CRAIG RUSSELL

FEMALE IMPERSONATOR

Actors vary in the way they approach their profession and the way they present themselves in it. Rock Hudson (see card 24), who was homosexual, played only heterosexual roles. Brad Davis (see card 11), who was heterosexual, played both gay and straight parts. Craig Russell, who was perceived as homosexual (although he was married), played only women, and for a long time he ranked among the best-known and most successful female impersonators in North America.

Born in Toronto, Ontario, about 1948, Craig Russell was drawn to show business when he met the actress Mae West in 1965. He followed her back to Los Angeles and moved into her home there. He worked as her secretary briefly, they fell out, and he returned to Canada to become a hairdresser.

He made his first professional appearance as a performer in a gay club in Toronto where he impersonated the actress Tallulah Bankhead. Other gay icons who were subjects for Russell were Barbra Streisand, Judy Garland, Peggy Lee, and Bette Davis. In the film Outrageous! (1977) he portrayed an extravagant drag queen, and his performance won him an award as best actor at the Berlin Film Festival. At the Virgin Islands Film Festival for the same part in Outrageous! he was given both the awards as Best Actor and Best Actress. The sequel to the film was called Too Outrageous (1987).

In 1981, Russell grew angry with an audience and threw things at them. This lost him some bookings, but his fans remained loyal to him, and in 1982, he married one of them, Lori Jenkins, who survived him when he died of AIDS, October 30, 1990, at the age of 42. Next Card 48: VITO RUSSO: Film Historian, Gay Activist