Europe’s Game-Changing Bearded Lady

Europe’s Game-Changing Bearded Lady
BY WINSTON ROSS 12/27/14 AT 6:01 PM
ConchitaWurst
Wurst belts her ballad “Rise Like a Phoenix” at the 2014 Almdüdler Trachtenpärchen Ball in Vienna, Austria. WINSTON ROSS

Filed Under: Culture, Conchita Wurst, Eurovision, LGBT, Television
Eleven hours after my plane touched down in Austria, one miscommunication about the difference between Friday and Saturday and a frantic search for lederhosen in the non-negotiable final minutes of shopkeepers’ hours in Vienna and I arrived at the eighth annual Almdudler Trachtenpärchen Ball, hoping no one will notice that my socks didn’t match my leather knickers, awaiting like everyone else here the arrival of Conchita Wurst, the Queen of Austria.

They don’t call her the Queen of Austria because she is a drag queen. They call her that because she has in the past nine months become one of this country’s biggest stars. Wurst ranked seventh in Google searches worldwide in 2014, just in front of ISIS and just behind Flappy Bird. It's an improbable rise to fame for the man beneath the gown—25-year-old Tom Neuwirth, who has since 2011 taken the stage in one dazzling gown after another and with a full, black beard. This country still yearning to escape its Nazi shadow is not known for its tolerance, and yet somehow, a bearded lady has seized the Zeitgeist. In May, Wurst won the Austrian stage of Europe’s older and more successful American Idol—the Eurovision song contest, in Copenhagen—and now she smiles for flashbulbs everywhere she goes.

The “Almdudler” in Almdudler Trachtenpärchen Ball refers to its sponsor, the country’s hottest lemonade brand. (Lemonade is a big deal here.) Trachtenpärchen translates roughly to “costumed couples.” So this was costume party thrown by a lemonade company, held in Vienna’s stupendous City Hall, the Rathaus. And that’s about all I knew before fastening a half-dozen buttons on my almond-colored lederhosen, looping the attached suspenders over a poplar shirt and strolling up the red-carpeted stairs to the main stage with a date I met an hour earlier (via Tinder.)

Subscribe to Newsweek Today: Offers

“The Queeeeen of Austria!” came the introduction in German from Russkaja’s lead, Georgij Makazaria, and her fans went wild as she glided onto the stage in a shimmering black gown, her curly midnight locks barely covering her broad shoulders. She opened the first of a mostly cover song set with her original “Rise Like a Phoenix,” which has been viewed 17 million times on YouTube:

Peering from the mirror
No, that isn’t me
Stranger getting nearer
Who can this person be

[chorus]

Rise like a phoenix
Out of the ashes
Seeking rather than vengeance
Retribution
You were warned
Once I’m transformed
Once I’m reborn

Her audience, comprised of the most traditional-looking Austrians you could hope to assemble in one place, sang along with every word, shouting Zugabe! at the end of her set, pleading for an encore.

A few months ago, most Austrians found Wurst a curiosity at best, a monstrosity at worst. But when she became their contestant, when she went to Eurovision as this country’s representative, they rooted for her as a matter of national pride.

The audience of Eurovision has trended rainbow for much of its 58-year history, so you could argue that Wurst’s victory says little about Austria, that it merely shows that a bunch of people who love gays, lesbians and transgenders voted for one of them.

But that would be a short-sighted analysis, say gay rights activists across Europe. Yes, there were petitions to edit her out of Eurovision footage in Russia, Belarus and Armenia, and yes, some Russians shaved their beards in protest, and yes, two city councilors from the Russian city of Murmansk campaigned for reelection “against loudmouths and gays” in a six-second video that features cartoon images of Wurst. Of those who have watched her YouTube version of “Rise Like a Phoenix,” nearly half gave it a thumbs down. Commenters call Wurst a “perverted freak,” wonder “Why is that even legal?!” and declare it “Einfach abartig”—simply disgusting.

But she won with the help of some notoriously anti-gay countries. Wurst placed second among voters from Armenia, whose finalist publicly promised to “help her figure out if she is a man or a woman.” And in Russia, which this year passed a law banning the distribution of “gay propaganda” to minors, Wurst came in third. A week after that performance I attended at the lemonade ball, gay rights supporters in Belgrade held a pride parade for the first time since a 2010 event was broken up by violent hooligans chucking stones and molotov cocktails at the police assigned to protect marchers. This year, the parade was safe and attended by the mayor of Belgrade and several high-profile ministers.

Europe is changing, and Conchita Wurst is both beneficiary and agent of that change. Her stardom is proof that Austria is willing to love someone different. Now’s she’s been elevated to a global stage. She fields interview requests from international media outlets, headlined Pride events in London, Madrid and Stockholm, did a fashion photo shoot with Karl Lagerfeld, a voice-over (as snow owl Eva) for the German language version of Dreamworks’ Penguins of Madagascar television show and performed before the European Parliament.

