In the ballroom of the Sheraton Grand Chicago Riverwalk, beneath the glitter of a disco ball, a DJ is spinning Sisters Are Doin’ It for Themselves while hundreds of people dressed as sitcom characters laugh and scream.
It’s the costume competition at Golden-Con, a convention for fans of The Golden Girls, the Emmy-winning 80s show about the lives and loves of four women of a certain age living together in Miami in a house beset with rattan furniture. The “Blanches” are slinking across the stage in floral leisurewear and pastel negligees, doing their best impressions of the highly sexed fiftysomething southern belle played by Rue McClanahan, a woman who loves to draw attention to her “perky bosoms”.
The competition is fierce. “This is a bloodbath!” exclaims Jason B Schmidt, a member of the drag comedy troupe the Golden Gays, hosting the night’s event. Dressed in a voluminous green velvet skirt suit for his impersonation of Dorothy – the tall, stern teacher played by Bea Arthur – Schmidt barks at a contestant, “Just punch her in the face and she’ll leave!” It is flawless Golden Girls shtick – outrageous and comically offensive.
More than 1,000 people have come from as far away as Australia for these three days of celebration and homage.
On the opening night, they enjoy a performance by another Golden Girls drag troupe – the Golden Gals Live!, starring Ginger Minj of RuPaul’s Drag Race – that is so funny you wish the youth of Tennessee could see it, and cheer a rousing duet of the show’s theme tune, Thank You for Being a Friend. For this, Cynthia Fee, the bluesy original singer, is joined by Aaron Scott, the young man who in 2017 became a social media sensation with his passionate gospel version.
