Show sends Wisconsin drag queens to camp
What could be more entertaining than watching grown men survive a week at summer camp? If those grown men are dressed in drag and competing to be the Queen of Camp.
Brandon Wright and his brother Ashley Wright created “Camp Wannakiki,” a reality show coming to YouTube next month that features eight drag queens from Wisconsin and Illinois who compete in camp activities and participate in a nightly talent show.
“There’s a lot of drag reality out there in the universe on TV and on YouTube,” Brandon Wright said. “We felt there was a lack of celebration for the campy queen. The shows are all for these glamorous drag queens. The iconic campy queen is not currently featured.
“So we started thinking about that. And it just popped into our head like ‘Camp, campy queens. What if we took campy queens to an actual summer camp?’”
The concept is chock-full of comedic opportunities. The trailer shows a few pratfalls and plenty of plays on words.
The drag queens and a production crew went to an actual summer camp near Rockford, Ill., to film for a week.
“Every episode is a day at camp, so it was one week long, seven episodes total,” Wright said. “Every day at camp they had to compete in a daily camp activity. The kinds of things at camp: archery, canoe racing. And then at night, there’s a talent show where they present a look that is based on the theme of the day.”
The Wright brothers co-own Hamburger Mary’s International and are drag queens themselves (Apple Brown Betty and Cherry Pi, the Sugarbaker Twins) and serve as camp directors on the show, which (if the trailer is any sign) embraces the puns and theatrics that exemplify campy comedy.
The Wrights recruited eight drag queens from Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison and Eau Claire to participate in the show as campers. Milwaukeebased drag queen Dear Ruthie plays the camp counselor. If the show takes off, Brandon Wright said they’d do casting calls.
Aldo Rene Perez, whose drag persona is Pagan Holladay, had never gone to summer camp before but was all in on the reality show. Perez heard about the show through a friend. He used to work with the Wrights at Hamburger Mary’s in Milwaukee.
“I had a lot of fun. There was a lot of physical discomfort with drag, and doing it military style is something that I hadn’t done before,” Perez said. “Being in drag for the better part of 14 hours and shaving multiple times a day and reapplying — there was a lot of pain. At least I looked good.”
“Camp Wannakiki” posts Tuesday Aug. 7. It’ll post on subsequent Tuesdays, but Hamburger Mary’s locations in Chicago and Milwaukee will air it beforehand featuring appearances from the contestants, as well as Dear Ruthie and the Sugarbaker Twins. The previewing parties are Mondays in Milwaukee and Sundays in Chicago.