Juanita More, famed local drag queen and DJ, talked about going to the Stud when she was in high school. Peaches Christ, the filmmaker–slash–drag queen whose midnight-movie screenings helped put Showgirls on the cult-cinema map, talked about how she once got eighty-sixed from the bar and had to deliver a handwritten apology letter to get back in. Out came a barrage of queens, past and present, performing songs, swapping stories, and reading each other just like they did onstage during pre-coronavirus times. Then, with whiplash speed, the party started. “But also of channeling our pain into performance, celebrating life even as we acknowledge the darkness surrounding us.” “In times like these, we queens fall back on traditions of taking to the streets,” said Mahogany, a season-five queen on RuPaul’s Drag Race. native Honey Mahogany, wearing a black gown and a crown of black flowers, looked directly into the camera as she opened the ceremony, held on May 31. It was a splendid, fitting farewell for the Stud, San Francisco’s iconic gay bar: a virtual 12-hour drag show that swung from festival to funeral and back again.
