[This story appears in the September/October 2021 issue of Boston Spirit magazine. Subscribe for free today.]
“Disneyworld might be the happiest place on Earth,” says Richard Weber, “but Renaissance fairs are the most welcoming.”
Weber knows whereof he speaks. He has been performing at King Richard’s Faire, which runs weekend Sept. 4–Oct. 24 in Carver, Mass. Weber’s played a part there since the earliest years of the 1982-founded annual festival. Every year, King Richard’s brings together thousands of visitors for a series of woodsy fall weekends full of fun. There are historic reenactments and era-appropriate costumery, lots of live entertainment—from magic shows to interactive theater to jousting on horseback—and plenty of munching on mammoth roasted turkey legs.
For the last few decades, Weber has been performing at the fair as Sir Percival Degagé, a character who is something of a foppish, eccentric dandy. The gay actor has chatted up countless guests on the midway as “Percy” over the years, and the persona has made him a Paul Lynde-like ambassador of queer sensibility to Joe and Jane Q. Public. For that reason, it’s also been a unique opportunity to gauge how public attitudes toward LGBTQ people have evolved over the years.
One thing, though, has remained pretty consistent according to Weber, who has performed at similar fairs across the country, as well as the other performers and staff members at King Richard’s: Renaissance culture, in general, has attained a reputation for particularly inviting—and being populated by!—LGBTQ folks. Why? Who can say. Although it probably has something to do with how many of the performers come out of the theater world, especially those disciplines with a vaudeville bent. And when you think about it, what is a Renaissance fair, with all its costumed, fully fleshed-out characters, if not an extremely elaborate medieval drag show?
As King Richard’s kicks off its 40th anniversary season in September, it’s the perfect time to check out this annual event with a surprisingly rich queer community at its heart. “A huge part of the actors and staff is made up of LGBTQ family,” says Kirk Simpson, a longtime Renaissance fair enthusiast who has been playing King Richard himself there for years. Simpson was a self-described “geek” when he was growing up, a closeted kid who immersed himself in Dungeons & Dragons. At King Richard’s Faire, though, he and his friends found an accepting family of folks who were similarly comfortable at the fringe. “It’s always been a safe space,” says Simpson, who even recalls being gifted with a bear flag-inspired bracelet from one guest. “When you step through those gates, you can be whoever you want without judgment.”
For that reason, it’s also been a place where anyone, including younger visitors, is able to play with identity, dress, and gender in ways that might not feel comfortable elsewhere. Simpson has seen a lot of parents playing with sons in princess costumes, for instance, and at one point the fair’s Queen Mum was portrayed by one of the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, an order of dragged-out queer nuns. Although there’s bound to be representation from LGBTQ actors, staffers and guests just about any time the fairground is open, Columbus Day Weekend has become a bit of an unofficial gay weekend, according to Ryan Roy, production director at King Richard’s. It’s no coincidence that some bear groups and other queer contingents happen to show up the same weekend that the fair stages its annual Men in Kilts Contest, a crowd-pleasing show of shirtless “Highland and Celtic hunks.”
That said, this year’s strapping lineup has plenty more fun on the agenda, and the eight stages, spread over 80 acres, will be filled with all manner of acrobats and aerialists, pipers and lute players and Irish bands, canine acrobats, fire-eaters and frolicking fairies—in more ways than one.
To that point, don’t hold back when you visit. If there’s one thing that you can rely on at a Renaissance fair, it’s that there will always be an appreciative audience for colorful characters. That means you, says Roy, who spent time behind the bars of several Boston-area clubs like Paradise and Ramrod before running the shows at King Richard’s.
“There’s a line that, ‘It’s always someone’s first Pride,’” Roy says. “Well, I always tell our actors, ‘It’s always someone’s first fair, too.’”
For more: kingrichardsfaire.net
Not a subscriber? Sign up today for a free subscription to Boston Spirit magazine, New England’s premier LGBT magazine. We will send you a copy of Boston Spirit 6 times per year and we never sell/rent our subscriber information. Click HERE to sign up!
