DRAGx남장신사 is a documentary-style play at the National Jeongdong Theater that brings Korean queer lives and community history to the stage through drag-king (women performing exaggerated male gender expression) performances. Using real testimonies and embodied scenes, the production features characters including a 60s lesbian bar owner, a first-generation trans person, a firefighter parent, an FTM (Female To Male) bigender youth, and ‘butch’ performers—whose masculine presentation challenges binary gender categories. The show calls itself a ‘gender-disrupting play,’ exploring identity, memory, and intergenerational solidarity while turning a drag-king contest into a platform for visibility and queer pride. The creators say drag helps people accept deviations from social ‘normality,’ and the run includes an original and a B performance that questions whether pride requires feeling proud. The diverse audience reactions reflect how the play prompts both queer and non-queer viewers to reconsider assumptions about gender and sexuality.
