A Dainty Fish in a Small Comedy Pageant

Yoohooooo~
It’s me, Flaminia. What’d you do this weekend?
That’s a rhetorical question of course. This blog doesn’t have a comments section.

I competed in the Mx. Chez Comedy Legends pageant! Last year when I was just an audience member for the pageant it became an instant favorite of mine. For those of you that have never been (I’m so sorry for your loss), I’ll explain how the pageant works. It’s split up into three sections.

Talent: Do literally whatever you want for 5 minutes, just make it funny.

Reading: Insult comedy. The gay version of a roast.

Runway Interview: Walk around in a silly outfit while a voiceover plays of you answering a pageant question.

I’ll try my best to go through the night from POV, Flaminia. I’ll even give you some juicy insight you can’t get anywhere else ;)

When I was painting my face for the pageant I thought, oh boy I’m really gonna camp it up today. Lavender eyeshadow, and an intense bold lip and red blush. I am just too pretty for my own good though, because I ended up looking like a glamorous editorial model instead of a gaudy clown. Especially compared to my castmates who mostly look like gaudy clowns anyways.

I spent like 40 dollars total on my package for this pageant. Everything I’m wearing in this picture are clothes I already owned. This jacket and matching white purse (not pictured) were hand me downs from my (biological, not drag) mother. The ill-fitting pink bra is a hand me down from my (biological) sister. The tank top is just a regular tank top I have a dozen of. I wanted it to be lower cut, so I took a pair of scissors and cut it lower. My hair and body parts were admittedly much more expensive, but I bought those years ago and have worn them countless times since.

I got ready way too early like I usually do, and I forgot something at home like I usually do. On the bright side it’s nice to be the first one there because I get to see what everyone else comes up with. Frizzie Borden and my (drag) sister Rory Roux Lay arrived with fabulously ridiculous ensembles. Frizzie brought a colorful painted cardboard dress complete with cardboard wig. As you all know, I’m a big fan of paper dolls so I loved this design. Rory came with a giant white paper machete astronout helmet, but on closer inspection I noticed a certain famous painting glued to the sides of it. She was the pearl with the girl earrings. Ugh her mind. I was looking forward to meeting Egg, she had been posting about all the work she put into her costumes. Unfortunately, she was sick and couldn’t make it.

Kiki and Giganta, two of the three judges for the night, had arrived. My (drag) mother, Mia was MIA though. Enigma got a text from her at around 8 PM with an out of drag selfie saying she had just woken up. Good for her! She wasn’t in drag when she got to the Chez, but she was happy and well rested. She’s at a hectic time in her life right now and has given far too much of herself for this art form for too long. I’ve felt burnout doing a fraction of the work that she does. It’s great to always do our best and challenge ourselves, but we need to go at a sustainable pace. I would rather see Mia out of drag and happy than in drag and exhausted. She laughed so much that night. Even with the full bar I could hear her laugh at every joke.

Up first was the talent portion. Which I didn’t realize. I thought reading was first!

“Did you read the email, diva?” asked the lovely hostess and organizetress Enigma. I had skimmed it.

For my talent I wanted to show off a skill I’ve had for years but is completely impractical to bring to the stage. Dance Dance Revolution. I never went to dance classes as a kid, because I was self-conscious about being too openly fruity. DDR was something I could do in private. Just me and my (biological) sister. I started playing at 6 years old. Now when I play it at arcades, I usually end up with crowds of strangers watching. Of course, playing at an arcade is not the same as playing with 10 pounds of makeup and silicon on with the screen 50 feet away. I set up an actual play station 2 at the chez. Something that’s never been done before and should never be done again! John Pepe, the owner of the bar, was amused but not surprised. He’s pretty used to my shenanigans at this point. I had the PS2 working perfectly… almost. I missed one wire. Which led to a delay that threw me a bit off balance. Then I couldn’t find the song that I planned on doing, a fast one with a lot of jumps that would have been more of a spectacle.

I stand by that it was a good idea, but there were some rough edges to the execution that could have been sanded out with more rehearsal. There’s not a single show that turns out the way it goes in your head. Some things will be better, some things will be worse. All that really matters is that you learned from it. There are a lot of things I would have done differently for the talent. It was still fun, and I rolled with the punches. Doing not my best the first round took off a lot of the pressure for the next two sections!

Next was the reading portion, I was so sweaty and winded from the talent portion, but so ready for this. We were put into groups for reading, and the minimum requirement was to have at least one joke for everyone in your group. I went last and loooved hearing the jokes about myself. Frizzie applauded me for my community service work… dating the elderly. My goals with the reads were to make the jokes flow from one to the next like a monologue, and to make jokes that were biting, but poked more fun at the persona than the person. Here's the monologue if you wanna read it, I’m not sure if anyone got video but I’ll edit that in later if there is.

Disclaimer: this was a 21+ event at a bar so some of the jokes are on the raunchier side. Discretion advised blah blah whatever.

