Read an Excerpt
DRAFT
Chapter One: All of Me
Lori Jenkins had planned a way to meet Craig Russell for weeks.
It was February 1978 and Craig was set to be a guest at a concert at the hip and happening El Mocambo club on Spadina Avenue in Toronto. Lori dropped everything to go. At last she could meet the man she adored. It was a great opportunity to show him the tapestry she had made of his likeness. Maybe she could give it to him. At the very least, she could tell him how much she loved him.
Lori was a high school student with a love for the drama club when she first heard about Craig Russell, an impressionist of Hollywood’s greatest female entertainers. Craig was making a name for himself in the world then, taking his one-of-a-kind act on the road with a packed touring schedule across North America, Europe and the United Kingdom. He also had a starring role in the just-released, critically acclaimed film Outrageous. He’d come a long way from his Mae West Fan Club and Toronto drag show days. Lori was hooked before she even saw him perform.
When a project came up in Lori’s art class, she chose Craig as her subject. She spent weeks carefully sewing a tapestry of Craig as Mae West, Barbra Streisand and Carol Channing, using colourful thread, feathers, sequins and rhinestones. She called it “All About Craig,” a play on the title of the film All About Eve. Lori was so proud of the final product she had her brother take photos on slide film before she submitted the tapestry to be included in a student installation at the Art Gallery of Ontario.
Lori loved the whole entertainment scene —art, drama and music —but preferred live theatre. It didn’t matter to her whether it was gay or straight, and she did not discriminate in her choice of venues. She saw A Chorus Line at the Royal Alexandra Theatre, David Bowie at Maple Leaf Gardens, Shirley MacLaine at the O’Keefe Centre and B.B. King at the Ontario Place Forum. Café des Copains was her favourite cabaret theatre and Club David’s was her favourite disco.
When she wasn’t out at a venue somewhere downtown, Lori loved to watch popular talk shows hosted by Alan Hamel and Brian Linehan to see the biggest stars. She liked the interviews so much she’d make notes about them in her journal. She wrote most of her entries backwards. It was an act of defiance to her mother, who always told her she was backwards.
When Lori liked an entertainer, she would be consumed. Case in point: When she first saw entertainer Peter Allen on Linehan’s interview show, City Lights, she ran out to Sam the Record Man’s flagship store on Yonge Street to buy all of his albums. Lori listened to them —all of them —in time to see him at the Colonial Tavern jazz club, where she made a request for a song she already knew from memory.
Peter’s flamboyant persona was right up Lori’s alley. She preferred versatile performers, who could sing, act and be funny, but who also had seductive personas and vibrant sexualities that teased at gender norms and sexual identity. She loved Freddie Mercury and David Bowie. Lori was elusive when it came to her own sexuality. A part of her was shy; a part of her liked to keep people guessing.
More than any other art form, Lori loved female impersonators, now better known as drag queens. Drag was thriving in Toronto in the 1960s and 1970s. The St. Charles Tavern, the Manatee, Club 511 and the August Club were popular gay clubs that featured drag on their stages. In clubs that accepted female patrons, Lori saw shows by Canadian drag queens Michelle Du Barry, Georgie Girl, Jackie Loren, Michelle Ross, Murray Cooper, Ronnie Holliday, Danny Love and Rusty Ryan as they were building their careers. She did not see drag as a novelty, or something just gay men did. She respected it as an art form, and put drag performers on the same pedestal as other, more mainstream entertainers.
The El Mocambo was drag friendly, too. It was a hot spot in Toronto in those days. The El Mo was popular among the younger generation who wanted rock ’n’ roll when other clubs played disco. Blondie, The Ramones and Joan Jett played there. The Rolling Stones recorded part of their Love You Live album there in 1977 and made headlines when they partied there with Margaret Trudeau, wife of then-Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau.
Lori was no stranger to the El Mo either, and on February 15, 1978, Peter Allen was on the bill. With Craig rumoured to be a special guest, Lori arrived at the venue early, took a table near the stage and kept her eyes peeled for him. She was so excited she was almost giddy. This was it. This was her chance.
Craig was excited to go, too, but for different reasons. An appearance at the El Mo was a great opportunity for the self-professed “promosexual” to get another mention in newspapers ahead of his planned engagement at the Royal York Hotel later that month. He headed to the club ahead of show time, entourage in tow, hoping to see reporters he knew.
But the first person who spotted him was Lori. Not missing a beat, she zipped over to his table, squeezed by his bodyguard and, in one breath, introduced herself and gave him a photo slide of her “All About Craig” tapestry. She told him she was his biggest fan, explained her artwork with pride and said she wanted him to have it.
Craig took the sudden demand for his attention in stride. He met fans often and was used to having them around at events and parties. He took the time with most, and often invited them to hang around and go on to the next venue with him. He was no different with Lori, but since their time was short, he suggested they exchange phone numbers.
Craig did not have any added interest in this particular fan. He was not attracted to her, and was not looking to take her to bed. Lori did not stand out in that way. She was soap-and-water beautiful. She was plainly dressed, a little masculine, and didn’t look femme at all. She fit right in with the androgynous look so popular then. Her beauty came out in her adoration and enthusiasm; when she was excited, she beamed.
To Lori, all that mattered was this moment. She was obsessed with Craig, just liked Craig had been with his own idol, Mae West. Her entire sense of self-worth at that time was tied to the fact that now this movie star seemed to want to get to know her.
Craig wants the tapestry, she thought. He wants to get to know me. She was so thrilled she documented the exchange in her journal with little mention of Peter’s actual concert at the El Mo that night. Meeting her star was the highlight of her day, her week and her year. Her world had changed.
Lori never did reach Craig by phone to arrange the handing over of her gift. Undeterred, Lori got in touch with his mother, Norma Hurst, and asked to come over for tea. Norma agreed, and a week later, Lori excitedly handed over her tapestry and talked Norma’s ear off. Norma was touched by the gesture but found the whole exchange odd. She gave the tapestry to her sister who, like Lori, documented everything she could about Craig’s career.
Lori met Craig again five months later, in July 1978, when Outrageous screened at the New Yorker Theatre (now the CAA Theatre) on Yonge Street. Craig was away performing in the United States when the film premiered at the 1977 Festival of Festivals in Toronto, so the red carpet was rolled out again for a flashy screening. True to form, Lori knew Craig would be there. She sat through three screenings of the film before he arrived for the fourth.
