(FREEda SLAVE)
Please don’t ever break these chains of love
You’ve wrapped around me
‘Cause I’ve been so happy darling
Ever since the day you bound me
(From the song “(Don’t Break These)
Chains of Love,” from the Love Child album by Diana Ross & the Supremes,
1968, composed by Johnny Bristol/Harvey Fuqua/George Beauchamp)
While still at QVC, I one day sat flipping through the entertainment trade publication Back Stage and noticed an ad that read, “Needed: drag queen extras for the upcoming movie To Wong Foo Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar.” The movie was starring Wesley Snipes, Patrick Swayze, and John Leguizamo. It was the American answer to The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, an independent “road picture” about the adventures of three drag queens traveling across the Australian desert in a bus. To Wong Foo would follow three drag queens driving cross-country from New York to Los Angeles, in a Cadillac convertible.
At
the QVC Fashion Channel, we were in the last few months of operation. The
morale was gone, and we were just going through the motions. The drag queen
film project sounded like fun. To apply, you had to send in a picture of
yourself in drag. I had never worked on a movie dealing with gay characters but
had wanted to do something very gay.
I showed the listing to our fashion stylist, Felicia, and said,
“Wouldn’t it be a hoot to dress up in a wig and heels and work on this movie
with Wesley Snipes?”
Felicia glanced at the ad and said, “If you’re
serious, we have enough stuff here in the styling department to make you into a
fierce drag queen.” Overhearing this, Trina, who was one of
my favorite Fashion Channel models, chirped up and said, “I got a wig you can
use!” Then somebody called the QVC
makeup buyer, Josephine Birchall, and makeup arrived within a few short
moments. My styling team had surrounded me, and I watched as my transformation
into a woman began right before my eyes.
Felicia brought out a beautiful, black Vivienne Tam
dress featured on a show dedicated to plus-sized women. The dress was low cut
with an empire waist, sheer and pleated all the way around. It felt so sexy to slip on -- like
butta! I could tell that to pull
this off I was going to have to shave my upper chest. I next got a lesson in eyebrow plucking, eye shadow, and
contour. Flori Roberts #5, a makeup
designed to mask scars and used by people with vitiligo, became my best friend
since it covered my very thick hair stubble. The representative who pitched the
product to the Fashion Channel told me that actors used it in the video Michael Jackson: Making Michael Jackson’s
‘Thriller’.
For a rush job, I looked pretty good. Admiring myself
in the mirror, my image at some angles reminded me of my mother when she was in
her thirties. I put together three different looks using various wigs and
dresses, all compliments of the wonderful ladies at the Fashion Channel.
Josephine took my pictures, and I sent my headshots and information off to the
film’s casting agency in New York. Meanwhile, we waited for the ax to drop on
our jobs at The Fashion Channel.
Within a few days, I got a call asking if I could
commit to at least a week’s filming in New York for To Wong Foo. It was
perfect timing, because those last days at QVC were intolerable. Host Jean Allen Barlow was planning
goodbye shows for each of us, and it all felt like too much. I called my good
friend and former co-worker Kelly Dobbs, who had already quit, and said, “Oh
God, I can’t endure this. I cannot sit through a goodbye party on-air.” Kelly, always one to make me see the
entire picture, told me, “Look, Dale.
You’ve accumulated vacation and sick time. Just call in sick and don’t come back, problem solved.” I decided she was right. As the week of
filming for To Wong Foo drew closer,
I gradually started clearing out my locker and office materials, inconspicuously
so that no one would notice I was about to bail. Then I called off for the last
two weeks and left for New York. One of my brother’s old college friends,
Reggie Van Lee, owned a beautiful condo in Manhattan, and graciously offered to
put me up.
With a few treasures I picked up from a couple of
second-hand stores, I built quite a wardrobe. On my first day of work, my
instructions were to meet with the other extras in Greenwich Village where a
bus would pick us up and take us to Jersey City for filming. It would take
about a week to film the scene we were in, which was an important one; it was
the moment in the film from which the title is derived, when the three main
characters discover the autographed picture of Julie Newmar in Wong Foo’s restaurant.
The scene is a celebration after Wesley Snipes and Patrick Swayze’s characters
have just won a drag queen pageant and a trip to Hollywood. Hundreds of their
loving fans and other adoring drag queens surround them in the restaurant. When John Leguizamo’s character insists
that he tag along to Los Angeles, the crowned drag queens decide to buy a car
and drive across country, instead of using their airline tickets.
