Tom Stieghorst
Suddenly, drag queens are everywhere at sea.
Or so it seems
by the coincidence of several cruise lines announcing entertainment
concepts that vary quite a bit in format, but all have the involvement of
drag queens as a common thread.
There's the Drag Brunch planned
aboard Virgin Voyages' Scarlet Lady. Just putting those three terms in
one sentence is head-spinning (so was the evening brunch party Virgin threw to introduce its dining concepts, replete with pancakes, cocktails and a team of bawdy drag performers).
There's U River Cruises, formerly U
by Uniworld, which will offer a weeklong "U in Drag" themed river
cruise on its ship the A in July that will feature contestants from the TV show "RuPaul's Drag Race" and a shoreside bar crawl in addition to onboard performances.
And Norwegian Cruise Line gets
drag queens aboard the Norwegian Encore later this year with a
production of the hit Broadway musical "Kinky Boots," about a
shoe-factory owner who forms an unlikely partnership with a drag queen
to make high-heeled boots in an effort to save his business.
What do these projects all have in common?
Let's call it the "safe naughty."
Once upon a time, maybe when Bob Dickinson was running Carnival Cruise
Line, the safe naughty at sea was found onstage in a "flesh and
feathers" revue, with showgirls strutting in scanty costumes.
It
wasn't something you could see too readily in Dubuque or Des Moines, but
take a cruise, and Hey, Look at That. Nobody could call it good clean
fun, but no one could get too offended by it either, as long as the kids
were kept at arm's length.
But time and social mores march on.
Today a flesh and feathers show is more about nostalgia than
naughtiness. To bring a new generation of cruiser a frisson of safe
naughty, it appears that drag queens on parade are just the ticket.
No one is identifying their brand more with safe naughty than Richard
Branson, whose every reveal for Virgin Voyages seems to have an
obligatory safe naughty component. In unveiling Razzle Dazzle, the
restaurant where the Drag Brunch will occur, Virgin teased it as "a
healthy dose of nice with just the right amount of wrong."
But in the end, it's not a date. It's just brunch.
Norwegian gets a kick out of advertising "Kinky Boots," but the boots
are part of a musical package of song, dance and story that has been
validated by a heterogeneous audience that any Broadway show needs to
survive.
Of the three, the Uniworld cruise may be the chanciest.
With just 120 passengers onboard, it's not hard to imagine the drag
queens assuming command of the ship and forcing everyone to wear costume
jewelry and too much mascara for the duration of the cruise.
I, for one, will be interested to see how well this cruise sells and who the paying passengers will be.