Conversations about Wurst address not just whether it’s OK to be gay but what it even means to be a man or a woman, and whether we should rethink the whole concept. It’s a remarkable achievement for a small-town boy whose classmates once called him “faggot” for showing up at school in clothes surreptitiously borrowed from his female cousins and his mom. And while Wurst loathes the idea that she has become some kind of political figure, she is a big influence in Europe, with a big microphone.

“Conchita has an opportunity to talk about these complicated issues in a way that opens up space, inspiring new conversations and making people uncomfortable,” says Ian Lekus, an LGBT rights specialist with Amnesty International USA. “We have a lot of work to do to explain that drag performance and transgender are not identical, for example, although they are related in terms of conscious and unconscious performance of gender roles. But they do in various different ways force us to confront that gender is complicated and fluid.”

Three days after the lemonade ball, Wurst met me in a small cafe a few blocks from Vienna’s touristy Naschmarkt, wearing clothes from Zara and H&M: a black bra visible beneath her see-through blouse, a long leather jacket and leather pants, her black wig perfectly styled and her beard perfectly trimmed. She is now one of the most famous people in Austria and is well-known throughout Europe, too, but when she tells me “It’s nice to meet you!” I believe it.

(When in drag, as she was for this and all interviews, Wurst prefers to be referred to as a woman. When at home, or when grocery shopping, he returns to Tom Neuwirth, a man, “a lazy boy,” and is refered to as “he.”)

Neuwirth grew up in the town of Bad Mitterndorf in the Styrian countryside. That’s not in the most conservative or racist parts of this country of 8.4 million people, but not the more liberated Vienna, either. “You have some moments of your life where it’s a bit tough to be happy,” she says.

As far back as Neuwirth can remember, he liked boys, but he had little idea what that meant, or how to describe it. He had only the sense that it was somehow wrong to feel the way he did.

Still, young Tom borrowed girls’ clothing, and entertained himself by playing dress-up and singing Disney songs in the attic. Not because he wanted to be a woman, but just because he liked to act like one. By 12 or 13, he had worked up the nerve to wear dresses to school, enduring daily taunts from his puzzled classmates. It was painful, Wurst says now, but only until he realized who he was, until he became “secure enough to say, ‘Yeah, I’m gay, so what’s next? You want a kiss?’”

As far back as he can remember, Neuwirth wanted to be a performer. He memorized all the songs to Disney’s The Little Mermaid, and “If there was a stage, I was on it.” His first “break” was in 2007, in a “casting show” (what they call reality TV here) called Starmania. In a promotional interview before the show aired, a journalist asked him about his love life. “I had two options—either I lie, and lie to myself, or be true to who I am,” he says. “I decided to just say [that I was gay] and then I went home to my mom and said ‘Mom, I’m gay, and next Wednesday everyone will know it.’”

Neuwirth’s parents weren’t happy about it, but mostly because he’d outed himself so publicly. They owned a hotel in town and worried the news might be bad for business. Over time, though, his parents both became supporters. And Neuwirth grew more bold.

At 18, sure his appearance on the casting show had made him a big enough star to drop out of school, he quit, and “waited for offers.” The first was to join a boy band, which Neuwirth knew wasn’t likely to suit him. But it was work, and it offered him the chance to sing, and he took it. He hated it. The band, Jetzt Anders! (“now different”) sang in German, and Neuwirth prefers to sing in English. Plus, he wanted the spotlight only on him. After eight months, “nobody cared about us,” and the band broke up.

Three years ago, Neuwirth moved to Vienna and joined a burlesque show, his first foray into performance as a drag queen. It was here he first decided to perform both in women’s clothing and with a beard, back then simply because he preferred the way his face looked with a beard and not because it made some kind of statement. Conchita Wurst, a character Neuwirth imagined to be born in the mountains of Colombia but raised in Austria (she can’t speak Spanish) was born. When she’s not Wurst, he’s Neuwirth, traipsing ab

Результаты (русский) 1:

