illegal alcohol black and white gay and lesbian life came into contact with one another and dominant society and for a while dominance society loved it drag flourished in madison square garden greenwich village and at its most vibrant in harlem where the hamilton ball lodge drew crowds of thousands to marvel at drag queens there were even drag kings like openly bisexual gladys fatso bentley who played piano and sang explicit songs while wearing a white tux and hat this openness was short-lived as by the mid-1930s prohibition had been repealed and the spaces in which queer life thrived became increasingly policed and stigmatized new york city banned female impersonation and the growing popularity of movies and radio saw the end of vaudeville this backlash became even stronger after world war ii when a family-centric heteronormative culture intensified the age of conformity the 1950s this saw the creation of the problematic homophile movement in which white and middle class members of the gay community distanced themselves from drag queens and transgender people in an attempt to assimilate into mainstream society to the 60s female impersonation was given a comedic edge cross-dressing was portrayed in film and tv as a punchline or something unsettling like an alfred hitchcock's psycho in which a deranged man dresses as his mother to murder his victims however there were still drag acts who broke through the negativity and had successful careers like dame edna everest [Applause] who first appeared in the 1960s as a drab housewife poking fun at australia's boring conservative suburbia much to society's dismay it wasn't until she became a dame that she finally won their favor totally there's no offences just if i forget your name drag queens of the 60s weren't just at odds with mainstream society as internal conflicts and the racial tension in the community also grew i would not know i have been beaten i have had my nose broken i have been thrown in jail i have lost my job i have lost my apartment for gay liberation and you all treat me this way think about that as immortalized in the 1968 documentary the queen when a major drag beauty pageant passed over african-american crystal la basia for the white blonde harlow labasia stormed off stage and passionately denounced the drag scene's perverse habit of rewarding white queens at the expense of queens of color missy hi guys don't say she's not beautiful but she wasn't looking beautiful tonight she doesn't equal me look at her makeup it's terrible oddly enough it would be the new york mafia who would covertly give the drag queens and gay community an outlet by purchasing the stonewall inn which would then become a hub of gay culture it was a riot at this very location that would see all members of the community unite against the police and stigmatization of queer americans it was drag queens and transgender patrons like marsha p johnson who threw stones ashtrays or coffee cups marsha p johnson was the rosa parks of the lgbt movement i want my game right now galvanizing the gay community against their oppressors and leading to the creation of the gay liberation front stonewall marsh and i fought the cops off we were in the streets turning off cars the movement started the next day in fact just one year later on the anniversary of the stonewall riots was the first gay pride [Music] inspired by new york's example activists in other cities organized gay pride celebrations eventually inspiring the world to take a stand the fight for acceptance and equality grew in profile over the 1970s with harvey milk becoming the first openly gay man to be voted into public office in san francisco in 1977. drag culture seemed to slowly fold into mainstream society with such drag and gender-bending performances by actor tim curry in 1975's rocky horror picture show and the aesthetic stylings of musician david bowie at this time drag pageants evolved into drag balls these iconic underground events featured later in the 1990 documentary paris's burning the balls became a place namely for queer people of color to walk the runway emulating parts of mainstream society of which they were still largely excluded from in a ballroom you can be anything you want you're not really an executive but you're looking like an executive and therefore you're showing the straight world that i can be an executive seasoned drag queens became drag mothers who would form houses where they would take up-and-coming drag artists under their wing and provide them with a home and it's important to me to be the mother because there's so many little kids that i have to look out for the mother used to become the mother because she's usually the best one out of the group in the 80s balls and houses were especially crucial to the gay struggle during the aids crisis as americans started getting sick and dying spread in many cases through unprotected sex aids ravaged the gay community once again mainstream society's homophobia had been turbocharged the three people that get this have died and i wonder if the president isn't aware i don't have it and so the gay community supported themselves there was community every other sunday there was a party on ward 5b house mothers educated their offspring about safe sex and provided healing for the deep emotional trauma of those living with aids drag queens and queer spaces provided to the queer community what straight society would not protection love and care drag icon divine starred in many movies by the director john waters well i first saw divine and i just thought raw beauty uh to me duty has looks that you can never forget and i've walked down the street with divine and seen car accidents happen the 300-pound drag queen who gave no [ __ ] notoriously consumed dog [ __ ] on camera tomorrow you have to eat the dog oh this is great he wasn't kidding she ate dog [ __ ] they were able to market the movie do you know this queen eats dog [ __ ] everyone sat in those seats waiting for that scene which doesn't come till the end was done for anarchy and it worked as anarchy the watermelon spread and then it spread all over the country as my father later said yeah i like cancer he even played edna turnblad in the original version of hairspray and is thought to have been the inspiration behind ursula from the little mermaid this shock value was contagious and fed into the explosively experimental manhattan east village performance scene and its annual wig stock drag festival created by lady bunny another drag icon who challenged audiences to laugh with her and laugh at her the consummate skill of a professional female impersonator by the 1990s the world was ready to make drag queens more mainstream than ever before this decade also saw the discovery of none other than rupaul charles who would change the history of drag in the modern age his hit 1993 single supermodel you better work catapulted rupaul now people are busting but now you know the pendulum swung so far to the right it's gonna come crashing back to the left okay who soon after became the first drag queen to ever become a spokesperson for a major cosmetics company with matt cosmetics as the new face of max do you think the average woman is really going to be able to relate to you i think so i think rupaul speaks to the individual in in everyone and a morning radio show as more drag queens came out of the shadows mainstream media continued to paint more portraits of female impersonation but there was a notable shift drag queens became less of a punchline and new movies like the adventures of priscilla queen of the desert depicted drag queens in a more flattering light in 2009 rupaul premiered his reality competition series rupaul's drag race audiences all over the world were now able to see the best queens america had to offer in the comfort of their own homes on a weekly basis over 100 contestants have appeared on the show frequently bringing with them conversations about issues that affect the lgbtq plus community like hiv i've been living with hiv for the last two years of my life gender identity a transgendered woman mental health and relationships for all to see today drag queens are able to build incredible followings via social media live performances youtube podcasts netflix specials fashion appearances and more but some of the community's biggest issues still remain for example drag race has been critiqued for giving queens of color less praise than their white contestants and these queens are also often targeted by internet trolls due to their ethnicity the show has also been critiqued for pushing a narrow representation of what drag is for example celebrating queens that are hyper feminine and not casting any drag kings i want to see more diversity on the show and i think by having more stories on the show is going to connect even more people ultimately we need to acknowledge what drag race has done for drag but continue to evolve beyond and outside of the show in 2018 shows like pose and dragula started to emerge representing drag before drag race and also different styles of drag drag culture has a complex history and is made clear by this video it is almost impossible to do it justice and i have undoubtedly not covered everything drag has existed long before drag race and will continue to exist long after the show has definitely helped push drag into mainstream pop culture but now that it's in the spotlight representation of diversity needs to continue to expand rupal often says how drag is less about gender and more about mocking identity and parodying society hello my name is katie [Laughter] laughing at ourselves and inviting others to break free and do the same thanks for watching and feel free to comment below any moments in drag history i've missed and to learn more about drag check out my blog linked in the bio thanks guys you