The Showbags Phenomenon
Showbags was a unique moment in Melbourne’s Drag Scene, when a number of factors came together to make Showbags and their venue, the Greyhound Hotel in St Kilda the centre of drag in Melbourne. Showbags tenure at the Greyhound even attracted an article in The Age newspaper, and its Anniversary Birthday night was noted in Victorian Parliament, such was its reputation as a gathering of alternative communities in Melbourne, many of whom had adopted the Greyhound as their own.
Showbags was born in 2000, when Jessica James moved to Melbourne from Sydney and asked two total amateurs if they’d like to form a group.
Linda Lamont, and me, Amanda Monroe, were very much amateurs; performing in the various drag competitions around, doing spot numbers on any stage that would have us. We had barely begun to ‘pay our dues’.
Jessica put together our set list, choreographed the songs and taught us choreography, and made the costumes. Linda and my contribution was a sort of terrified concentration on getting things right,! And so we set out on our path.
I had been running the Saturday night Greyhound shows for about three months and so our newly formed troupe had lucked into the holy grail; being a good stage, with a fabulous sound system, and on the best night of the week – a Saturday.
Showbags debuted on the roof of the Xchange Hotel, in 2000, during a Commercial Road Fair, after a ‘dress rehearsal’ at the Glasshouse Hotel the night before. I cheekily promoted our show at the Greyhound to the Xchange roof show audience, (“We’re the Showbags. We’re on stage at 11 at the Greyhound Hotel”), and enough people heard me that we managed a great crowd for our actual opening night at the Greyhound.
From that night, word spread, and within 3 months our audience had grown from a hundred or so, to 300, and was continuing to grow until we were regularly attracting 600 plus patrons to our Saturday shows. All this just 6 months after our first show.
Linda Lamont left to travel the world after Show 4, and Vivienne St James joined the cast for the next 3 shows at the Greyhound. Show 8 only lasted 3 weeks on stage before Jessica and I quit the Greyhound. Vivien chose to remain at the Greyhound and Viv went on to be Melbourne’s most admired and talented performance artists. Vivien perfectly reflected the U.S. Pageant Queen circuit and in Melbourne she was a sensation.
So once again we needed a new member. Luck had found us again, and so, we were joined by a very talented drag queen we’d gotten to know through the Early Shows at the Greyhound, Miss Bunny.
After the Greyhound, we had a few short seasons at the Xchange. Most notably presenting our ‘Red Curtain‘ show from our preevious Wednesday nights at the Greyhound. The Xchange was adamant there be no dead time on stage – which killed our musical ‘chasers’. Luckily we were rescued with video from Skye Brooks replacing our audio ‘chasers’ from the Greyhound production. Skye also worked with us providing video for ‘Glitz’ our first new show at the Xchange.
The Xchange season gave us the impetus to try for our own venue. which turned out to be the Newmarket Hotel in St Kilda. They had a Saturday night free, and we named our night ‘PINK‘.
We tried to continue the ‘old’ Greyhound community feel, before a vast empty space turned it into a nightclub. We took the same formula we’d used there: Jessica’s amazing costumes, our erratic choreography, GuyDJ music, Drag shows for baby drags and for icons. (The renowned Host of Melbourne’s Les Girls, Stan Munro, did his final Victorian performance on our PINK stage just as Melbourne legend from Pokeys and Les Girls, Debra Le Gaye, had given hers on the Greyhound stage.)
Showbags had expanded to four, with Miss Bunny and Linda Lamont with Jessica and me. After a few seasons together, Miss Bunny and Linda were again travelling. We became a trio again when we were joined by Roxy Bullwinkle, a talented dressmaker and stage presence with a quirky sense of humour.
Whilst this was going on, over in Collingwood, we presented a weekly night called ‘Spag and Drag‘, which was also where we made our:
Meanwhile, PINK struggled to find an audience and despite the hard work of everyone involved, the day came when we were trying ‘one last show’ to see if we could keep the doors open.
The one last show was an idea Jess had had been thinking about for a long time. It combined all the elements that we had been working on; narrative, comedy core and, for want of a better word, authenticity. This was ‘The Sound of Music Drag Show’ (and it needed a larger cast,)
I tried to make PINK inclusive and open, with the same philosophy that had made the Greyhound a community in the early days, and so with this spirit, a few of our regular drag queens put together their own show and cleverly called themselves ‘The Manly Sisters’. And so Jillette, Jackie and Kris Del Vayze joined the Showbags cast, and Drags Aloud was born.
In many ways Showbags opened the final chapter on a drag industry in Melbourne that had started with Les Girls.
There had been a similar media fascination with Showbags and the Greyhound. Like Les Girls, we received mainstream press coverage and The Age Newspaper reviewed our Christmas Show, (possibly their first every drag show review), and this led to a two page spread on the ‘Greyhound phenomenon’ .
Warren Gooch put together a touring show featuring Melbourne drag queens as popstar icons, (Madonna, Tina Turner, etc) which took Melbourne’s younger drag queens to the suburbs and country towns. The revitalised drag scene in Melbourne, which had started with Showbags, continued with the Greyhound and Xchange competing with opulent shows reminiscent of the Pokeys days. and seems to have lasted until the Greyhound was renovated and became a nightclub.
The Greyhound was demolished in 2017. The Xchange closed in 2011. The dedicated drag talent, audience and fans have found their options few and far between, and the drag centre of Melbourne has moved to Sircuit, Mollie’s Bar and the ’86’ in Fitzroy. Unfortunately, the dinner theatre venue “Vaud’vile Drag Cabaret” run by Bumpa Love has closed. The positive side, is that drag is now on the entertainment lists for everything from Hens parties to major Product Launches, but the traditional ‘Priscilla’ shows are few and far between.
RuPaul has revolutionised the drag world and the old ‘homegrown’ versions of drag have been internationalised. The distinctive Melbourne drag scene is now built upon and based upon the RuPaul drag industry. Drag has been globalised, and the Drag Race shows have informed the world about drag. Drag is no longer peripheral but a recognised art form which is featuring in every major media outlet – from advertising to film and even publishing. (Melbourne star Art Simone, for example, has a book on Australian Drag Queens.
So as the stars aligned for us and our little drag show from a run-down hotel in St Kilda, presented by a group of amateur drag queens (except Jess who had more drag experience than the rest of the cast combined), was invited to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Scotland.
Drags Aloud was international.