Perfecting your Halloween drag

Y’all, Halloween is just around the corner, and, if you are like me, it is starting to stress you out — but in a good way. We, as gay folks, have a reputation to protect. We have to have the best costumes and the best parties. The straighties are looking to us, and we cannot let them down.

For a drag queen, Halloween is an all-year event — although we do use the holiday to get a little experimental. I am super excited for my costume this year; it is an idea I have wanted to do for years, and now, I am finally doing it. I’m exhausted, stressed and excited all at the same time. But that usually means I am really proud of whatever it is I am working on.

It is so hard to get inspired and stay inspired to see a look or an idea through to completion. I suffer severely from not following through; I will talk myself out of doing something I think will be great because of the chance it won’t go over well. Sometimes, you pour your heart and soul into an idea, a look, a performance — whatever — only to have it be met with a “meh” from an audience. It can literally hurt your feelings.

Let me give you an example: For Christmas in 2003, I got the original Broadway cast recording of Wicked as a gift. I was immediately obsessed. I played it pretty much non-stop for months. Before I actually saw the musical, I tried to piece together the story and mentally picture how each song was performed. This was before YouTube. (God, that sounds weird! Before YouTube! … Anywho.) This was before you could look up and find videos or clips of whatever you wanted, so I only had a few pictures that I found online from the musical.

I knew I wanted to be Elphaba from Wicked on Halloween, and I wanted to perform “No Good Deed” in the show. I got the costume, the make-up, the broom and even made a very cool looking grimoire (her spell book). I was so freakin’ excited for the Halloween show!

That night I got to the club extra early to make sure I had plenty of time to do my make-up and get everything perfect. It is a pain in the ass to base your head and hands green. You gotta get in your ears, behind your ears, the back of your neck, hands up to your elbow (just in case the sleeve is loose) and, of course, every pore on your big ol’ man face. Luckily,

I had Asia O’Hara and Jenna Skyy backstage to help me cover everything.

The look came together, and I was loving it.

I walk out onstage looking like the perfect Wicked Witch, hands manically waving over my spell book, casting a spell over everyone in the room.

“Eleka nahmen nahmen! Ah tum ah tum eleka nahmen!

“Eleka nahmen nahmen! Ah tum ah tum eleka nahmen!”

I was really getting into it when I finally looked out into the audience. The room was packed, but only a few people were paying attention to what was happening on the stage.

I had made the big mistake that so many drag queens make: Never debut a performance on Halloween. The gays want to be seen in their costumes and are not paying any attention to anybody else. It happens every year; I don’t know why I thought it would be different that year.

Looking back, I realize that not enough people knew the music from Wicked well enough then to be excited about seeing it in a drag show. The album/CD had only been out about 10 months at that time, and only my hard-core musical-loving gays even knew that Wicked existed.

Hell, Idina Menzel hadn’t even performed “Defying Gravity” on David Letterman yet! Plus, I probably would have had better luck if I had performed “Defying Gravity.”

I spent the rest of the night heartbroken and pissed off. To top it off, I had to figure out two other songs to perform whilst being painted green. I think I did Evanescence as Medusa and Celine Dion’s “River Deep Mountain Wide” for some reason.

Worst Halloween ever!

But I did learn a valuable lesson: I don’t have to wait for Halloween to do something fun. I’m a fucking drag queen! I do what I want!

So, this year, I will be debuting my Halloween costume the night of the block party, and I will probably wear it at every show through Halloween and beyond. Who knows: If it goes over well, I might bust it out at the first of every month when bills are due. Drag ain’t cheap, and Halloween drag, done right, surely ain’t cheap.

Who am I tellin’? If you are reading this and are a big gay homo, you probably already have your costume picked out and are spending your evenings embellishing the accessories. That’s what I love about our community, we are so extra!

And to all of you fine-ass gays that wait until Halloween to dress slutty — Stop it! Dress slutty all year! I promise, if y’all do that for me, I will be more “experimental” throughout the year with my drag for you — Pennywise in February, Slutty Mrs. Clause in August.

Let’s get fucking crazy! You go first.

Remember to always love more, bitch less and be fabulous! XOXO, Cassie Nova