Performing gender: queer art as collective action

A group of female and non-binary theatremakers sit in a room and ask the question: What is masculinity? It’s a big question. And one that perhaps we have felt instinctively but never verbalised. To discuss it is confronting but liberating.

We begin with the stereotypes, the alpha male, the danger, the threat, the abuse of power. We talk about religion, cults, incels, late stage capitalism, media and how these have shaped our view of Masculinity as something dominant, negative and toxic. And of course, as non-men we know that this fear associated with masculinity is real. As a woman I do not walk alone in the dark. I sit in tube carriages with other women so I don’t feel exposed to any danger. There is a level of safety and power a masculine person has in public that allows a certain amount of freedom.

The last time we made this show we focused mainly on the braggish, aggressive stereotype of alpha men. This time we want to delve deeper. We discuss gender as something reinforced, and competitive. We wonder what pressure there is on men to ‘prove’ their masculinity, or perhaps their absence of femininity or queerness.

Now, here's some fun gender theory for you: Simone De Beauvoir suggests in her book ‘The Second Sex’ that femininity is constructed, saying ‘one is not born, but rather becomes, a woman’. Now to say it is constructed does not mean it isn’t real. In fact it implies that our existence within society forms the perceptions of our gender identity. Judith Butler extends this, suggesting that gender is something you do, rather than something you are. She suggests that gender is performative, a series of repeated actions that eventually form an external identity.

While Butler is not suggesting that gender is a literal performance, this idea of repeated acts reminds me a lot of theatre. Performers work together to form a world, and in it, characters that perform their unique identities.This idea of performing gender is incredibly exciting to me as a queer theatremaker creating a drag king comedy show. By performing masculinity as non-male performers we are treading an unsteady line between perpetuating and subverting gender stereotypes. We perpetuate them by heightening the most obvious aspects of male performativity. But we do so with a knowing wink. The subversion lies in the fact that our identity as drag performers becomes difficult to easily categorise into a predetermined gender binary.

All this to say, when I attend drag events, especially drag king events, I feel a sense of belonging. I feel as if there is a community that will take me as I am, and embrace my quirks rather than shunning them. I attended my first drag king event alone, the wonderful Canal Street Kings (founded by DJ Wolfy, TX Maxximus and The Vicar's Daughter)- if you ever find yourself in Manchester, you’d be a fool to miss it. I was taught how to bedazzle a tie and treated to a drag cabaret featuring a mix of debuts and seasoned drag performers. Each performer was treated with the same amount of reverence and respect. An atmosphere of support and collective creation that I haven’t found as easily in many other spaces.

In the 1974 American Sociological review, Becker described art as a form of collective action, saying that “all the arts we know about involve elaborate networks of cooperation.”. I think these networks are especially essential in marginalised and historically persecuted groups. The queer and trans community especially embraces the concept of a chosen family - networks of care that help us survive and support each other. The art we create is both an affirmation of our unique identity, and a collective space of mutual care.

However, Queer art often emerges in opposition to our loss of political control in a world growing ever more polarised and threatened by our mere existence.  When the UK supreme court ruled that ‘woman’ and ‘sex’ in the equality act should only refer to biological sex, queer, trans and non-binary people protested across the country. As well as protesting, we wrote poetry, gathered in community hubs, went to drag shows, supported our community. To continue to create queer art, is to affirm our identities. Queer bodies existing fluidly, joyfully and proudly onstage, is a protest, and declaration of community. By highlighting queer joy, and the liberation that comes from existing outside of binaries we are asserting our existence as something that offers levity rather than threat. I hope queer theatre can act as a force that embraces fluidity and change, and opens up constructive dialogues between radically different groups.

For ‘Who Gave You the Mic?’ I have loved devising in a room of queer creatives. The openness of our discussions and Work In Progress process has allowed us to experiment a lot with gender and masculinity. I’m excited for people to see what we have been experimenting with the past month.

Come to watch ‘Who Gave You the Mic?’ if you love drag kings, queer comedy and (most importantly) to see if the Mikes succeed at proving their masculinity!

Who Gave You The Mic will runs on March 10th at 9pm.

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