Europe’s Game-Changing Bearded LadyBY WINSTON ROSS 12/27/14 AT 6:01 PM ConchitaWurstWurst belts her ballad “Rise Like a Phoenix” at the 2014 Almdüdler Trachtenpärchen Ball in Vienna, Austria. WINSTON ROSS Filed Under: Culture, Conchita Wurst, Eurovision, LGBT, TelevisionEleven hours after my plane touched down in Austria, one miscommunication about the difference between Friday and Saturday and a frantic search for lederhosen in the non-negotiable final minutes of shopkeepers’ hours in Vienna and I arrived at the eighth annual Almdudler Trachtenpärchen Ball, hoping no one will notice that my socks didn’t match my leather knickers, awaiting like everyone else here the arrival of Conchita Wurst, the Queen of Austria.They don’t call her the Queen of Austria because she is a drag queen. They call her that because she has in the past nine months become one of this country’s biggest stars. Wurst ranked seventh in Google searches worldwide in 2014, just in front of ISIS and just behind Flappy Bird. It's an improbable rise to fame for the man beneath the gown—25-year-old Tom Neuwirth, who has since 2011 taken the stage in one dazzling gown after another and with a full, black beard. This country still yearning to escape its Nazi shadow is not known for its tolerance, and yet somehow, a bearded lady has seized the Zeitgeist. In May, Wurst won the Austrian stage of Europe’s older and more successful American Idol—the Eurovision song contest, in Copenhagen—and now she smiles for flashbulbs everywhere she goes.«Almdudler» Almdudler Trachtenpärchen мяч относится к его спонсор, горячий лимонад бренда страны. (Лимонад это большое дело здесь). Trachtenpärchen примерно переводится как «ряженые пары.» Так что это был костюмированный бал, бросили компанией лимонад, состоявшейся в Вене в колоссальный мэрии, ратуша. И это все, что я знал Перед креплением полдюжины кнопки на моей миндаля цветные lederhosen, перебирая рубашку тополь прилагаемый подтяжки и прогуливаясь по красным ковром лестнице к главной сцене с датой я встретил час раньше (через трут.)Подписаться на сегодня Newsweek: предложения «Queeeeen Австрии!» пришли введение в Германии от Русская в свинец, Георгий Makazaria, и ее поклонники пошли дикие, как она скользнула на сцену в мерцающих Черное платье, ее фигурные полночь замки, едва охватывающих ее широкие плечи. Она открыла первый в основном охватывают песня с ее оригинальный «расти как Феникс,» который был просмотрен 17 миллионов раз на YouTube:Пиринг с зеркалаНет, это не мнеНезнакомец, получение ближеКто может быть этот человек[припев]Расти как ФениксИз пеплаИщут, а не местиВозмездиеВы были предупрежденыОднажды я превратилКак только я возрождаетсяЕе аудитория, состоящая из наиболее традиционных глядя австрийцев, вы могли бы надеяться собрать в одном месте, пели вместе с каждым словом, выкрикивая призывы! в конце ее набора, сославшись на бис.A few months ago, most Austrians found Wurst a curiosity at best, a monstrosity at worst. But when she became their contestant, when she went to Eurovision as this country’s representative, they rooted for her as a matter of national pride.The audience of Eurovision has trended rainbow for much of its 58-year history, so you could argue that Wurst’s victory says little about Austria, that it merely shows that a bunch of people who love gays, lesbians and transgenders voted for one of them.But that would be a short-sighted analysis, say gay rights activists across Europe. Yes, there were petitions to edit her out of Eurovision footage in Russia, Belarus and Armenia, and yes, some Russians shaved their beards in protest, and yes, two city councilors from the Russian city of Murmansk campaigned for reelection “against loudmouths and gays” in a six-second video that features cartoon images of Wurst. Of those who have watched her YouTube version of “Rise Like a Phoenix,” nearly half gave it a thumbs down. Commenters call Wurst a “perverted freak,” wonder “Why is that even legal?!” and declare it “Einfach abartig”—simply disgusting.But she won with the help of some notoriously anti-gay countries. Wurst placed second among voters from Armenia, whose finalist publicly promised to “help her figure out if she is a man or a woman.” And in Russia, which this year passed a law banning the distribution of “gay propaganda” to minors, Wurst came in third. A week after that performance I attended at the lemonade ball, gay rights supporters in Belgrade held a pride parade for the first time since a 2010 event was broken up by violent hooligans chucking stones and molotov cocktails at the police assigned to protect marchers. This year, the parade was safe and attended by the mayor of Belgrade and several high-profile ministers.Europe is changing, and Conchita Wurst is both beneficiary and agent of that change. Her stardom is proof that Austria is willing to love someone different. Now’s she’s been elevated to a global stage. She fields interview requests from international media outlets, headlined Pride events in London, Madrid and Stockholm, did a fashion photo shoot with Karl Lagerfeld, a voice-over (as snow owl Eva) for the German language version of Dreamworks’ Penguins of Madagascar television show and performed before the European Parliament.Conversations about Wurst address not just whether it’s OK to be gay but what it even means to be a man or a woman, and whether we should rethink the whole concept. It’s a remarkable achievement for a small-town boy whose classmates once called him “faggot” for showing up at school in clothes surreptitiously borrowed from his female cousins and his mom. And while Wurst loathes the idea that she has become some kind of political figure, she is a big influence in Europe, with a big microphone.“Conchita has an opportunity to talk about these complicated issues in a way that opens up space, inspiring new conversations and making people uncomfortable,” says Ian Lekus, an LGBT rights specialist with Amnesty International USA. “We have a lot of work to do to explain that drag performance and transgender are not identical, for example, although they are related in terms of conscious and unconscious performance of gender roles. But they do in various different ways force us to confront that gender is complicated and fluid.”Three days after the lemonade ball, Wurst met me in a small cafe a few blocks from Vienna’s touristy Naschmarkt, wearing clothes from Zara and H&M: a black bra visible beneath her see-through blouse, a long leather jacket and leather pants, her black wig perfectly styled and her beard perfectly trimmed. She is now one of the most famous people in Austria and is well-known throughout Europe, too, but when she tells me “It’s nice to meet you!” I believe it.
(When in drag, as she was for this and all interviews, Wurst prefers to be referred to as a woman. When at home, or when grocery shopping, he returns to Tom Neuwirth, a man, “a lazy boy,” and is refered to as “he.”)

