The examples and perspective in this article may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. (June 2024) |
Female impersonation is a type of theatrical performance where a man dresses in women's clothing for the sole purpose of entertaining an audience.[1] While the term female impersonator is sometimes used interchangeably with drag queen, they are not the same. Drag as an art form is associated with queer identity whereas female impersonation may come from a wide a range of gender identity paradigms, including heteronormativity. Additionally, many drag artists view drag as a lived form of self-expression or creativity, and perceive drag as something that is not limited to the stage or to performance. In contrast, female impersonation is specifically limited to performance and may or may not involve an LGBTQI point of view.[1]
United States edit
The term female impersonator was in wide use during the 19th century in theater in the United States to refer to a specific type of performer in minstrel shows and later vaudeville known as "wench" and "dame" roles. These roles were performed by both cisgender heterosexual men,[2] and by queer men who were closeted and in some rare cases openly non-heterosexual.[3] In the 19th century and early 20th century minstrel show female impersonators did not attempt to present the illusion of femininity, but rather lampooned cisgender women through a comic representation of women that did not attempt to completely remove the actor's masculine physical traits. Minstrel show female impersonators often employed sexist and racist stereotypes within bawdy humor to make fun of women, often in black women, in blackface. While this type of humor continued on the vaudeville and burlesque stage, near the end of the 19th century a new type of female impersonation, the female illusionist, began to appear in vaudeville. This type of performer did not use humor to denigrate women, but rather attempted to celebrate women by presenting a realistic looking woman in tasteful fashions of the period.[4]
In the twentieth century some cross-gender impersonators, both female and male, in the United States became highly successful performing artists in nightclubs and theaters. There was a concerted effort by these working female impersonators in America, to separate the art of female impersonation from queer identity with an overt representation of working female impersonators as heterosexual. Some of the performers were in fact cisgender men, but others were closeted due to the politics and social environment of the period. It was criminal in many American cities to be homosexual, or for LGBTQ people to congregate, and it was therefore necessary for female impersonators to distance themselves from identifying as queer in order to avoid criminal charges. The need to hide queer identity was prevalent among female impersonators working in non-LGBTQ nightclubs before heteronormative audiences from the early 1900s to as late as the 1970s.[5]
See also edit
References edit
- ^ a b French, Sarah. Staging Queer Feminism. Palgrave Macmillan UK. p. 94. ISBN 9781137465436.
- ^ Fisher, James (2021). Historical Dictionary of Contemporary American Theater. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. p. 331. ISBN 9781538123027.
- ^ Boag, Peter (2012). "Chapter 2: "I Have Done My Part In Winning the West": Unveiling the Female to Male Crossdresser". Re-Dressing America’s Frontier Past. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520274426.
- ^ "Gender Crossings; Female Impersonations In American Entertainment". Queering the Popular Pitch. Taylor & Francis. 2013. ISBN 9781136093708.
- ^ Goodman, Elyssa Maxx (2023). "Chapter 4". Glitter and Concrete: A Cultural History of Drag in New York City. Hanover Square Press. ISBN 9780369733016.