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TV Tuesdays Free Talk
Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.
Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.
I'm still really enjoying DropOut content. (I promise you I don't get paid to shill for them) links are trailers.
Gastronauts is most fun from cooking show I've had since early seasons Great British Bake Off. Full episode 1 is free on YouTube.
Thousandaires is such a fun concept: spend $1000 so you and your friends can have a good time. It's not an insane amount of money and it looks like it has to be an experience that can be brought indoor to their studio, but that's where some creativity has to come in as well.
Very Important People is so weird I don't know what to say about it.
Adventuring Academy is possibly the closest thing to "family friendly" the network has got. I am a new Brennan Lee Mulligan fan and it's just nice to see two people talk about tabletop games, improv, story telling and eat (sometimes) silly snacks. New episode with Brian David Gilbert dropped I'm planning on watching that tonight.
Dropout Presents seems very ambitious:
Vanessa 5000 in particular I am blown away by it but I don't know if I would say I enjoyed it? I think so? I saw some comments about it being a sort of clown and part burlesque and part drag? And then I also saw a few segments of drag from Thousandaires and I think I don't understand what drag is, and by the time I'm too afraid to ask. :/ suggested readings welcome - I don't want to just randomly google and stumble upon awful and untrue viewpoints from disrespectful folks
Hey so drag is a performance of gender, often with comedic elements involved. Drag performers create personas and fully embody those personas in their act and sometimes in their broader professional lives. It's an expression of queerness, gender non-conformity, and identity.
Here's a good link
Sasha Velour explains what drag means to her
Some of the queens that have been on dropout, and who you could look up to see them in other things: Monet X Change, Bob the Drag Queen, JuJuBee, Alaska (Thunderfuck), and several more. Monet's Slumber Party has a mix of dropout cast and queens, Dungeons and Dragons Queens is a short Dimension 20 side quest, and the queens have shown up on Um actually (it was ok) and on Dirty Laundry too just if you want to see them.
I haven't watched Vanessa 5000 yet so I can't speak to that but the drag episode of Thousandaires was wonderful IMO.
I will cosign loving Gastronauts and particularly Brennan's dedication to heavy food and the bit of continuing to eat that pasta bake thing.
If it's a performance of gender.....so really any gendered person can perform as any other gender, including the one they usually identify as, and it would still qualify as drag?
I was thinking about how much people are in an uproar about drag story time, and one of their complaints being that drag is always or inherently sexual. From very little that I've seen I would say it's "often" sexual in nature? What are some examples of non sexual and child appropriate drag? (I have no interest in making their warped minds make sense I'm asking just for my own sake. Besides, those people usually have no problem with Hooters or female teen beauty pageants or having pageant queens read to kids...)
Thank you for the link!
As someone who used to regularly go to drag nights at Crews & Tangos here in Toronto, and regularly ate at a drag restaurant (Zelda's), the vast vast vast vast majority of drag is non sexual, and not much different from cosplayers dressing up for Comicon, mainstream pop diva concerts, or adult beauty pageants like Miss America. And drag story time events themselves are completely non sexual and child appropriate. It's literally just drag performers (usually in slightly more conservative versions of their costumes, so it is entirely child appropriate) reading kid appropriate books to kids. And yet you don't see idiots picketing any of those other similar events saying they're "inappropriate for children!".
But let's be honest here, the complaints protestors levy against drag shows and drag story time events are really just euphemisms and dog whistles, because what they really want to say (it's a "sin/perversion", "gross/unnatural", "corrupting" the youth, etc... all the things homophobes have always said about us queers) would reveal them for the bigots they actually are. So instead they pull the "protect the children!!!" card and surround it with lies to try to get more people on their side who are ignorant about drag and think drag shows are sex shows (which they're not, they're basically just karaoke night for the whole audience with drag performers in fab-u-lous costumes lip syncing and dancing to the music on stage ;).
There are a bunch of people who simply grew up without exposure, and the only intersections are where it's fraught with controversy so it becomes this "I don't know anything about this but 100% of what I've heard is bad". It's not just drag either, there are (different) dear friends who won't go to yoga or try meditation or eat shrimp or play D&D or drink or whatever.
Anyway thank you for the perspective: "the vast vast vast vast majority of drag is non sexual" -- this is a surprise out of that ignorance for me. I would have "charitably" placed it as 30% non sexual - not excusing my ignorance but just explaining that in parts of my circle I wouldn't be surprised if their charitable guess is 1-5% non sexual.
I mean, it can definitely be risque at times. And every drag performer does their own thing, some being far more risque than other. And I suppose everyone has different thresholds for what they consider "sexual" in nature too. But like I said, it's really not much different than cosplayers dressing up for Comicon, mainstream pop diva concerts, or adult beauty pageants like Miss America. So if you consider Taylor Swift walking the runway at a fashion show or dancing on stage at her concerts to be "sexual" then I suppose most drag is "sexual" too. But nobody bats an eye or protests about kids attending those other events, so I think it's pretty telling that it suddenly becomes a massive moral outrage when the only difference is the person doing essentially the same things is in drag.
