Although he’s become a darling of the London scene with his cabaret shows at alternative East End queer club, The Glory, Roscommon native Anthony Keigher, aka Xnthony, has always had his eye on a bigger prize, as his new show at the Dublin Fringe attests. As Xnthony gears up to rebrand himself as a straight for pop stardom, Keigher talks to Brian Finnegan about fame, his own Marvel Universe, fake authenticity, and the strange correlation between queerness and rural life.

Interview

Alter Ego – Fame – Playing Straight

Photos by Luxxxer.

Even Lady Gaga’s gone ‘authentic’.” So says Anthony Keigher, aka international celebrity wannabe, Xnthony, who returns to the Dublin Fringe this year with a sequel to his 2015 show, Douze, in which he made a bid for Eurovision glory with a song selected by the audience. This time around, having failed to get to the finals, Xnthony is seeking to reinvent himself, as a very on-trend, inoffensive pop star in the vein of Ed Sheeran.

“Gaga had that Artpop phase, which was just a disaster; so she came back with Joanne, which was country. Then Beiber comes out with ‘I’m so sorry,’ or Miley turns from acidic pop queen to softness and balloons. Everyone’s trying to rebrand as authentic, trying to appear like Ed Sheeran or the queen of authentic, Adele. But there’s nothing authentic about it at all.”

Xnthony equates authentic with a kind of straight queerness, and his show, The Power of Wow, sees him marry collaborator Tiffany Murphy every night for the run, with the audience attending their wedding.