Clipboard-Clutching, Coked-Out Stage Kitten
A tale of two dressing rooms and 2764983 drag queens.
“Do you have stage experience?”
The year is 2022, and I’m at the Knockdown Center, about to clock in for my volunteer shift at Bushwig.
“Um,” I say.
The gay boy who’s asked me this question is clutching a clipboard, looking crazed, probably a little coked up.
“Not really?”
As a kid, I’d taken dance classes, dipped a toe into theater camp. I liked the lights, the velvet seats, the smell of the theater.
“Do you want some?” he asks.
“Um.”
Not no? The idea of a million eyes on me sounds heinous. But the thought of going backstage, being allowed under the skin of the show. That sounds like a hit of molly.
“Yes,” I say, my body filling with adrenaline.
“OK,” he says. “Let’s go.”
Two years later, on a random Tuesday night in June, my arms aching, my kitchen table covered in green tulle, I find myself backstage again. But I’m not at the Knockdown Center—I’m in my apartment, and I’ve clocked in for my shift at The Tulle Boa Factory.
“We’re making really good time,” Josh sings.
All three of us, Josh, Oden, and I, are wrapping tulle like machines. Flip, pull, flip, pull. Layer upon layer of tulle gets spun around my collection of high school yearbooks. This is how glamour magic, how drag, is made. Offstage, in the shadows. The work is more tedious than you’d imagine.
In 2022, I follow Clipboard Boy behind the stage, past the rafters, into the inner sanctum: the dressing room.
“Hi, ladies,” he sings.
Three queens sit before us. They’re painting their faces in a room made of cinderblocks and cement, using mirrors ringed with incandescent lightbulbs. They’re towering, terrifying, dripping with sequins and mesh.
“This is our stage kitten,” Clipboard Boy says, gesturing to me.
Their what?
All three queens turn to observe me. Several more stomp in, flooding the room.
I swallow, smiling stupidly. I feel like an insect, small enough to be crushed underfoot.
“Imagine how much time this would have taken me alone?” Josh says, horror in his voice.
Flip, pull, flip, pull.
“Days,” I say.
Little packets of tulle are piling up on the floor, the rolls melting away. On the TV, Jem and the Holograms streaks across the screen. Oden finishes a tulle packet, shakes out his arms. He’s a bodybuilder, a powerlifter, but this work is all repetitive motion. It aches.
“Should we take a break soon?” he asks.
“Maybe in 15 minutes,” Josh says.
We keep working.
“OK, so,” Clipboard Boy says to me, talking fast. “Here’s what you’re gonna do.”
All around us, chaos. Queens are pacing, screaming at each other about eyelash glue and bobby pins. Black-clad stagehands scurry back and forth, criss-crossing every inch of floor space like ants.
“You’re gonna stand right here,” Clipboard Boy says, gesturing to the staircase leading up to the stage. “When a queen finishes her act, you’re gonna run up.”
Oh shit.
“You’re gonna pick up any clothes she took off. Quick quick quick.”
I nod, my ears ringing with fear.
“You’re gonna gather all the dollars people threw.”
I nod again.
“Quick quick quick. Then, off the stage, dollars to the queen, back to your position. OK?”
Like an answering machine, I repeat back what he just said to me.
“You got it,” he says. “Good luck!”
And he’s off, clipboard crushed against his body, screaming at someone about something.
I peer out at the crowd, which is huge, because this is the night, the very center of the whole event, the time when the main headliners take the stage. And I have to scurry after them, my face in the light.
“Smoke break, boss,” I say, many more than 15 minutes later.
Oden, Josh, and I all put down our tools, halting the assembly line. We walk up the one flight of stairs from our apartment to the roof. Under a sea of faint city stars, we light up a joint, pass it between us. The air smells like summer: leaves and pavement and firework smoke.
