By Gillian Weeks
Perhaps because of my years in the theater, I always dress the part. I make a point to be elegantly disheveled at Sunday brunch, fashionably demure in the office, and self-consciously undone at a Williamsburg loft party. When I go to a wake, my insoles match the coffin lining. What can I say? It’s a gift.
Being profoundly appropriate requires a choice. Do you want to be a part of the scene, or stand out in the crowd? Ideally, both, right? Unfortunately, it takes a degree of celebrity or radiance to rival Our Lady of Guadalupe for most of us to have it all. You’re best off picking a strategy and running with it. Commitment, zeal, cold hard cash – in Manhattan, this is what it takes if you just want to belong.
Last Tuesday, I slipped. I started out on point, wearing a baggy V-neck grey merino sweater over black jeans and blue patent-leather flats. I was going to a friend’s apartment for dinner and planned on calling it an early night. As usual, I didn’t. After several glasses of wine and, later, whatever sauce was in the freezer, we found ourselves at the velvet ropes of Room Service, on 21st and Park.
(Photos by Tricia Romano)
You won’t find the typical club scene here on Tuesday nights. Michael Musto, the esteemed Village Voice columnist, describes it best: “The night is growing in freaky allure, attracting something akin to the old Happy Valley crowd, but darker, louder, and distilled to just the eight-wigs-and-nine-genitals bunch.” I walked in, and what should have been a disorienting sight – strobe lights and sequins galore – was, to me, quite sobering. “Oh God,” I thought, “I’m wearing the wrong outfit.”
I made a beeline for the bathroom, where I took off the tank top I was wearing beneath my sweater. It was a deep V, and I hoped that showing a little sternum could spice up an otherwise conservative look. I was wrong. Here I was at a drag show, but dressed for a dog show. Clearly, the Times got it wrong when it observed, “In this crowd, everyone blended in.”
Back on the dance floor, I tried to stir things up with some enthusiastic moves. A friend caught an errant elbow in the nose and went to the bar for some ice. I became distracted by a half-naked male dancer who stood on a platform above us, flexing his abs and working a pair of sweatpants down over his be-thonged ass. He was pushed aside for a performance by German disco queen Billie Ray Martin who, she sang, “got no brakes on
After Billie Ray left the stage, MC Kenny Kenny announced that the burlesque show was about to start at the strip club next door, Tens. A narrow hallway and a wide cultural gulf separated the two venues. I watched the Tens patrons blink dumbly as a 300-pound transvestite with two-inch eyelashes squeezed into the adjacent booth. I expected the scene to erupt in name-calling and chest-thumping, wigs flying everywhere in a cloud of blinding glitter. But as it turned out, that cultural gulf can always be bridged by a mutual love of T&A. Homo-, hetero-, or trans-, at the end of the day, we’re all sexual.
(Photos by Tricia Romano)
In the meantime, one of my male friends had caught the eye of a tall, blonde woman, who dragged him, with the rest of us in tow, over to a booth in the strip club. We sat down and watched as a spectacularly appointed crowd gathered at our table. This, I could see, was the popular group. There was Cazwell, up-and-coming rapper who sported a chain around his neck that could pull a tug boat; Kenny Kenny, the MC, who wore a black corset and an austere tuft of hair on his shaven dome; and Amanda Lepore, the world’s “number one transsexual,” singer, designer, and David LaChapelle muse.
I turned to Amanda and tried to be politically correct. “I love your barrette!” I exclaimed, ignoring her bowling ball sized breasts, outrageously inflated lips, platinum wig, and glossy acrylic nails. “Thanks,” she replied in her singularly husky whisper. When a woman across the table put her legs behind her head for no apparent reason, I knew I had to step it up. I slid my sweater down a little, exposing a bare shoulder. I waited for signs of acceptance, but none came. I might as well have been wearing a Hazmat suit.
My friend’s admirer turned out to be an incredibly convincing transsexual, given away by her man-hands and six-foot frame. I tried to make conversation over our $12 beers, even proposing a toast to the stripper’s remarkable flexibility, but it only came out sounding impossibly lame. I could see her cringe, arranging her chiseled jaw and heavy brow into an expression of tolerance and pity. When did I get so square?
The burlesque performer had just taken off her stewardess hat when I decided it was time to leave. I paid my bill and said my goodbyes to the cool kids. As I got up, the tall blonde put out her hand. I grasped it in my own, but she just held it steady, like she was waiting for something. I realized she intended me to kiss it, not shake it. I dropped to one knee, brought my other hand to my naked sternum, and looked into her twinkling eyes.
“Madam,” I said, my voice throaty and low, “It’s been a pleasure.” I pressed my lips to her man-hands, rose to my feet, and strode out of the strip club. Even in a sweater, I thought, I’m no kind of lady.
TONIGHT!!! A Butterfly In Times Square 
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