By Karen Parr-Moody

CLARKSVILLE, Tenn. – With names like Anna Freeze and DixieNormus opening the Spring Drag Show at Austin Peay State University, you know it’s going to be fierce. These two gals will step on stage in their stilettos at 7 p.m. Friday, April 11 at Clement Auditorium.

Tickets are $7 at the door and proceeds will go to the overall mission of the university’s Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA). The GSA is partnering with the African American Student Association for this event.

“People who aren’t familiar with drag don’t realize that it’s such an artistic performance,” said Jess Brundige, the public relations officer for the APSU GSA and co-chair of the GSA Drag Show Committee.

“In fact, it’s one of the oldest forms of performance art,” he added. “The drag performers you’ll see Friday night are carrying on a tradition that goes all the way back to ancient Greece.”

Dani Hunter is the vice president of the GSA and co-chair for the GSA Drag Show Committee. She says drag shows are a “brilliant” way to share information with the public about the GSA.

“Drag has a power that some individuals lack, and that is the power to break down boundaries, to reach outside what society considers normal,” she said.

Hunter said that her organization’s goal is “to be able to build a stronger sense of community for those who identify within the LGBTQIA group, and then connect that community with the general body.”

(The acronym LGBTQIA can have fine nuances in its definition, depending on who you ask, but generally stands for “lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning, intersex, and asexual.”)

Hunter said her favorite part of drag shows is how the drag queens interact with the audience as performers, just like any other type of performer, from musicians to actors.

“Nothing makes my night quite like when the performer makes jokes with the room, sings to someone in the audience, or plays around with the audience in general,” she said.

Karen Parr-Moody began a career as a New York journalist, working as a fashion reporter for Women’s Wear Daily, a beauty editor for Young Miss and a beauty and fashion writer for both In Style and People magazines. Regionally, she has been a writer at The Leaf-Chronicle newspaper and currently writes about arts and culture for Nashville Arts magazine each month.