Hot Press Meets Panti

In 1993 homosexuality was decriminalised in Ireland; 20 years on, Panti, arguably Ireland’s most famous drag queen, has a show in the country’s most famous theatre, the Abbey.

Panti – full name Pandora Panti Bliss – is the theatrical creation and alter ego of Rory O’Neill. While the Abbey is certainly at the heart of Establishment Ireland, the dramatic arts have historically been at the forefront of social change, he points out.
“The theatre world has always been quite open,” Rory reflects. “I can remember 15 or 20 years ago seeing Angels In America and butt sex on the Abbey stage! I don’t think it’s quite as conservative as people might imagine. This definitely is a stamp of approval from the art establishment.”
Panti’s All Dolled Up: Restitched is something of a Cinderella tale – or as Rory puts it, “How you go from being a small boy in County Mayo to being a big painted stage lady.
“The subtitle of the play is ‘To thine own self be true and fuck the consequences.’ If you know nothing about drag queens I hope that the overall arc has a universal quality because it’s about how to make yourself happy. I hope that the stories that come out of my life would be fun and interesting to someone who doesn’t know anything about drag or the gay world.”
Turning your life story into a play and allowing strangers access to it seems a risky business.
“I’ve always been kind of mouthy and open,” he confesses. “I’m not very good at keeping secrets. I don’t feel I’m exposing myself. This is the only way I know how to be. Of course, there are some very personal details in the show. But once you put them in a theatrical context in some ways they become bigger than you. And, obviously, there’s the drag element, which, in a weird way, separates you from the story. I think of myself as being a seanchaí – that’s what I do for a living. The difference is I do it dressed up.”
Drag has a long history. In ancient Greek and Roman theatre and throughout the Renaissance female roles were played by boys, as it was thought unseemly for women to take to the stage. Today, Brendan O’Carroll’s Mrs Brown’s Boys, which involves a drag performance of sorts, is one of the most watched comedy sitcoms in Ireland and the UK. Despite this, there’s quite a bit of misunderstanding around drag.
“It’s very difficult to explain what drag queens are because there are so many different kinds of performers,” Rory avers. “The drag character is very rooted in the character of the performer. It’s a symbiotic relationship. Panti is Rory with some elements of my character ‘pressed down’ and other aspects highlighted or exaggerated.
“In the past Panti has gotten involved in gay rights issues and people often don’t understand how a fake character can speak about serious matters. The gay community understands that the drag character is a real person and the separation between the performer and character is blurred. Panti can talk about issues in a way a character like Mrs Brown can’t. Panti lives in the real world whereas Mrs Brown is a theatrical construct and doesn’t exist outside of that. I understand it can be difficult from the outside because people get confused between drag queens and trans people, cross-dressers and transvestites. It might take some people a while to see past the drag and just see the performance. However, I’ve performed in every shitty town around Ireland and people love it! They see drag as another kind of clown.”
Drag is sometimes criticised as a parody of femininity. This is a misunderstanding explains Rory.
“They’re not actually being female. Nobody is going to mistake Panti for a woman. We’re creating a third gender in a way, and through that you can make comments about how society sees gender or beauty. Women are almost forced to perform gender in mainstream society – make-up, the way you have to do your hair, high heels and all that. If you take away the make-up, the GHDs and all of that, what you’re left with is not what’s on the cover of FHM. Drag queens are taking that to the next level.”
Twenty years on from decriminalisation, it seemed as if this year’s Pride celebration was to be stripped of much of its political significance. Organisers had initially decided to cut the number of speeches at the event. Following a public outcry, activist groups and speeches were reinstated.
“When something like that happens I try to be the mommy and put oil on the water,” Rory smiles. “The wonderful thing is it shows how much people care about Pride. Everybody wants it to be perfect and they expect so much of it. They want it to be political, they want it to be fun, they want it to be diverse, they want it to be effective – it’s a lot to ask from one day and one event. It’s a difficult thing to pull off. Everybody wants the same thing – they all want it to be the best Pride it can be.”
Panti is a gay icon and something of a spokesperson for the gay community, but these are roles that Rory had not envisioned taking on.
“My work just makes me visible,” he says. However, I can’t let him leave without asking what he thinks are the most pressing issues facing Ireland’s gay community.
“I think gay marriage is super important. I’m not necessarily the kind of person who thinks everyone needs to get married. Plenty of gays do want to get married and for me it’s a pure equality issue. That is one of the final legal hurdles. A much bigger issue is changing hearts and minds.
“If you’re an 18-year old gay boy or lesbian, what’s affecting you is the shit you get at school or walking down Dame Street, or people bullying you at work. The issue is how to change people’s view of being gay – not as something to be bullied or pitied, but to see it as something great and to be celebrated. It adds colour, doesn’t it?”
Rory argues that changing hearts and minds is an issue that affects both the straight and gay communities.
“I worry about the creeping new gay conservatism. Young gay people are much more conservative than older gays. I think that’s partly because, when older gays decided to live as their real selves, then in a sense they had to reject everything they’d known before. They had to create their own society. It was much more political. Whereas now, younger gays don’t have to reject the society they came from and their families are okay with it. They see Graham Norton on the TV, so they have the same wishes for their future that their straight cousins have. They want to find a nice boy and bring him home to meet Mammy at Christmas and settle down. That’s great, if that’s what you want. There’s a creeping element that I see of gays judging other gays who don’t want that.
“You see them giving out to other gays because they don’t approve of, for example, drag queens or dykes on bikes or whatever and they want everyone to act hetero-normative. That drives me mad! As far as I’m concerned if someone wants to live in a threesome for the rest of their life – fair play to you!”

All Dolled Up: Restitched runs on the Peacock Stage at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin from July 9 to 20