Drag queens in the US provinces: The queens of “Queen City”

There they are, the people Republicans warn their children about. A mother looks in their direction, quickly lowers her gaze and hastily pulls her son across the street.

But even from here you can't miss them: five huge drag queens in the middle of the dullest small town America. They blow cigarette smoke into the evening in high spirits; excessive wigs, dresses glittering with sequins, faces made up like dolls and sometimes a wobbly lunge, damn high heels.

The five are nervous, and it is not just because of stage fright before their show in the run-down Embassy Theater in the small town of Cumberland.