“It’s so great to be here with my Chez Est family. A family full of love, petty fighting, and incest. Like Robin Fierce always says, you can’t spell family without ‘u’ and ‘me’. Robin’s not dumb though, just bad at spelling. Perry’s dumb. Perry is so dumb the doctors didn’t even bother giving him an IQ test. Just gave him a cube and counted how many times he tried putting it in the circle and triangle holes. Speaking of people that have had trouble with fitting in because of holes, Frizzie’s here tonight. Frizzie, some people say you don’t belong in the drag community because you’re a woman. I think that’s terrible. You don’t belong here because you were clearly meant to be a horse girl.”

Had to pause for a while after that joke because the audience lost it, but then I continued.

“I can see how you got confused. Instead of giving apples to ponies named Cinnamon, you gave dollar bills to Clydesdales named Midnight. We’re so lucky to have someone as kind as you. You were the only one that went with Bebe Gallini when they sent her to the glue factory. Rory’s kind too. Did you know she does charity? She sends pictures of her sewing room to children in Bangladesh, so they feel less bad about the sweatshops they work in.”

Then I moved onto the judges. “Speaking of sweatshops, hi Mia! I’m Mia’s first drag daughter, and if I’m not careful about what I say tonight I’ll be her umpteenth abortion. Giganta knows all about abortions. She had so many that planned parenthood had to tell her to get lost and get swallowing. She was a size 2 back then. Who could forget our last judge?”

A pondering pause, “I could! Moving on.”

I had some nice shorter reads for the other competitors. “Maddie Triss is desperately chasing her dreams… keep trying. Maybe someday I’ll sleep with you. And Glass Staine, keep doing what you’re doing and your dreams will come true too. You can end up on a federal watchlist. Ethel doesn’t have to chase her dreams, she just pays poachers to do that for her. It’s too bad Egg couldn’t make it tonight, I heard she’s a great chef. I’m a little nervous to try food made from trans fats though.”

I finished by reading last years winners “Indica and Sativa will try anything once they’ve had a roach. And their home is full of roaches! Indica and Sativa, maybe you should try a mop and broom. Thank you, I’ll be here until I’d rather be in bed!”

I have no idea why I couldn’t think of a good joke for Enigma. I guess you could say it’s an……………… mystery

After reading was a 30-minute intermission and shoutout for Kevin Ferrisi of Connecticutdrag.com, one of the sponsors of the evening. The website highlights local drag entertainers. I’ve written and photographed for it before, and I believe it’s a wonderful resource for the community. That site was a big inspiration for me, Flaminia, making this one.

At this point in the night, I was exhausted and a little delirious. One of the things I forgot to pack was my energy drink. Whoopsy! Another was my pair of tearaway jorts that I had planned on using in my runway. At least I remembered the most important pieces. My fish mask and about half a dozen plastic eggs. I had to buy new plastic eggs for this. I bought a bunch years ago for a number I never did but couldn’t find them. My question was “when does a girl become a woman?”. A lot of comedic potential there, Enigma did a great job coming up with questions for all of us. There were a few different angles I thought about approaching this from.

I wanted to avoid the jokes other people would likely be making, like plastic surgery or losing my virginity. Some of the other questions were explicitly about those topics. My first thought was making the answer about completing some cultish rite of passage into womanhood. I would have revealed into some kind of occult attire, maybe have a sacrifice or something. I was kind of in a cult for a couple years (a subject for another blog post perhaps). My second thought was to take the angle of a housewife. With the joke being that I learned womanhood through dedication and responsibility, and it was terrible. I’d probably have revealed from an apron to a little party dress. I was kind of a housewife for a few years (a subject for another blog post perhaps). When I was writing both of those, I started to dwell too much on the real-life experiences and ended up making myself upset.

my runway, image courtesy of Rebecca Chien, one of my sweetest and favoritest fans (´◡`❁)

I thought about it more and decided to go from the perspective of a salmon. With this answer, as well as my others, I wanted to emphasize how ridiculous the standards and expectations surrounding womanhood are. I also wanted to wear a stupid outfit. From behind I just looked like my usual self. Turning around to reveal my salmon head was so much fun. The audience loved it, probably. I could barely see or hear any reactions, or a lot of what the other questions and answers were. The mask was miserable to actually wear. Somehow, I didn’t mess up my makeup though. I got to catch Maddie’s runway since I was back upstairs watching on the tv. The outfit looked even better up close. An impeccably constructed balloon print gown with a balloon chest that she inflated live. I’m so proud of her. I got a chance to listen to her answer beforehand and I thought it was funny and tied in nicely to her outfit.

After that it was time to announce the results. After my lukewarm talent portion, I figured I wasn’t winning this. To my surprise I still got third place! I got third in the chez Snatch Game too. Maybe they’ll make a title for mx. lovely second alternate (✿◡‿◡)

Even if I hadn’t placed at all this was such a magical night. What made this show amazing to watch is what made it amazing to be in. Getting to do something different. All of us using our real voices. Highlighting the relationships we have with each other, which is more interesting than how we exist in a vacuum. I’m grateful to everyone involved. My fellow castmates, the judges, Enigma, Kevin, John,

Check my upcoming events page to see what’s next for me, Flaminia.

Until then, ciao!