Paris Is Burning Page #2

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We're the upcoming ones. We've been out

longer than the ones that are here now.

And we done had our...

We have our status in the ballroom.

How long did it take you

to do the tank top?

An hour.

An hour?

Yes.

You don't do that.

It usually doesn't take you

an hour to do a shirt,

especially a

tank top. Mm-mm.

That's not your speed.

(man) Kim Pendavis.

Statement, "Future legend."

Kim and me have...

We've been together...

And it's more or less me.

I'm the one that's Kim's protg.

Because I go with Kim

to the balls,

help him out, help him iron.

'Cause if I don't go

to a ball with him and iron,

I mean, he'll be there wrinkled.

Or he'd be there ironing.

But, you know, it helps out

when somebody else is there in your corner,

at your side to say,

"Yeah, you can do it. You're gonna be fine.

Just go out there and do

what you usually do."

What do I get out of it?

Just simple, you know,

joy, satisfaction.

That's it. Not... You know,

I don't really ask much.

And then from time to time,

later on, I could wear the outfit.

Yeah!

Everyone waiting in the wings,

you know you have to make room

for Pepper LaBeija.

Pepper LaBeija, Pepper LaBeija.

Give her some walking music.

(man) Liz Taylor is famous.

Pepper LaBeija.

So is Pepper LaBeija.

In a sense, so am I.

But a very much

different quantity.

No magazine's gonna run up to

cover me if I go to a premiere.

But it's still a fame.

It's a small fame.

But you absorb it,

you take it.

And you like it.

You like the adulation,

the applause.

The people cheering you on,

the winning.

It's like a physical high,

you know?

It's a good high.

It's an addictive high,

like all highs,

in the long run,

turn out to be.

But it's a high

that won't hurt you.

If everybody went to balls

and did less drugs,

it'd be a fun world,

wouldn't it?

I'm dressing, of course,

to go to a show,

because I've always done this

professionally

and I was a dancer.

And I'm trying to remember

when the first time I went to a ball

that was the early-type ball

when everybody just walked

and they gave away, like, four

or five prizes

in a very limited category.

And the children now,

most of them,

75 percent of the children

you see at the ball,

wouldn't know what a ball was

if it knocked them in the head.

When I first started

going to balls, it was all about drag queens

and they were interested

in looking like Las Vegas showgirls -

back pieces, tail pieces,

feathers, beads and all that.

But as the '70s rolled around,

the things started changing.

It started coming down. They just wanted

to look like a gorgeous movie star...

like Marilyn Monroe,

Elizabeth Taylor.

And now, they've went from that

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