Neuwirth grew up in the town of Bad Mitterndorf in the Styrian countryside. That’s not in the most conservative or racist parts of this country of 8.4 million people, but not the more liberated Vienna, either. “You have some moments of your life where it’s a bit tough to be happy,” she says.

As far back as Neuwirth can remember, he liked boys, but he had little idea what that meant, or how to describe it. He had only the sense that it was somehow wrong to feel the way he did.

Still, young Tom borrowed girls’ clothing, and entertained himself by playing dress-up and singing Disney songs in the attic. Not because he wanted to be a woman, but just because he liked to act like one. By 12 or 13, he had worked up the nerve to wear dresses to school, enduring daily taunts from his puzzled classmates. It was painful, Wurst says now, but only until he realized who he was, until he became “secure enough to say, ‘Yeah, I’m gay, so what’s next? You want a kiss?’”

As far back as he can remember, Neuwirth wanted to be a performer. He memorized all the songs to Disney’s The Little Mermaid, and “If there was a stage, I was on it.” His first “break” was in 2007, in a “casting show” (what they call reality TV here) called Starmania. In a promotional interview before the show aired, a journalist asked him about his love life. “I had two options—either I lie, and lie to myself, or be true to who I am,” he says. “I decided to just say [that I was gay] and then I went home to my mom and said ‘Mom, I’m gay, and next Wednesday everyone will know it.’”

Neuwirth’s parents weren’t happy about it, but mostly because he’d outed himself so publicly. They owned a hotel in town and worried the news might be bad for business. Over time, though, his parents both became supporters. And Neuwirth grew more bold.

At 18, sure his appearance on the casting show had made him a big enough star to drop out of school, he quit, and “waited for offers.” The first was to join a boy band, which Neuwirth knew wasn’t likely to suit him. But it was work, and it offered him the chance to sing, and he took it. He hated it. The band, Jetzt Anders! (“now different”) sang in German, and Neuwirth prefers to sing in English. Plus, he wanted the spotlight only on him. After eight months, “nobody cared about us,” and the band broke up.

Three years ago, Neuwirth moved to Vienna and joined a burlesque show, his first foray into performance as a drag queen. It was here he first decided to perform both in women’s clothing and with a beard, back then simply because he preferred the way his face looked with a beard and not because it made some kind of statement. Conchita Wurst, a character Neuwirth imagined to be born in the mountains of Colombia but raised in Austria (she can’t speak Spanish) was born. When she’s not Wurst, he’s Neuwirth, traipsing ab

Результаты (русский) 3:

Европы Game-Changing рассуждал леди
, Уинстон РОСС 12/27/14 в 18:01
ConchitaWurst
Wurst ремни ее баллады "расти подобно птице феникс" в 2014 году Almdüdler Trachtenpärchen шарик в Вене, Австрия. Уинстон РОСС

подана на основании: культуры, Кончита Wurst, Евровидение, увы, телевидение
одиннадцать часов после того, как в Австрии,Один недопонимания между пятница и суббота и отчаянные поиски lederhosen в необоротной последних минут коммерсантов" часов в Вене, и я прибыл на восьмой ежегодной Almdudler Trachtenpärchen шарик, надеясь никто не будет заметить, что мои носки не совпадают моя кожа knickers, в ожидании как и все здесь прибытия Кончита Wurst,Королева Австрии.ветровому они не позвонить ей королева Австрии потому, что она является перетащите кровать куин-сайз. Они называют ее в том, что из-за того, что она в течение последних девяти месяцев стать одним из этой страны в самых больших звезд. Wurst заняла седьмое место в Google ищет по всему миру в 2014 году, только в передней части ISIS и позади Flappy птицы. Это маловероятно металкор в man под халат - 25-летний Tom Ньюверт выступала