The queer cabaret night Razed and Confuzed is normally a physical event, but as drag king Beau Jangles tells us: “Miss Rona had other plans.” There’s no doubt something awkward about attempting to warm up an invisible crowd, but Beau is a compelling host. “All the toilets are gender neutral,” he says, pointing out the positives of a night out at home, “and the drinks are much cheaper.”
Beau is the only artist performing live, so the show doesn’t have the same collective, pulsating feel of events like Queer House Party, where the digital platform is used to create a vivid sense of community. Instead, four performers have received funding to each create a new piece of recorded work during lockdown.
A video-essay from performer Barbs queers the countryside with hazy shots of hay bales, bonfires and bright-pink PVC, while drag king Wesley Dykes explores attitudes towards masculinity in R&B with fellow fellows Manly Mannington and Romeo de la Cruz. In a zebra print two-piece with clawed gloves and roller skates, self-taught Symoné creates a kaleidoscopic collage with glimpses of pole and hula skills, and closing the night is Brian, a drag act unpicking the performance of sexuality and queer utopias.
This foray into digital cabaret is a worthy experiment, but the format doesn’t yet best serve these artists. The recorded work feels somehow flattened and distant. More than anything, the night makes me miss the surge and support of a crowd, the rush and physicality of a live lip-synch, and the feeling of being physically together in a queer space.
Nevertheless, all four pieces have a sense of protest at heart. In the middle of Pride month, with urgent global calls to upheave our societal racism, this event serves as a reminder of the importance of supporting queer work, particularly recognising the work of black trans artists. The name “Razed and Confuzed” comes from queer spaces being destroyed, a major problem even before the pandemic. For a future of exciting, experimental queer work, we need more spaces, both virtual and physical, for events like this.
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