What a Drag!: Female & Male Impersonation in Film

Although drag is loaded with anthropological implications, any examination that opens with a dedication to Pal, who impersonated Lassie, tells you what to expect. The introduction defines drag here as an impersonation of the opposite sex. Already the notion that one's gender is defined by clothes and not one's body is a given, and that certain clothes are easily identifiable for each sex. The practice began in primitive societies where witch-doctors wore female garb for certain pagan rites. Julius Caesar and Nero dressed as women. Boys played the female roles in Shakespeare's productions, since the Catholic Church had pronounced it immoral for women to appear on stage. The term drag is said to have started from the way the actor came on stage, with his gown behind him. The Japanese Kabuki theatre also employed men to play women. It was in the late 19th century that women began to appear in the theatre as men, the most famous being Sarah Bernhardt playing Rostand's L'Aiglon, Napoleon's doomed heir. In 1892 Brandon Thomas' farce Charley's Aunt debuted to become one of the most performed comedies of all time. Contemporary audiences began to add dimensions to the appreciation of drag, with role-reversal evolving into camp, where the disguise was obvious, or more realistic interpretations where the disguise was unnoticeable. The gay community initially embraced drag as a liberating force of expression until some began to see the stereotyping of women as divas was oppressive, and mysogynistic. A celebration turned into a perceived mockery. This reaction led to the "cloning" of men as cowboys, policeman and blue-collar types, which became known as another form of drag. The lesbian community also reacted against the gay drag phenomena, creating similar butch and femme types, as a reflection of heterosexual coupling (though when a woman donned the female drag things became perhaps a little too confusing). So what began as entertainment took on a political flavour when drag, cross-dressing and roleplay confronted ideas of empowerment and identity. Impersonation may reveal more latent sexuality in the impersonator, but one has to consider the partriarchal fears of western society that tells us that men dressed as women is funny - but not funny, and women dressed as men is never funny. The book presents stills with little commentary so one is free to project one's feelings over the images. Of course, one begins the pretence with the knowledge of the true gender of the pretender. Most of these impersonations are done for comic effect, to create deliberate deceipt, so naturally the man cannot be truely convincing as a woman, and vice versa. At best, they are perceived as being socially unattractive, and thereby less powerful in the battle of the sexes. (Of course it is when they are perceived as attractive that we start getting into trouble, and the idea of a woman in male drag becomes more palatable). The comedy is also reliant upon those who must be decei