SFGate.com – Reyhan Harmanci
In its 12th year, the San Francisco Drag King Contest is breaking new ground. The annual show of imaginative embodiment of male gender expression – the opposite, of course, of drag queens – is “bigger, better and longer,” says promoter, performer and emcee Lu Read. While Read is speaking of the night as a whole, with more performances and enhanced after-parties, he could very well be speaking just of the names.
Like drag queens, drag kings’ naming conventions speak volumes about the flavor of the event: whimsical, timely and very, very funny. This year’s performers include Bernard Incrediballs (flying in from Paris), Afro Disiac, Papi Cock, Pete Sake, L. Ron Hubby, Seiman Marcus and, of course, Read’s co-emcee the Indra, a “bisexual, bipolar, half male, half female character.”