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From the archives

Some Assembly Required?

What could be next for democracy

Very Big in Sheboygan

Why we still love John Candy

Terrors of the Unknown

Adriana Chartrand’s eerie debut

Out of His Own Way

And the rest is drag

Leah Allyce Canali

Outrageous Misfits: Female Impersonator Craig Russell and His Wife, Lori Russell Eadie

Brian Bradley

Dundurn

360 pages, softcover and ebook

Picture it: 1960s Hollywood. The young, fresh-faced president of the Canadian Mae West fan club had just set foot in Los Angeles to meet his idol, befriend her, and become her personal assistant and all-round Agador Spartacus. Craig Eadie had seemingly done the impossible. He’d turned groupie-level infatuation into a real relationship. He’d left Toronto for the City of Angels, where he was brought under the wing of one of its most notorious icons. He needed a change of scene, a place where his talent for impersonation would thrive and his feminine side would be celebrated. And then — imagine — in sashayed Mae West, with an invitation to come up and see her sometime.

West was about to become a new mother — a drag mother, that is. Now picture a makeover montage, with wigs, dresses, jewels, where the star of I’m No Angel delights in turning her young protegé into a funhouse-mirror version of herself: brazen, sensual, and steeped in intrigue. Under her tutelage...

Leah Allyce Canali is a singer, songwriter, and producer, often to be found in Toronto’s Village.

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