The history of drag is full of bigger-than-life personalities who have been trailblazers, setting the scene for the Drag Race generation of superstars. Making their entrance into the drag spotlight like a lioness with style, grace, and a side of camp, is one of entertainment’s finest leading ladies…Charles Busch. This multi-hyphenate entertainer made an indelible splash onto the scene in New York in the mid-’80s with his play Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, an unlikely hit that became one of the longest-running plays in the history of Off-Broadway. Not only did the show turn the theater scene on its head, but it also ignited the audience’s love affair with Busch, making his drag famous (or infamous) on a mainstream level with no one doubting the man in a wig as a bona fide starlet. This playwright, actor, director, novelist, cabaret performer, and drag icon’s career would prove to be as colorful and almost as fanciful as one of his early plays with a Tony nomination, Outer Circle Critics’ John L. Gassner Award, Sundance Film Festival Award for Best Performance, honorable mention at the Tribeca Film Festival, Drama Desk Award for career achievement as both performer and playwright, a star on the Playwrights Walk outside the Lucille Lortel Theatre, two MAC awards, an infinite amount of critical acclaim, standing ovations, and a near cult following. This summer he tells all in his memoir, Leading Lady. Talking to him is dizzying as he recounts his almost too-hard-to-believe real-life stories, the people he’s come across, and the characters he has created.

On this episode we chat about Charles early childhood including the loss of his mother and being raised by a real life Auntie Mame, his sexual evolution, the duality of his characters, his first plays, getting into drag for the first time, his novel Whores of Lost Altantis, East Village in the 80s, getting political through art, some dish about his upcoming memoir Leading Lady, and more! Hosted by Alexander Rodriguez