Earrings can make or break a costume, as any drag queen knows. They can add just the right amount of camp or class and can add just the right touch of authenticity to a costume. For what amounts to a relatively minor detail, all other details can go back to that one. As such, some queens maintain a large collection of earrings in order to be able to facilitate their transformations; even those who specialize in a particular character like a selection of earrings to choose from, allowing them to set the mood for the particular performance. This makes drag queen earrings extremely important.
Creating A Character
Different characters have different costumes, each based on the period of the character in question. One of the first steps to creating a persona based on a person is to look at their general choices in jewelry and fashion. Fashion is relatively simple to master; it is the broad strokes of the character, and those strokes are always the easiest to master. Even the make-up of a particular character is easy to master; there has been enough written about certain people that all of their make-up choices, even their perfume, are easy to uncover.
Jewelry, however, is hard. The key is to find something that resembles what the person actually wore without going too far into exaggeration; once you cross that line you are into parody, not recreation, and you want to be firmly within the limits of recreation. Necklaces are relatively simple, as the necklaces of most celebrities have been recreated by someone; even if the performer has to go with a similar style, it is usually not that hard. Drag queen earrings, however, are a harder element because there are so many choices that need to be debated, making it the most interesting part of the costume to recreate.
The Earrings
Once a performer finds a supplier of the right earrings, she has most likely found a friend for life. Earrings may be the hardest jewelry to find because they need to recreate not only a period of time but a particular emotional resonance, As such, it can make for a long and arduous quest, but ultimately the quest, if it pans out, is well worth it. The earrings make the woman, and no one knows that any better than a performer who has sought to capture every nuance of the woman she is recreating on stage.