Finding the bus in Greenwich Village was easy -- I
just followed the trail of boa feathers and wig boxes. The street looked like
it was getting ready for gay pride when I saw the hundreds of other extras
hired for the scene. There were
those like myself who arrived dressed like men, and carried their costumes in a
bag. Then there were professional drag queens that arrived in various stages of
makeup. Next there were “street girls,” who looked as if they had just turned a
trick the night before and had not washed off their makeup. There were also
real women, very overdressed for daytime, who filled out the quota for “fag
hags.” Also in the mix was a small
contingent of Chinese people, who were to play waiters and cooks in the
restaurant.
The process of
being checked in and herded together was one of the reasons I usually dreaded
doing extra work, especially large “cattle” calls. That’s exactly what they were called. In general, it was usually no big deal. I went in and
did the work, grabbed my check, and got the hell out as quickly as possible
while expending the least amount of effort. However, I told
myself, “This is the one time you get to dress up in drag in public. Feel like a glamorous Supreme -- enjoy
it.” The money was good, and I was
going to get a chance to see Wesley Snipes up close and in drag. For some
reason, I found the idea of a whole bunch of queens in a room with Wesley
“Demolition Man-Nino Brown-New Jack City” Snipes an interesting paradox. He had always played such macho,
masculine roles. I read that many black male stars had gone out for the role,
but that Wesley really wanted it so he could show a different side of himself
as an actor.
As
extras, our entire wardrobe had to be checked and approved. In that respect, (at least), we all
received the star treatment, as if each one of us were to be in a special
close-up. Our wigs had to go through touch-ups from the hair department, and
because there were more than a hundred extras in drag, preparations took hours.
After
hair and makeup, we moved into a holding area inside a college cafeteria,
across the street from the restaurant where the scene was being filmed. Once in the building, production
separated and assigned everyone to “union” and “non-union” floors. Union talent
got preferential treatment and better food, as union rules specified. This made
the real drag queens, who were non-union, turn green with envy. They weren’t
prepared for the harsh realities of background work. In a world where they were used to being the center of
attention, they were now in the film world where they were told to be pretty
but to stay out of the true stars’ limelight.
They hired some very lovely drag queens. Many of them far outshined the three
stars of the movie in that they were more beautiful and “passable” as real
women. The drag queens that fit
this description had no problem letting anyone within earshot know this. However, when hired as an extra, your
job is to fill the background. Unless asked by the director to do something
specific, you just blend in. As a rule, you never wear white, red, or anything
that could draw a viewer’s eye away from the stars of the film. Also, from a cinematographer’s point of
view, white blows out the iris of the camera. The real drag queens could not understand the rejection of
their red sequined gowns in favor of some drab grey or black dress. And for
some reason, the director hated pearls. Wardrobe asked everyone who had worn
pearls to remove them, and any discarded pearls were replaced with another
accessory. It was no big deal to me, but some of the other “girls” were
offended.
Many of the drag
queens didn’t like the ensembles put together for them by the wardrobe
department, so they would quickly change back into their original outfits after
the selected ones had been approved.
Street girls realized how long it took to do makeup and hair, so they
would get in line first, get made up, go out and turn a few tricks, then return
while still on the clock. Security had a hard time with crowd control because,
once in makeup, all the drag queens wanted to party. They turned up a boom box,
and sudenly a scene unfolded from Paris
is Burning. The cafeteria
tables became catwalks, and drag queens pranced, posed, and vogued while
everyone took pictures. Union actors knew that if they took pictures on the
set, it could mean automatic dismissal.
But there was no rule about taking pictures in the holding areas. I had a ball photographing all the
colorful drag queens.
Some of the queens
were clearly impersonators of female celebrities. It was amazing to watch a white guy apply brown makeup and
transform himself into a Diana Ross wannabe, complete with the white gown from
the “Missing You” music video. I wasn’t trying to look like anyone. Trina’s
mushroom wig worked perfectly with my Vivienne Tam dress, and I had
deliberately bought low heels because I knew the days would be long and I
didn’t know how many hours I would be standing. Reggie loaned me a gorgeous
black lace jacket to wear over my dress, and people kept telling me I looked
like Oprah.
“Yeah
-- the thick Oprah or the thin Oprah?” I would question, then burst out
laughing.
