A long time ago at midnight on April 1, in a dance club on Dublin’s Dame Lane…
Muriel Walls, Brian Sheehan
You are at the bottom of a narrow and shaky spiral staircase in what had been promised to be a “dressing room”, but instead turned out to be a space roughly the size of a handkerchief that not only has to accommodate you and your three changes of costume for Daywear, Swimwear and Eveningwear – but also the same trio of changes for the flailing, preening bodies of nine other contestants. All of you are soon to be propelled, one by one, up the staircase and directly onto the stage, which is more a vertiginous ramp, thrusting at an angle across the dance floor. The only thing separating you now from the hoards of punters is a thin curtain, a film of smoke and some free booze. Realising it was all a bit late for character, you have thrown yourself into costume – you have always relished drag as travesty, dressing-up and making-up as an act of transgression and political statement.