Mado Lamotte

Mado Lamotte, the stage name of Luc Provost, is a Montreal drag queen, author, and gay community personality.

A high camp drag queen, Mado emphasizes her outlandish, libertine personality and wickedly sharp tongue in her shows, favouring bright fuchsia wigs and proclaiming "Chus pas "il," chus pas "elle," chus "ça"! Ch'une chose!" ("I'm not a he, I'm not a she, I'm an it! I'm a thing!") and "Je suis pas personnificatrice féminine. Je suis trop laide. Je suis drag queen" ("I'm not a female impersonator. I'm too ugly. I'm a drag queen.")

Mado has been performing for more than 15 years, rising to fame on the strength of her bingo nights at Le Lézard, Club Zorro and at the famous Sky complex. She was a longtime emcee and DJ of "Ciel Mon Mardi" at Sky, before opening her own drag cabaret, "Cabaret Mado", in Montreal's Gay Village in 2002, trading on her fame as the most prominent drag queen in Montreal's large gay community. She usually only lip-synchs the opening number, preferring to simply DJ (on certain nights) and bring her comedy talents to bear as emcee, though she occasionally favours her audience by singing live.

She is a major contributor to the annual Divers/Cité pride festival, conducting not only her famous "Bingo à Mado" nights at the Montreal Casino, but also hosting "Mascara : La nuit des drags." This immense free open-air drag show usually held the night before the parade, featuring over 80 performers every year, is the high point of Divers-Cité's entertainment and is one of the largest drag shows in the world, in the running with New York City's Wigstock.

Mado is also an author, writing a weekly column for the "Ici" weekly newspaper and a monthly article for the "Fugues" gay and lesbian newsmagazine, supplementing her trademark style with heavy joual. In 2000, she published a collection of her columns entitled "Tu vois ben qu'est folle" ("She's obviously crazy").

She has also released a record album, had a cameo appearance in the 2003 movie "Saved by the Belles", and starred in the 2007 play "Saving Céline", in which she (credited as Mado Lamotte, not Luc Provost) portrayed a drag queen obsessed by Céline Dion who becomes embroiled in a murder plot against the singer.

External links

* [http://www.mado.qc.ca/ Le Monde de Mado] (Official website) fr icon