Feast of Fun : Gay Talk Show

Make no mistake about it: Stonewall was a riot. Windows were broken, protesters were beaten and the neighborhood was trashed all to let the police and the mob controlled bars know that queer folks weren’t going to take it anymore. Today, the long time theater editor for the Chicago Reader Albert Williams, joins us to talk about planning and attending the first Pride March in Chicago and how it connects with the Black Lives Matter Protests happening now. The following June, which is 50 years ago this month, those legendary riots were commemorated with LGBT marches that are now known as the Pride Parade.

One of Netflix's most heartwarming new reality TV shows is the competitive floral design series, The Big Flower Fight, where ten teams of plant enthusiasts are challenged to create larger-than-life plant and flower installations to win top prize- Best in Bloom. Today Henck Röling and Yan Skates, the wildly creative and costumed contestants from the show join us to spill the herbal tea on their friendships and shady rivalries between contestants on the show.

Comedian Matt Brown says it’s hard to be in an interracial relationship, with himself. He recently posted that “the black man and white woman that live in my head have been arguing this week” and it’s stressing him out. Part of him wants to visit the beauty salon and the other half wants to see the world burn while he sits on the couch. Today Matt Brown joins us to chat about being a biracial child who couldn’t fully embrace his blackness until he was a young adult.

After auditioning for nine seasons of RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nina West was ready to throw in the make up smeared towel when she finally got that life changing phone call. We all could see it in her eyes on every episode of Drag Race “I can’t believe I’m finally here.” Nina went on to win people’s hearts and became Miss Congeniality. Today Nina West, from RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 11 joins us to talk about her adventures after becoming Miss Congeniality. This Friday Nina passes on the torch to this season's winner. Will this season’s winner be ready for the crown?

Considering how important it is to give blood, every donor should be greeted with a pizza party when they give a pint of blood to a complete stranger. Instead, some blood donors still get turned away if they answer yes to being men who have sex with other men. Today gay rights activist JD Miller joins us to look at why the ban on gay blood donation persists even with its devastating impact on everyone’s health.

With all the gloom and doom surrounding the Rona, Lady Bunny’s twisted humor makes her an essential worker. But some wonder, haven’t we suffered enough? Today, the deranged and demented Lady Bunny gives us a sneak peek into CUNTAGIOUS, her half hour comedy special. In what may be your last good laugh before the apocalypse, Bunny parodies songs by Lizzo, Justin Bieber, Madonna and even Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee’s Despacito.

We’re just crazy about Tommy Walton, who Chef Gordon Ramsay said was one of the most memorable people on his reality TV cooking competition MasterChef. Today we chat with Chef Tommy Walton about his stint on reality TV, his wild fashion sensibility and how he managed to convince one of the contestants that he was a vampire.

Mike Ruiz is a world renowned celebrity and fashion photographer who’s worked with the world’s top brands and entertainers, but we’ll always know him best as the director of one of our favorite cult films, Starrbooty. Today Mike Ruiz joins us to take a look back at directing RuPaul’s outrageous cult film Starrbooty which gave us the notorious filter for season one of Drag Race and being the April/May cover stud for Out Magazine.

In the latest and quite possibly final installment of the series, The Last Sharknado: It’s About Time, one of our favorite drag queens, Alaska Thunderfuck, death drops for her life. Today Alaska Thunderfuck joins us to take a bite out of The Last Sharknado film and to talk about playing the daughter of Star Trek’s Marina Sirtis in the movie.

One of our favorite tv shows from the late 70s was NBC’s Real People, a celebration of everyday people doing extraordinary things like a guy who ate soil, a one-legged man who ran across Canada and a couple who owned a roadside store that offered a million dollar pencil for sale. Real People was by an ensemble that included the recently departed comedian Fred Willard, the show put a spotlight on people’s triumphs and helped introduce eccentric goofballs like Richard Simmons. Today Brian Sweeney breaks his silence to take a look at the life of comedy legend Fred Willard.

Comedy has an amazing power to heal, and Jackie Beat and Sherry Vine’s brilliant video series is getting us through the worst of the quarantine by bringing back to life some of our favorite sitcoms and campy film stars. From Joan Crawford chastising Christina via video Facetime, to Stephen King’s Carrie getting berated by her twisted Trump loving mother, Jackie Beat along with her pals Sherry Vine, Mario Diaz, and Alaska Thunderfuck put the sickoning into sitcom. Today Jackie Beat joins us from her home in LA to talk about her quarantine parodies of Three’s Company, Carrie, Mommie Dearest and The Golden Girls presented into a whole new genre: video conferencing sitcom.

Coco Peru’s new one drag queen show touches on some intense issues-  living with regret, isolation, social media and aging. Amazingly, she always finds the humor in some pretty tough topics. Today Coco Peru joins us from to talk about surviving these tough times we are living in.

Since the beginning of Hollywood, crossdressers have had their place in film as either a comedic foil or as a threatening monster. In mainstream movies like Mrs. Doubtfire and Tootsie, the straight men dress up in drag to win hearts or get a fabulous job but rarely do they show the boys dressing as girls just for the fun of it. Today, Miss Understood, one of the drag queens from the film Too Wong Foo, joins us to look at ways drag queens are portrayed in Hollywood films, what they got right and what they got wrong.

After Hattie McDaniel won an Academy Award in 1940 for her role in Gone with the Wind, it would be another 50 years before another African American woman, Whoopie Golberg in Ghost, would snatch an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress. But what if you could go back in time and rewrite Hollywood’s history to be more black, queer and feminist? Listen as we chat with comic Matt Brown about the magical revisionism of Murphy’s series which showcases vintage Hollywood in all it’s gay glamour and sexy shenanigans.

One of the biggest changes in the age of the Rona is our fashion. Folks are still trying to express themselves in their video teleconferences and sometimes the results are hilarious. Pants? What are pants? Folks wear pajamas all day long, heads are shaved and if they go outside at all, they look like bank robbers. Today comedian Amanda Cohen, best known as one of the most challenging people to appear on the makeover reality TV show What Not to Wear joins us to take a look at fashion in the age of Coronavirus.