The Austin Gay & Lesbian International Film Festival (aGLIFF) sponsors the concluding offering of its monthly outdoor summer film series before the festival is scheduled to begin on Aug. 29. “Love beads … a string of pearls … a tie-dye T-shirt … a beaded blouse … Janis Joplin … RuPaul. Of course! Woodstock … Wigstock. According to the gals in Wigstock: The Movie, the drag queens of today are just like the hippies of yesterday, except they’re better coiffed. A celebration of love and harmony from the lofty perspective of a pair of high heels, the Wigstock festival, held every year since 1984 in New York City on Labor Day weekend, is a scene to be believed. Wigstock: The Movie chronicles the 1993 and 1994 events in home-movie fashion, featuring interviews with such luminaries as the festival’s co-founder and perennial hostess, the Lady Bunny (whose blond wig looks like it exploded on her head), and performance clips that are in lip-sync with the ridiculous and not-so-sublime. (The Dueling Bankheads, singing “Born to Be Wild” with handbags flailing, would have had Tallulah hoarse with laughter.) There’s no real thematic structure or import here. Gravitating toward the serious only when noting how AIDS has thinned the ranks, this sunny, upbeat movie has no agenda but to expound upon the joys of a fabulous wig. To attempt to do otherwise would subvert the movie’s simple pleasures. In the words of one of the divas in Wigstock: The Movie, it doesn’t matter whether you look like a real woman when doing drag – it’s all in the attitude, honey. “You go, girl”
This article appears in July 16 • 1999 (Cover).
