Liberty City Arts Presents – Opera is A DRAG!

About the Show

Opera is a Drag celebrates the deep, intertwined history of drag artistry and opera — two worlds that have always had more in common than their reputations suggest.

The evening is structured like an episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race. Performers enter in a Werk Room-style intro with kitschy cutaways to a makeshift TV screen for confessionals. The mini-challenge is a mini Snatch Game featuring well-known opera stereotypes — think the cast of characters from the JG Wentworth commercials, the soprano shattering glass, Brünnhilde, the opera audience member with the lorgnette — guest judged by Cookie DiOrio alongside two other judges from the opera community. The mini-challenge winner then assigns pre-scripted composers, styles, or shows to the other performers based on their selections. The Maxi Challenge is the main performance of those pieces, closing with a group number — potentially a lip sync to a well-known classical chorus such as “O Fortuna” from Carmina Burana.

The host will have the option to perform a set of their own material in the thirty minutes before curtain. While the majority of our performers are expected to have a background in classical singing, we are open to the full spectrum of drag artistry. If you don’t identify as a singing queen but are willing to “sing bad” for the bit, we want to hear from you. We’re also open to creative ideas for characters with connections to classical music or the broader world of opera — think along the lines of the personality archetypes you’d find on a Drag Race season: the comedy queen, the looks queen, the dancing queen. If you see a place for yourself in this world, tell us about it in your application.

Creative input from performers is welcome and encouraged, at the ultimate discretion of our artistic advisor on the project, Ryan Colbert.