Small
cliques of drag queens formed the very first day. I started hanging with the other professional union actors,
who considered their drag role to be just another acting job. We shared
information about upcoming films and discussed union regulations. We also acted
like watchdogs to make sure that all the other union actors knew their rights.
Fragile
egos showed themselves on the second day of work when some non-union drag
queens complained about the union extras receiving better food. Some walked out
and others acted out. One morning, we arrived on location to find liquor, weed,
and used condoms in the non-union holding area. Security, in response to the
vile behavior, became downright rude. Some of us were left stranded in Jersey
City when the film’s hired bus drivers, also fed up with the behavior of some
of the non-union extras, refused to take any
of us back to the Village. My union group caught a city bus back to New York
and called the union. The assistant director of the film, the person
responsible for making sure things ran smoothly on set, was fired. The film company was fined, and the
union extras received additional pay for the inconvenience.
The
week of shooting seemed to “drag” on forever, because so little time was spent
in front of the camera. Most of the week, we sat around and waited. But we
always started the day with four-hour hair and makeup sessions. Then one day,
towards the end of the week, we heard that our scene would shoot later that
night. The slow countdown to 1 a.m. began. The overtime was nice, as we had
been on set since about 8 a.m. that morning. But waiting around was boring as hell. A few of us left the holding area to
hang out in front of the college building, and we literally stopped traffic! That
area of Jersey City was, and still is, very popular with Asian tourists, and
being curious they got out of their cars and took pictures of us. I posed with
homeless people, some of the tourists, and cops. One guy tried to lure me back
to his apartment with the gift of a teddy bear. I was flattered, but refused
his offer. We all had a blast and I had the time of my life. We were all excited, and the attention
and adoration from the people on the street that day made us feel like
celebrities. I’ll never forget one
moment that afternoon when a gorgeous drag queen, paused in mid sentence,
pulled up her skirt to adjust her “tuck.”
I watched in shock as she took out her very long, soft penis, and pulled
it like an elastic thong fabric between her butt cheeks before patting down her
skirt. This she did as naturally as primping her hair. I had to quote Miss RuPaul and said to
myself, “Girl, you better work!”
Finally,
around 1 a.m., we were called to the set. All three stars were there and
everyone was cutting up with laughter, except for Patrick Swayze. He seemed intensely focused on his
character and did not interact with the rest of the cast. John Leguizamo was
all over the place, camping it up. By that time, I learned that we had been
waiting for Robin Williams and Naomi Campbell to arrive, as they were making
guest appearances in the film. Soon, they both appeared.
The
scene began and the cameras rolled.
I was sitting at a table near the door, and Wesley, Patrick, and John
came in, waving. As they strutted down the center of the restaurant, Naomi
jumped up and said to Wesley, “I wish I could be as beautiful as you!” We all
howled with laughter, and the scene continued.
Since
Robin Williams loves to improvise, he did a different take every time the camera
rolled, always giving us something new to laugh at. The director, Beeban Kidron, was pregnant, and I still don’t
know how she survived the smoke-filled room. During a break, Wesley stopped by my table and thanked us
for being so patient. Then he said I looked like someone he knew.
“People
keep saying I look like Oprah,” I told him.
“No,
not Oprah,” he insisted, staring at my face. “But it will nag me until it hits me later.”
“Would
you mind if I take a picture with you when we wrap?”
“Sure, kid,” he replied. “No problem.”
We
shot through most of the night, because production was packing up the next day
and taking off for the Midwest to complete the film. The sun came out just as
Beeban got her last shot. After we wrapped, Wesley returned to pose for a
photo. He posed only in hot pants and go-go boots because his long, golden
tresses had been sent back to the hair department. I thanked him, and then left
the set to return to my real life.
About
a year later, when the cast of To Wong
Foo appeared on Oprah to promote
the film, I waited for Wesley to tell Oprah about the beautiful young drag
actor he’d met on set who looked just like her. He didn’t.
During
the filming of To Wong Foo, I had
learned about Stonewall, another gay
flick shooting in New York City that needed drag queen extras. I sent in my
best drag photos and was chosen to be in the film. The feeling on that set was very different from To Wong Foo. The low-budget production did not separate union extras from
non-union extras. The main actors were not isolated in trailers, and the
atmosphere was friendly and homey. The director, Nigel Finch, made all the
extras feel special. Almost daily,
he made it a point to thank everyone for working on his project. I felt honored
when my hands were used in the opening shot and I thought, “Selecting a song on
the juke box might make my hands famous!” After all, I had been a professional
hand model. My hands were making
their movie debut.
