SPJ Florida: Drag Show Returns to FAU Despite Political Pressure
After political pressure killed last year's show, it returns Nov. 20 with new sponsors – and a new purpose.
BOCA RATON, Fla., Nov. 10, 2026 /PRNewswire/ --
| OutFAU Drag Show |
When: | Friday, Nov. 20. Doors open at 7 p.m., show starts at 8 p.m. |
Where: | Kaye Auditorium, Florida Atlantic University, 777 Glades Road, Boca Raton |
Tickets: | $10 for general admission, FREE for students with student ID |
For 14 years, Florida Atlantic University's auditorium hosted an annual drag show for up to 900 students, faculty, and community members – the largest in Florida. That ended last year when, under pressure from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Republican lawmakers, the show was quietly stopped.
"The politics started when Gov. DeSantis pushed laws declaring drag was a crime," says FAU alum Gerald S. Arroyo Prada, a.k.a. Ariel Rimm, a South Florida drag entertainer who has co-produced, hosted, and performed at the "FAU Drag Show" since its inception in September of 2011, leading up to the last FAU Drag Show in 2024. "There was absolutely no marketing or advertising," Prada says. "Attendance was approximately 100 people, falling short of the hundreds of students and community members who had attended several of our previous productions."
FAU never announced there would be no 2025 show and did not move forward with it for the first time in 15 years.
Now the drag show returns to FAU – despite FAU.
A slew of new sponsors is underwriting the show, and they've rented the same venue: The Kaye Auditorium, where the show introduced generations of South Floridians to the art form of drag.
It's been renamed the OutFAU Drag Show, after FAU's 3-year-old LGBT+ student newspaper. OutFAU is one of only a handful of queer student newspapers in the nation, according to the Society of Professional Journalists.
Because OutFAU has won numerous awards, including from SPJ's Florida chapter, that chapter is supporting the drag show and OutFAU's coverage of it. Other sponsors include…
The performers for the OutFAU Drag Show include some of the best drag queens in the state…
The OutFAU Drag Show has a dual mission, says OutFAU editor Mary Rasura. The first is political.
"Gov. DeSantis called drag 'really disturbing' and Attorney General James Uthmeier called it 'disgusting, obscene content.' Other lawmakers have said it's 'grooming our children," Rasura says. "But I don't think they've ever been to a drag show. So we're sending them personal invitations and reserving seats for them."
The second reason is simpler: "It's a really good time."
SPJ Florida past president Jason Parsley – an FAU alum who's now co-publisher of OutSFL, the largest LGBT+ newspaper in the southeast United States – says it's time to do more than report on "the lies about our community."
"There's an old adage in journalism: Show, don't tell," Parsley says. "We're sponsoring the drag show so anyone can attend and see that it's not evil. And it's less scandalous than most Netflix shows."
For general admission tickets, click here. Parsley's OutSFL is offering a meet-and-greet photo opportunity for any attendees who pay an extra $10 – with all of that going to the performers who can spend hundreds of dollars on makeup and outfits per show. The meet-and-greet starts at 6:30 pm, a half-hour before doors open. Sign up here.
SOURCE SPJ Florida Pro Chapter
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