Yes! Dolly Parton is arguably a drag persona (she does say if she'd been born a guy she'd be a drag queen. She's also a popular drag imitation character.) And by Oklahoma's proposed drag ban she would have counted as one:
There are definitely Queens that are cisgender women, for example. It is more common for there to be some sort of cross-gender aspect to it, but especially given how some Drag Queens are trans women and how most Queens will use she/her pronouns when they're in drag even if they don't outside of it, the lines are inherently blurry
But yeah, @cfabbro hit on why drag is held apart from other performances; it's just bias. There are sexual acts, there are risque ones, there's straight up comedy acts that are just in drag, singing and dancing not required. Suzie Izzard identified as an "action transvestite" in her comedy acts before coming out as Suzie. (Transvestite seems to be used as an identity more in the UK still among older folks, maybe? Happy to get a correction on that, it seems entirely out of use in the US, but it may just be a case of "this is the language around when I got my identity so it's mine")
I have struggled with liking drag for a long time until I realized that it's mostly that I'm uncomfortable with high femme stuff - I don't like beauty pageants and things either - and it's because I'm demi-gender and don't identify that strongly with being a woman. I'm also an introvert, and the combo of big "loud" personalities and the high femme aspects of drag is a personal turn-off. Even though that's exactly what makes drag appealing to its performers.
But it's still art even if it's not my vibe!
It was at one point a mainstream psychology/medical term... but that is no longer the case, and it's considered derogatory these days. But there is definitely a "taking it back" aspect to people self-identifying with it these days too. Plus, there is also "I'm just a sweet transvestite, from Transsexual, Transylvania." being a rather famous line from Rocky Horror Picture Show that is oft repeated by LGBT+ people of every stripe. ;)
p.s. Every person I have heard say something like drag just not being their vibe, who has then attended a drag night, has changed their tune. They're just so much damn fun it's really hard not to fall in love with everything about them. So IMO you should get thee to a drag show! :P
I'm familiar with it from both the psych history and Rocky Horror! But I don't see folks use it as a label for themselves around here. I have seen it mostly with older British men who identify as "transvestites." Not many, so I wasn't sure if that has just lingered in the culture more there or not.
I've been. I was literally working at an informational table at Drag Bingo last Monday. So, the whole thing where I worked through why I was uncomfortable with high femme performance and how it was related to my gender identity as a non-binary, demi-gender woman is actually what's going on.
Ah, fair enough. Drag shows definitely aren’t for everyone. I just happen to be a cheesy pop music and massive musical theatre/broadway fan though, so they’re right up my alley. :P
Oh sure, I really like Broadway musicals and musical theatre in general. This just isn't my thing. Doesn't mean it shouldn't be other people's thing or I'd want to ban it because it makes me personally uncomfortable with my squishy gender.
That's a good point, re personality. I dont watch "loud" tv even if they're supposedly CIS or even family friendly, such as survivor or runway project (?), talent type shows, or cheerleading or sports.... So it'll take me a bit of serpeate out how much I've shied away from drag because I don't like flamboyance in general vs rooted in discrimination.
:D I really liked how much fun everyone seemed to have had in Thousandaires episode with Sam and friends though. It's sort of like a celebrity or Elvis impersonator, but of your friend! That's fun :) not sure that I would watch an hour of it though haha it was very high energy
(FYI, "cis" isn't an acronym)
Yes, I don't really enjoy loud concerts and stuff either. It's a combo of things. But man I wish I could play at a table with Brennan and Aabria (and Ericka!, and ...)
That would be really fun wouldn't it! Yeah good point, conventions and live D&D I seem to be okay with and would love to be part of as well.
Are you interested in their live play sessions? Tickets are kinda pricey (100-250) but that's about same (or less) for any musical theatre production type thing. It's not the same as "playing with them" of course. Unless I win the lottery and I'm somehow rich enough to request a charity one shot with those guys lol I'd invite you >v<
It's not financially/location-wise an option for me right now to go to their live shows.
I'm pretty sure if I met Brennan or my favorite author (Seanan McGuire) or anyone I'd be speechless and embarass myself.
I met the guy that played Marcus in Babylon 5 and while this was like... 15 years ago, he was still older than he'd been in the show and seemed like life had been a bit rough. I was still toungetied and made a fool of myself.
I just live vicariously through others mostly while trying not to be parasocial about it.
That's the beauty of fandoms: it's normal within that small circle to live parasocial lives vicariously together. I have a family member who fell into a boy band thing few years since, and I didn't really get it, but put it into Dropout cast and suddenly it clicked.
So I'm about to get an annual subscription to Dropout! I have been getting the Game Changer and Make Noise shorts on YT and they've all been hilarious! I finally watched some of the free Game Changer episodes and that sold it for me. I'm gonna go through the other free episodes and sign up for dropout.
This is a part of the internet I was unaware of, but glad I discovered it
I thought I was going to be done after the first month, because I was only interested in Game Changer. :)
But yeah besides the honestly excellent content and rather aggressive new release schedule, I also genuinely appreciate a modern company that treats their talent + crew + auditioning talent with respect and pay them good wages / renumeration.
Shrinking - 8/10
Watched season 1 over the past week and it's giving me a ton of laugh out loud moments, even some where I can't breathe for a moment! Some of the drama parts are quite mediocre though I know that's secondary to the comedy. Funniest show I've watched in years!
Season 2 is apparently starting to roll out but a 30-minute show on a weekly basis doesn't really interest me, sorry/not sorry, so I'll wait until the whole thing is out. Looking forward to it though!