Bloke in a Dress!

A recent post over at the Scaryduck blog about the sad passing of Ryan Minogue the hamster reminded me of part of my past that I'd blocked out - possibly to prevent post-traumatic stress.

Many years ago I was a young aspiring actor, and one of the traditions at the college I was attending was to put on a (very) adult review show at Christmas once the pubs had chucked out. The show was mostly an opportunity to take the piss out of the college staff, the audience were too drunk to care about the quality and that was to everyones advantage.

One of the skits that I was involved in was a drag act, based on three of the lecturers, which was irreverent, insulting, libellous and disgusting. Dressed in glittery dresses and caked in make-up we came on, sang parodies of "Sisters" and an incredilby filthy version of "Boogie-Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B" and indulged in a bit of banter which mainly revolved around sex toys and unnatural acts with animals.

By all accounts they loved it. One even asked if anyone had taped it.

We were particularly proud of our drag names:

Bertha Fanation (me)
Barbara de Seville
and
Shirley Shum-Mishtake