Review by Booklist Review
Goodman, a writer and columnist focused on the arts and LGBTQ+ culture, parlays her ardor for drag into a uniquely comprehensive, vibrant, and eye-opening history of the art form in New York City. By creating a parade of seminal performers, each vividly portrayed, and a tour of key venues over time, from Greenwich Village to Harlem, Goodman chronicles the many modes of drag, beginning with mid-nineteenth--century so-called male impersonators on Broadway and in vaudeville, including Julian Eltinge, who performed as female, and Florence Hines, a Black woman performer who appeared as a male dandy. Goodman expertly tracks the popularity of masquerade balls or drags during the anything-goes 1920s and 1930s, followed by racist and anti-gay WWII-era crackdowns. She contrasts the experiences of drag kings and drag queens and chronicles "high camp" and high-fashion drag, drag competitions, mafia-run gay clubs, radical gay cafés and theaters, and the drag festival Wigstock, where RuPaul performed. Here, too, is drag during the worst of AIDS, drag in disco and punk, and the "houses" established by Black drag queens such as Crystal LaBeija to give queer youths of color a "place to belong." As Goodman charts the ways drag became more mainstream, including the launching of drag story hours, she sets the current anti-drag and anti-LGBTQ+ backlash within a historical context. Richly enlightening, enthralling, and invaluable.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Historian Goodman debuts with an expansive survey of drag performance in New York City from the mid-19th century through today. Drawing on archival research and interviews, she examines the surge of male and female impersonation in Broadway theater at the turn of the century; drag and masquerade balls in Harlem and Greenwich Village in the 1920s; drag revues put on by soldiers during WWII; drag queens' resistance to antidrag legislation and police raids of queer venues in the 1960s, leading to the Stonewall riot; the avant-garde and punk-inspired drag performances that raised awareness about the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s; and, finally, the rise of commercial forms of drag in the 2000s, culminating in the current era of RuPaul's Drag Race. Throughout, Goodman highlights members of New York's queer community and their allies who resisted antidrag laws and social stigma, including Mae West, a male impersonator and playwright before becoming a Hollywood star, who faced censorship and fines for writing several plays in the 1920s that featured gay characters and drag performers (more than once, the police raided performances of her plays and arrested the entire cast), and drag queens Marsha P. Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, who in 1970 founded S.T.A.R. (Street Transvestite Action Revolutionaries), the first organization in the U.S. to provide housing for homeless trans youth. Filled with vibrant character portraits and lesser-known histories, this is a comprehensive guide to New York's long tradition of drag performance and queer activism. (Sept.)
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Review by Library Journal Review
Freelance writer Goodman has loved drag since watching To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar at the age of seven. Her reverence for the art form shows in her deeply thorough history of NYC's drag scene, from the "gender impersonators" of the mid-1800s to the present-day popularity of RuPaul's Drag Race. Goodman not only uses archival resources, but she also interviews several dozen drag performers to get firsthand accounts of important moments in drag history and to preserve their stories. The intersection of queerness and drag is explored in-depth, and the book examines how culture and laws have affected how and when drag can be performed. An extensive list of further resources--books, film, television, and digital media--is also provided. VERDICT This book is extremely timely, as transgender rights and events such as drag queen story hours are constantly scrutinized in legislation and in the American media. A vital purchase for any collection.--Heather Sheahan
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
A comprehensive report on the history of drag. Writer and photographer Goodman vibrantly chronicles the history of "the renegades and rebels" who created and maintained the drag lifestyle since the mid-1800s. An ardent fan of drag since she watched To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar, the author shares her meticulous historical research, which includes numerous hours of interview material. Goodman begins with a discussion of how gender impersonation proliferated in the 1800s despite a suppressive 1846 "masquerade law" forbidding it. From the end of the 19th century, the popularity of masquerade "drag" balls took off in Harlem and Greenwich Village, where a more liberated form of performance became more popular, even motivating gay World War II soldiers to don costumes and inspiring actors like Mae West to defy conformity laws. However, law enforcement continued to disrupt the party, with increasingly violent raids on gay clubs and performance venues, adding fuel to a burgeoning liberation rebellion that culminated in the Stonewall riots of 1969. As a glamorous display of self-expression, the popularity of drag continued to grow, championed by artists, including Andy Warhol, who increased awareness throughout the 1980s AIDS epidemic. Embedded within these fascinating microhistories are vividly presented profiles of the fearless queens who embraced their craft regardless of naysayers or prohibitive laws. Marsha P. Johnson, Sylvia Rivera, Joey Arias, Divine, and countless others channeled their outrage and grief into radical performance art. Goodman also spotlights the venues that hosted these events, including the East Village's Pyramid Club, which was known for AIDS fundraisers and became a cultural workshop for queens to cultivate community, inspire activism, and develop their personas. Drag has since become more mainstream and commercialized thanks to programs like RuPaul's Drag Race. Throughout this lively and celebratory book, Goodman portrays the dynamic forces of a fearless community bound by their love of performance and using "glamour as a potent force of resistance." An essential addition to the literature of both drag and queer history. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
