The Sickening Ball is serving Halloween realness, drag queen style
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15.10.2019

The Sickening Ball is serving Halloween realness, drag queen style

There’ll be nowhere freakier this Halloween than the Sickening Ball, hosted by iconic RuPaul’s Drag Race alumnus, Raven.

Joining Raven for the Sickening Ball tour – which begins in Auckland on October 31 and comes to the Chasers Nightclub in South Yarra on November 2 – are seven queens who defined Drag Race season 11, which was broadcast from February to May this year.

Stephen Craddock’s production company, In The Dark, are the guys behind the sensational Sickening Ball lineup. It’s no surprise, really, as ITD has established itself as Australia’s leading LGBTIQIA+ events company over the last decade.

“We produce monthly tours throughout Australia and New Zealand, bringing you the best talent from RuPaul’s Drag Race and the wider world of drag,” says ITD tour manager, Kirsty Cochrane. “We love to feature local performers to give them access to a new audience and we strive to deliver inclusive events where everyone feels welcome and has a great time.”

Chasers also hosted the 2018 instalment of the Sickening Ball tour, which featured the likes of Sharon Needles, Alaska Thunderfuck and Karen From Finance. This year’s roster of queens is bigger than ever before, but the Ball won’t be an occasion of passive reverence.

“We’re encouraging everyone to come dressed up to have the opportunity to be tooted or booted by the one and only Raven,” says Cochrane.

Raven was the runner up of both season two of Drag Race and season one of Drag Race All Stars. She also works as RuPaul’s makeup artist and has accrued plenty of experience compéring drag-stravaganzas in her home city of Los Angeles.

“Raven hosts the weekly Show Girls night perhaps the most famous gay bar in the world,” Cochrane says. “She’s hilarious on the mic and you better watch out if you’re in the first few rows because she’ll be reading you to filth.”

Seven contestants from Drag Race season 11 are making the trip down for the tour. These include the finalists A’keria C. Davenport and Silky Nutmeg Ganache, who narrowly lost out to Yvie Oddly and Brooke Lynn Hytes.

A’keria has been going from strength to strength since the series wrapped up. After appearing in Taylor Swift’s ‘You Need to Calm Down’ video, in late August she performed with Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards.

The Sickening Ball lineup also includes New York City pageantry queen, Honey Davenport, plus Mercedes Iman Diamond, Nina West, Ra’Jah O’Hara and Shuga Cain. Vulture recently listed all eight of the visiting queens in their list of America’s top 100 Most Powerful Drag Queens.

“All of the season eleven girls are very unique performers,” says Cochrane. “Some of them are trained dancers, others are comedy queens. We let them do what they do best and it always makes for an exciting show.”

As for whether the performers are going to be working in coordination at all, Cochrane says we’ll “have to wait and see”. She can, however, confirm that, “you’ll definitely be left wanting to do the Monster Mash”.

The Sickening Ball promises horrific performances from Raven and the season eleven stars, so punters, be warned that things could very well get gory. The Halloween theme will be inescapable, says Cochrane.

“The queens will be bringing Halloween realness and with everyone dressing up, it’ll be spooktacular.”

ITD places great importance on cultivating an inclusive, expressive and creative environment at all of its events. Sickening Ball revellers can take comfort in the fact they’ll be free to go to town on their outfits and not feel in danger of being judged.

“Creating an inclusive environment is very important to us and we find that our community really embraces this,” says Cochrane. “We’ve had all sorts of looks over the years, from a little bit of face paint all the way up to fully realised elaborate costumes. Halloween is truly an opportunity to let your freak flag fly.”

The Sickening Ball comes to Chasers Nightclub in South Yarra on Saturday November 2. Grab your tickets via the ITD Events website, itdevents.com.