An actor in drag, posing for a portrait. Photograph by Mme Yvonne, 194-.

Yvonne A.R.P.S. London

Part of James Gardiner Collection: photograph album labelled ‘Drag’.

He wears a frilly dress and has long dark hair; smiling at the viewer. A publicity photograph for an unidentified performer in 'glamour Dame' costume, at the Windmill Theatre, London, in the 1940s. Drag performances became so popular with British audiences in the mid- to late-1940s that they were even seen on-stage at the Windmill Theatre, a bastion of heterosexual theatrical titillation, which famously "never closed" throughout World War II, and was one of the few theatres in the UK where near-naked showgirls could be seen (James Gardiner)

Item Actions

View At: https://wellcomelibrary.org/item/b20452020
Share
Citation: Cite

Item Information:

Identifier: h989r344p
Collection: James Gardiner 20th Century Drag Postcards
Institution: Wellcome Library
Date Issued: 1940 to 1949?
Genre: Photographs
Prints
Topic(s): Female impersonators
Resource Type: Still Image
Analog Format: 1 photograph : photoprint ;
Rights: Copyright undetermined
For more information on copyright, please read our policies