We
worked off and on the film for several days, and there were about six of us in
the core group. I met a beautiful
Asian drag queen who had trained Patrick Swayze for To Wong Foo. There
were also some other drag queens from the To
Wong Foo set, but this time we had to be transformed into drag queens of
the 60’s era. I took the wig I had
worn on the previous project and teased it up, then added a pink ribbon
headband. Then I slipped on a matching pink chiffon robe with pink feathers on
the sleeves. Like Diana Ross on the Ed
Sullivan Show, I looked very “Motown glamorous,” with big hair and flowing
fabric. I wore high-heeled, black
patent leather shoes and strutted like a diva.
The
scene I was in takes place at the Stonewall Inn in 1969, on the night that Judy
Garland died. Police raid the bar
filled with drag queens, and the queens resist arrest. When the queens start to
riot, the police drag them out of the bar in handcuffs. Then somebody punches a
cop and all hell breaks loose. Handed a set of keys, I un-cuff the other queens
while everyone starts chanting, “Free the Slaves! Free the Slaves!” While shooting the scene, Nigel turned
to me and said, “That’s a great name.
If you ever do professional drag, you should call yourself ‘FREEda
Slave.’” Everyone on set agreed that FREEda Slave was a great stage name. In
one of the film’s later scenes, the camera zooms in on me touching up my makeup
before I head back out to the rebellion. The character FREEda Slave had arrived
into the world on a rainy night in New York, complete with a pink gown and
flawless makeup.
I felt so sure I could resist you
My mistake was the first time I kissed you
Now I’m caught in a web of my own making
My heart’s full of love and
It’s yours for the
taking
Even
though it was wet and cold that night, you would never know it from watching
the film. The work was truly a labor of love, filling us with pride. We felt that Nigel really cared about
us. Sadly, I later heard that
Nigel lost his struggle with HIV/AIDS during the editing of the film and never
saw the final cut.
When
I returned to Baltimore, I called Pat Moran, the casting director who had put
me in Hairspray. I told her about my experiences on the
two films, knowing she would get a big kick out of it since she was good
friends with filmmaker John Waters and the late, great drag queen Divine, who
appeared in a number of his projects. Pat asked me, “How about playing a drag
queen being arrested on the NBC series Homicide:
Life on the Street?”
That
Vivienne Tam dress was getting a lot of exposure! I agreed to do the series episode, and my scene opened with
a cop pulling me into the police station as I argued and resisted arrest. When
the episode aired, I was very much in the foreground, but someone else’s voice
was dubbed over my speaking part. I was very disappointed, because I knew that
the “other” voice had earned a hefty session fee while I would only receive pay
as an extra.
But
everything happens for a reason. I told my friend Darryl Lemont Wharton, a
staff writer on the Homicide series, about my drag experiences on Stonewall and To Wong Foo. I had met
Darryl on another project, a 1991 film also called Homicide. The movie featured Joe Mantegna and William H. Macy, and
was directed by David Mamet, another director who treated extras with respect
and took the time to get to know them. Darryl was working on the film as a
production assistant and had just finished college. By 1996, Darryl had worked
his way up to being a television staff writer. He was young, bright, brash, and super talented, and had
already directed his own independent film, Detention. He was looking to diversify his talents
by writing and directing a one-man show. When I shared with him the stories I’d
been told by drag queens on set, he seemed intrigued. He thought that the world
of a drag queen would make for great theater. We explored the idea of drag
being used as a mask to hide who a man truly is underneath the makeup. Darryl loved the name FREEda
SLAVE. In the 90’s, everybody was
a DIVA. Jenifer Lewis’ one-woman
show was The Diva is Dismissed,
Sheryl Lee Ralph was producing the “Divas Simply Singing” benefit concerts, and
VH-1 had the popular Divas Live televised
concerts. Thus, FREEda Slave: Mask of a Diva was born.
We had a title for our one-man show, so all we needed next was a script.
Tighter, pull ‘em tighter
Till I feel love’s sweet pain
‘Cause these chains of love
Keep me from going insane
These chains of love
Tighter, tighter, tighter these chains
Chains of love
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