LIPSMACK: Drag Wrestling Show
Thee Stork Club
Oakland, Ca
December 5, 2025
Inside Oakland’s Thee Stork Club, 8pm start time of the show was at most a suggestion. At 8:30pm, only a few decorated the bar while a couple team members set up the velvet ropes and sequin tablecloth underneath the flickering lights reflecting off the disco ball.
“I think I like them off.” Cherry Cola yells to an empty room.
“Me too” a mysterious voice shouts back from a control booth.
Wearing plain pants, a flat brimmed hat, a t-shirt and cardigan, Cherry Cola turns, displaying a perfectly-trimmed, thick mustache and a masquerade mask of makeup.
I am informed the show will loosely start at 10pm. Apparently, you can never be late in these circles. Cherry Cola says to me “this is drag time, honey.”
I follow them behind the red curtains to a kitchen base stacked with pink fuzzy rugs, cleaning supplies, and ceramic breasts as they transform into lingerie, buckle harnesses, and a cape. Their welcoming and kind-hearted nature leads me to the green room, where the rest of the performers are trying on heels, gluing eyelashes, fastening wigs, and checking out their perfectly-formed butt for the evening.
Surrounded by cheering crowds and drag queens with microphones, two people picked from the crowd squat inside a painter’s tape boxing ring, cheek to cheek. The left in a tight, revealing all black outfit topped-off with deer makeup and ears, the right in army baggy pants and a bright yellow t-shirt. A busty cowgirl holds the mic to each contestant's face asking the age old question, “who are you fighting for?”
“Testosterone,” one contestant yells; “Progesterone,” the other.
The crowd ensues in chants, “HRT! HRT! HRT!”
Mama Celeste, the drag Santa DJ, rings the bells, signaling for the pair to use their self-proclaimed large glutes to push the other outside of the ring.
This ruthless party game is just one of the crowd activities at LIPSMACK: A Drag Wrestling Show at Thee Stork Club in Oakland this Thursday. A pair proudly twinning their premature balding, lay prone in the painter’s tape ring, faces red, necks strained, jaws clenched, forearms interlocked, like a still-life painting. Not only were their heads of equal shine but their arms of strength as each party seemed to be arm wrestling with a mirror..
As rounds of arm wrestling, thumb wars, and butt battles reign champion after champion, organizer Cherry Cola hands out hand-made trophies from kids soccer tournaments and science fairs adorned with pornographic images and dismembered doll parts.
Holding signs reading “Show Hole” and “Awoooga,” the audience laughs and cheers at the dramatic competition of Cheeeese and Pisse. Cheeeese adorned in a muscle suit and panty-hose mask urinates into a plastic water bottle and chugs the remnants as the most non-traditional pre-workout the crowd has ever seen. As Skid Marks wipes the floor, and the busty cowgirl calls him a “good boy,” Pisse rips off her snap away pants and catfights Cheeeese. Throwing fists, pulling out hair, and smacking pillows, the two crawl, yell, and scratch their way to victory.
Local resident, Sherien Maroufkhani, came early to Thee Stork Club with a date to get drinks and a good viewing spot before the Lipsmack showdown began. Sherien watches drag shows online but came to the show to support local artists. “Drag and wrestling are the perfect intersection of my interests,” she says, “I love the drama.”
Joanna Animal, a local burlesque and aerialist performer, comments on the importance of outsider entertainment. Co-founding a burlesque circus called Smoke and Mirrors Menagerie, Jo prioritizes the avant-garde to challenge gender norms and entertainment for audiences and performers. “It’s for men, women, all sorts of queer, nonbinary and trans identities,” they say, “celebrating and being inspired by someone else celebrating their own body.”
Lipsmack is a microcosm of alternative entertainment in Oakland that pushes the boundaries even of conventional drag representations that have been popularized by people like Rupaul. These performances aren’t simply for shocking theatrics but maintaining an outsider community that emphasizes experimentation in self-expression.