It’s About Time Drag Kings Took Centre Stage: Manish Interest

Fresh off of the biggest Drag King float at Sydney WorldPride, Manish Interest is booked, busy, and ready to transform the queer landscape.

Star Observer sat down with Madhuraa, also known by their stage name Manish Interest, to uncover this up-and-coming, gender-blending Drag artist’s origin story.

Having been on stage since they were only four years old, performing in the Indian dance style Bharatanatyam, Madhuraa discovered a new artform during the 2020 lockdowns –Drag!

“I started doing the makeup and stuff in my bedroom. I was posting a bit online and my friend took me to a Drag show. I haven’t looked back since then,” Madhuraa recounts.

Drag Kings and Gender-Bending

Over the past three years, Madhuraa’s drag persona, Manish, has helped them find new meaning in their queer identity.

“I had a lot of unwritten rules about what I could and couldn’t do before. Drag unlocked this complete other side of me that I had been really repressing for so long. Being able to explore my masculinity has led me to now, today, living as a gender fluid person.”

Kings existing in the gender-bending world of drag is by no means a new concept. Madhuraa notes, “in queer history, male impersonation has existed for so long.”

But, as misogyny would have it, Drag Kings have not always experienced the same mainstream attention as their royal counterpart. With pop-culture representation such as RuPaul’s Drag Race often excluding Kings from the production, Madhuraa has found it more difficult to find bookings.

Selective Diversity ‘It’s a double-edged sword’

Madhuraa also incorporates their Sri Lankin Tamil heritage into Manish’s performance, which has come with its own set of challenges. “I dance the traditional Indian style of dancing, Bharatanatyam, and there are definitely spaces where that’s not what they’re looking for. Me being very cultural or political can be a turn off.” Madhuraa also highlights the selective diversity that can unfortunately arise when trying to spotlight diverse talent.

“It’s a double-edged sword. Some people will want to book me because they need a brown person in their lineup, but that doesn’t feel good. I can almost always tell when that is the case. There’s a difference between hiring someone as a token and looking at the show you’re producing and wanting diverse performers and wanting to elevate different types of art.”

‘I’ve Never Seen Anything Like That’

Creating and maintaining inclusive, queer spaces has always been integral to Drag. Madhuraa agrees, “so much of drag is going outside of the norm and representing something different and so many people have been affirmed by seeing that.” They continue to recall their own experiences finding community within Drag spaces, “I’ve had experiences where fellow brown queers will come up to me after shows and be like ‘I’ve never seen anything like that, I love what you’re doing.’ Seeing someone like you on the stage doing something that is representative of your culture fills you with this incredible feeling of not being alone, which I think we are constantly searching for as people.”

Madhuraa has used their performance and platform to spotlight their political and cultural messages, such as bringing awareness to the Sri Lanka financial crisis that was largely ignored by mainstream media. However, at Manish Interest’s core is the desire to advocate for queer and trans joy, “just because you’re a marginalised person doesn’t mean you always have to be fighting the good fight. I do a bit of both, and I really hope to show other people like me that we can still have fun on stage and be sexy and funny as well.”

Madhuraa is contouring their way into this evolving industry and hopes to continue elevating people in their community. When asked where they see their career heading, they simply state, “I hope I get to do Drag for a long time into the future because I do love it. And I hope I get to keep interacting with the beautiful community that surrounds drag and help uplift others in the community as well.”