At the Knockdown Center, I’m sweating. I’ve cleaned up after two hours’ worth of acts, no breaks, and I’m finally feeling comfortable. At first, I was visibly terrified. But now? The audience is rooting for me. Every moment I’m on stage, my tits are half-falling out of my top, my ass threatening to rip the center seam of my jeans. But they’re cheering. It’s all part of the show.
And then.
“Suzanne is here!” Clipboard Boy screech-hisses.
Everyone backstage changes direction, speeds up, spins.
“Suzanne is here!”
The words echo from the mouths of a million frantic workers. Clipboard Boy grabs my arm.
“She’s got her own stage kittens,” he says. “No one but Suzanne’s crew touches the stage.”
“OK, where—”
“Stand here,” he barks, pushing me up against the wall. “Sorry.”
He seems to realize his own gruffness.
“It’s just. Suzanne is here.”
In 2024, it’s past midnight. Oden has gone to bed. We’ve wound all the tulle, attached every packet to the cord. The attachment process was like braiding hair, Josh and I weaving in and out of each other’s hands, alternating shades of green to create depth.
“Now, we cut,” Josh says, holding a pair of fabric shears to the folded edge of the first tulle packet.
I’m at the other end, my own pair of shears in hand. We’re almost done; this is the final step.
“Make sure to get all the layers,” Josh says, inserting his fingers into the center of his tulle packet.
Gently, with care, I do the same. It’s not unlike parting a pair of pussy lips, but it’s more difficult than anticipated.
“Oh, what the fuck,” Josh snaps, squinting.
The layers are sticking together, folding in on each other, refusing to come unfurled.
“Jesus Christ,” I say under my breath.
Eventually, we each make it to the core of our tulle-ussies.
Snip.
“Now, fan them out,” Josh instructs.
Again, this is more delicate than anticipated. Each layer of tulle is nearly sheer, unimaginably soft, clingy as hell to every other layer.
“Oh, my fucking god,” Josh hisses.
Our eyes meet.
“I thought this was the easy part.” Josh looks like he’s hovering outside of his body. “This is gonna take forever.”
I want to sleep. But the show is tomorrow, and one million layers of tulle need to be snipped, separated, and fluffed. The earlier efficiency of our factory assembly line now feels like a farce.
“Just keep going,” I say.
Together, we snip snip snip our way through this six-foot long boa, delirious, determined, deranged. We’ve made it this far—it has to get done, has to be birthed. Hours pass. The sun comes up.
Meanwhile, at the Knockdown Center, Suzanne and her Bartschland Follies enter the Knockdown Center, tumbling backstage like an alien dreamland circus. They’re laughing, shrieking, drinking champagne straight from uncorked bottles. I can’t believe I’m among them, these people I recognize from TV.
“Do you know where I can get some water?” one of them asks me.
She’s wearing a giant lampshade as a headpiece.
“That way.”
I point towards the dressing room, and she’s off, fringe swinging.
In 2024, I wake up on the living room floor, a throw pillow under my head. The sun is shining, the apartment steaming. Josh is drinking black coffee at the kitchen table, looking like he’s reached another plane of existence.
It’s done.
She’s beautiful. Fluffy, voluminous, the color of money.
“We did it,” I breathe.
Josh grins.
“I can’t fucking believe it.”
His phone buzzes.
“Shit,” he says, downing the last of his coffee, stuffing the boa into an open suitcase. “Help me bring all this down?”
Together, we lug two rolling suitcases and a canvas tote bag down four flights of stairs to the street. A black SUV awaits.
“You’re gonna be great,” I say as we load everything into the trunk.
Josh winces, climbs into the backseat.
“I just hope I didn’t forget anything.”
And then he’s off, flying in a four-wheel drive chariot towards a dressing room filled with Ru girls and drag children and frantic, coked-out, clipboard-clutching stagehands.
In Midtown and in Bushwick, at both Lincoln and the Knockdown Center, the show is about to begin.
Fabulous!