Frankie Sinatra: 'I was thrown out of my house for being gay'

Drag king, Karen Fischer talks about her tribute to Ol’ Blue Eyes, coming out, the drag king scene and sexism.

“Being alive and being me is a big political act, but that wasn’t my motivation,” Karen said with a smile on her face. She smiled a lot while talking to me, even when mentioning the struggles she overcame. We sat in a small but noisy Starbucks right next to the train station. The choice of location wasn’t accidental. Karen lives down the road, and the Vauxhall Tavern, where she regularly performs, is nearby. Her hair is grey and her eyes are as blue as of the man’s she portrays. She wore a comfortable sweater with a vest on top of it instead of the black suit and fedora she puts on during performances.

Karen is a pioneering drag king in London, known as Frankie Sinatra, and describes herself as a drag-king, party maker, singer and performer.

When asked about becoming a drag king, she explained that she did it because she thought it’d be fun. “My whole life people have called me sir and he, so I thought it’d be nice to just kind of play up to that a little bit, you know and use that for fun. I didn’t do that as a big political act,” she said. She always wanted to do something different and through her good drag queen friend, who gave her a leg-up, she got on stage, performing alongside drag queens. “I thought I could do that, so I did,” she laughed.

Although her motivation was and still is to perform, she admitted that it had become a political statement. “We parody men. It takes piss of masculinity. So I think I do it as a political statement without meaning to, you know,” she said.

Karen started in the 90’s as Georgie Michael but had to stop because there was no market for drag kings. When she had to restart her career four years ago, she didn’t want to do the same character because of “too much facial hair”.  Drawing inspiration from her favourite childhood singer, she came up with Frankie Sinatra.

Before the show, Karen watches Frank Sinatra videos to get in the mood. For about two hours before the show, she prefers not to talk to anybody and be by herself to think “Frank Sinatra thoughts”. When asked about lip syncing, she pretended to be offended but laughed.

“Noooo”, she smirked, “I’m one of the few live singers, excuse me!” She does, in fact, perform live which can come as a surprise. Her voice in real life isn’t as deep as her performing voice, which could trick you into thinking she’s a lip syncer.

I asked her why drag kings weren’t so popular compared to drag queens. She chuckled: “Because we live in a patriarchal world, darling. Men rule everything. Even if they are dressed as women, they will always have more power, they will always be higher up the social status than women.” However, she also talked about how her career was doing well because she dresses as a man, even though she identifies as a woman. “Something in that I find very illuminating as to where we are within society. I like being a woman pushing those boundaries,” she said.

Being a woman wasn’t the only challenge she encountered. When she started, it wasn’t just difficult and unheard of to be a drag king, but it was also hard to be gay. I asked her about her family reaction and she just said “terrible”, but then she leaned towards the recorder “I can’t tell you anymore, come to my show on 8th of March. You will find everything there,” she laughed.

When Karen came out at the age of 16, she had to leave home. She said: “It was very difficult, very challenging. I was thrown out of home for being gay.” Her relationship with family never improved, but she joked saying that she didn’t receive any nasty emails from them.

As for the public criticism, drag kings still remain in the shadows. “I don’t think they (people) even know we exist,” she burst into laughter. When Karen started doing drag, it was very niche. Today, it’s slowly spreading out from the LGBTQ community but not having a mainstream coverage makes it difficult. "RuPaul doesn't want drag kings on drag race. We haven't got that mainstream coverage yet," she said.

However, Karen is hopeful: “I think we’re on the brink of something emerging in the mainstream… Once we’re at level that mainstream can handle, then we’ll break through.” She believes that the society's constant crave for new and exciting will make people want drag king performances.

Karen runs a night out at Vauxhall tavern with the show called Kings of Clubs, with varying drag king performances from lip syncing to magic tricks. “People are amazed. ‘Oh, women are doing something!’ and a lot of trans-men are drawn to be a drag king as well, so it’s very inclusive genre,” she said. She also went on a tour to Wales, Manchester and Brighton. Her shows are topical, relating to the real world issues. But her main message remains unchanged: “Be kind to each other and realise that everybody’s struggling with something you know nothing about.”

With the man-up competition coming up next month, where Karen will be a judge, she gave her last piece of advice to young drag kings. “I just always say be yourself. I can’t tell you anything. I can just say blow your nose before you stick on a moustache, really,” she laughed.