As Laramie’s PrideFest celebrations built to a crescendo, the community gathered downtown for a drag show at the Collective. The performers leaned into the theme of the night — all things floral and blossoming — but they each brought a unique vision to that theme and to drag itself, demonstrating queer joy even as new legislation targets LGBTQ+ rights.
In a packed venue, under rainbow-colored lights and a misty, fabricated fog, Daisy Maize works a crowd of more than 100. She’s wearing a short black dress, knee-high cowboy boots, a black hat to match — and a full face of makeup.
“Are you all ready to keep this show going?” Maize asks the audience, inspiring cheers from around the thrust stage.
The crowd is already amped, charged up in the wake of four electrifying dance numbers. Daisy Maize treats the audience to a song, a cover of Anais Mitchell’s “Flowers” from the musical Hadestown.
“What I wanted was to fall asleep,” Maize sings. “Close my eyes and disappear … ”
The show tune is on the somber side, and it affords a moment to reflect on why this show is necessary and what it means to the community philosophically and politically.
Backstage, Vegina Quartz says drag is first and foremost about having fun.
“If you can't look like you're having fun, then the audience isn't gonna have fun,” she says. “If the audience isn't having fun — girl, why are they here?”
But while Daisy Maize, Vegina Quartz and the others ensure the crowd has a blast, they’re also doing important work in the eyes of the queer community.
For one, drag shows subvert expectations — and they do so to applause.
On stage, Vegina wears both her real beard and a flowing dress. That visual can be liberating for members of the crowd, some with beards, others in dresses, who might be drawn to both but feel restricted to one.
“Don't hold yourself back,” Vegina advises. “Just be yourself. You're gonna get farther if you're just more genuine.”
But drag is also about demonstrating resilience in the face of oppression. That’s something Vegina’s fellow performer, Carnivora Flora, understands intimately.
Carnivora grew up in a small, religious, Wyoming town. Openly gay and less openly transgender, there was plenty about their hometown that made them feel unwelcome.
“It was very strange to grow up in a place that's beautiful and amazing and I love, but then feel like I wasn't made to be there,” Carnivora says.
They came to Laramie more than a decade ago and, as so many young queer Wyoming people do, found an inclusive community and a place to experiment artistically. Carnivora started doing drag with Laramie Burlesque around 2014, before co-launching the Laramie Dragonettes with a friend.
“We focused really hard on trying to create queer and trans safe space in Wyoming,” Carnivora says. “It was really nice, I really loved it. And then COVID happened.”
All of a sudden, the drag community had only limited access to their favored form of expression.
“I think I did a single drag look and took photos,” Carnivora says. “And then the rest of quarantine, went into depression.”
The world has since reopened and drag has seen a resurgence. But it’s come back amid an altered political landscape. Drag performers, despite their long history in American culture, have been painted as predators seeking to corrupt the youth. These accusations are leveled not just at drag queens but at the entire LGBTQ-plus community. Those accusations have underpinned new legislation blocking access to healthcare or requiring schools to out queer children to their parents.
Carnivora says growing up in Wyoming gave them a lot of resilience and it’s useful at times like these.
“Moments like this, when it seems to get the hardest, are the moments when we need to have events like this,” they say.
One might think drag shows are simply a way for the queer community to blow off steam. For many, it probably is. But these shows can be something more. That’s where Carnivora Flora’s work comes in, work that is more conceptual.
“Because my character isn't really a woman or a man,” Carnivora says. “Carnivora isn't even supposed to be a human. Carnivora is supposed to be this mimic of a person.”
Carnivora is a prehistoric plant goddess, a figure of judgment and protection and queer power. That fits this year’s theme, “Blossoming Out West,” perfectly.
Organizers were inspired by the prickly pear cactus, a plant native to the west, equal parts beautiful and hearty. And, like Carnivora’s primordial stage persona, it’s always been here.
“The queerness of people in Wyoming, like the trans strength of people in Wyoming, has always been here,” Carnivora says. “Just because it's not as loud doesn't mean that it hasn't been there this whole time.”
And it’s perhaps never louder, never more on display, than when Rocky Mountain drag queens and kings take to the stage and bring down the house.
