The old drag queen is dead; long live the new drag queen. As Jason Donovan dons a frock this week in the stage version of Priscilla Queen of the Desert, cabarets and clubs across Britain are dispensing with “old school” drag artists in their thick make-up, grandiose wigs and extravagant outfits. They are being replaced by a new generation of sassy and sophisticated young men in make-up who are rejecting the “misogyny” of the grotesque female impersonator.

It is a trend paralleled in the mainstream: Paul O’Grady, who gave life to the caustic Liverpudlian Lily Savage, has doffed his wig; Danny La Rue is long gone, and no one seems to be in the wings to take up their mantle.

And while wearing make-up and women’s clothes has been a springboard for a number of entertainers, they have tended to scale back their cross-dressing once established. Eddie Izzard, well known as a transvestite, now rarely appears publicly in women’s clothes and is increasingly known for his straight acting. Julian Clary, who used to perform as the drag artist Gillian Pie-Face, is these days much more likely to be seen in a sharp men’s suit and tie.

See End of the road for old-school drag queens

For GLBT students in London, it must have been a romantic dream come true to see their lives and feelings depicted on the stage in a work pf passion and sweeping poetry authored by none other than William Shakespeare.

For others, however, the idea of a gay version of “Romeo and Juliet” called “Romeo and Julian” is “political correctness gone mad.”

The play was adapted by the London high schoolers in January for LGTB History Month.

But the kids’ playful reinterpretation of a timeless classic to pertain to their own lives ruffled some feathers, reported The Hindustan Times in a Feb. 28 article. See Gay Take on Shakespeare Sets Off UK Row

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