Some Like It Vaginal

“I’m glad I’m wearing the cheapest suit I own,” a man in rather spiffy business attire said to his friend. “How much was it?” I asked, ever a nosy eavesdropper. “$250,” he confided, a bit embarrassed. That didn’t seem cheap at all to me. Moments later, performer, artist and mega-personality Vaginal Davis, a 6-foot-6 tall drag queen and star of Speaking From the Diaphragm, currently at P.S 122, came over and began flirting with the man.

“Come on and sit up here, Daddy!” she purred, parking him on a pedestal where he sat contentedly for the rest of the evening. He was permitted to leave the seat when he joined the rest of us in a mid-show dance—Davis had allowed us all to stand and shake our asses for a few moments.

Davis is in town visiting from her adopted home in Berlin, and the selfdescribed homo-punk is performing in her own extravaganza modeled on the tacky but delicious variety talk shows of the 1960s and ’70s. The show is running for 10 performances, with Davis as bubbly emcee and a revolving eclectic freak show cast of groovy guest performers, scholars and other random oddballs drawn from her 30-year career in the arts. Joining Davis on stage are Bruce La Bruce, Annie Sprinkle, Penny Arcade, Slava Mogutin and Brian Kenny, Justin Bond and more.

The chairs in the P.S. 122 theater were covered with garbage bags. Uh oh, I thought.

Michael Boodro, the head of the Gesso Foundation, the evening’s sponsor, was sitting in front of me. When Salley May came out on stage holding aloft a bunch of milk cartons and a plastic carpet was rolled down the aisle, I had a feeling that she’d hurl the dairy at the audience. Naturally, some of the milk splashed onto Boodro and of course onto me too. That’s the price you pay when you sit in the front, but it was all in good fun. Max Steele, one of the featured performers in the show, was awe-struck: “Vag is a world citizen,” he said. “She knows everyone and everything. It is like being with the Oracle at Delphi.”