On Wesley Snipesās role Noxeema and John Leguizamo as Chi-Chi Rodriguez.
āI grew up in the ā70s and even within the street culture, there was a lot of flamboyancy,ā Snipes told TODAY of his perception of drag before filming. āPimps wore the same furs as theprostitutes wore.
āSome of the great musicians of the world, like Parliament-Funkadelic, were very androgynous. So it wasnāt really new for me to see men dressed as women or men dressed as drag queens.ā
Snipes attended the famed LaGuardia High School of Performing Arts and then State University of New York at Purchase. He wasnāt a dance major, but most of his friends were. āThat exposed me to the world of glam, vogue, drag, transgender and gay people, LGBTQā¦ but it wasnāt in fashion those days. But it existed and I was around it.ā
Not only did āPriscilla, Queen of the Desertā pave the way for āTo Wong Foo,ā so did films like the 1968 documentary āThe Queenā and āParis Is Burning,ā the 1990 doc that chronicled ball culture of New York and the various Black and queer communities involved in it.
Even though he was known for his action roles, Snipesā portrayal of Noxeema wasnāt the first time he played a drag queen. In 1986, he made his Broadway debut in the play āExecution of Justice,ā playing Sister Boom Boom, a real-life AIDS activist and drag nun who acted as the showās voice of conscience. Snipes pointed out, āSister Boom Boom did not have Noxeemaās makeup kit.ā
On whether he got any pushback for stepping into Noxeemaās pumps, he said, āNot so much professionally but the streets werenāt feeling it, and there were certain community circles. The martial arts communityā¦ they were not feeling it at all.ā
āIn fact, when the movie came out and they would come down the street, I would see them in Brooklyn sometimes, they started listing all my movies. I noticed they would always skip that one. I would correct them, āNow you donāt got the full count!āā
Lesser-known than his co-stars at the time, Lequizamo didnāt really anticipate becoming a transgender icon, but he did know that they were working on something special when they started filming.
āDrag didnāt really exist in movies,ā Lequizamo, who was nominated for a Golden Globe for his portrayal, told TODAY. āThere were straight men pretending to be women to get out of trouble or into trouble but this was not that. I was trying to make Chi-Chi a real life trans character and Patty and Wesley were trying to be real drag queens.ā Never fully articulated in the film, Chi-Chi Rodriguez has always been perceived as transgender, something that ending up making an indelible mark on LGBTQ people in the late ā90s as trans representation in media was limited.
āChi-Chi was a trans icon, but she also showed us that gay men and trans women can both perform and work in drag side by side, and that those relationships are symbiotic,ā Cayne explained.
āIt was a powerful thing. I get lots of fan mail from LGBTQ teens telling me how my character helped them come out to their parents,ā Leguizamo said. āThey didnāt feel like they were seen, so that was a beautiful gift from the movie.ā
Lequizamo also articulates that if āTo Wong Fooā were cast today, a trans actor should be cast in his role. (And that just may happen, since Beane is developing a musical for Broadway.)
āAnybody can play anything, but the playing field is not fair that way,ā he said. āNot everybody is allowed to play everything. So until we get to that place, it is important for trans actors to get a chance to act which they donāt. In the project Iām doing, Iām making sure that the person playing trans is a trans person so we can make it legit, make it real. That just needs to be done right now.ā
Source: How Hollywood heartthrobs and Steven Spielberg helped make a drag queen cult classic
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