Pageant

The documentary takes up a pageant. The pageant is called Miss Gay America. The contestants come out of the drag scene. The film follows five of them. Each one has a preparation of their own. Costumes, rehearsal and staging are parts of that work. The account goes backstage as well. The rules of the pageant and the competition are inside the film. The daily lives of the contestants are another strand. The differences among the five give the account its depth. The work is put together as a portrait. The pageant gives the account its frame. The preparation is as much its subject as the result. Ron Davis and Stewart Halpern-Fingerhut’s American documentary of 2008 runs eighty five minutes.