Eddie Bell, S.F. drag performer known as Cookie Dough, dies

At San Francisco's Trannyshack show in 2008, Cookie Dough (center) poses with Pollo del Mar (left), and Anjie Myma. At San Francisco's Trannyshack show in 2008, Cookie Dough (center) poses with Pollo del Mar (left), and Anjie Myma. Photo: Steven Underhill / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Steven Underhill / Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close Eddie Bell, S.F. drag performer known as Cookie Dough, dies 1 / 1 Back to Gallery

Eddie Bell, a leading San Francisco drag performer known as Cookie Dough, died in San Francisco on Thursday. He was 51.

Mr. Bell became ill Jan. 20 with meningitis while in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, for a two-week tour in the cast of a drag satire of the TV show “The Golden Girls.” During rehearsals, he got sick with what he thought was food poisoning. His condition worsened, and after becoming disoriented, he was taken by ambulance to a hospital.

He was in a coma before being transferred back to San Francisco, where he died at Kaiser Permanente.

His death was confirmed by his partner of 14 years, Michael Chu, who flew to Mexico to bring Mr. Bell back. According to Chu, it took intervention from both San Francisco Supervisor David Campos and Rep. Nancy Pelosi to get Mr. Bell released from the hospital in Mexico. Mr. Bell was not correctly diagnosed with meningitis until he was in San Francisco, Chu said, and by then it was too late.

“People know Cookie Dough as the nicest queen in the city,” said Chu, who worked with Mr. Bell as a DJ under the name MC2. “She loved people and loved performing. She remembered everyone’s name and made everyone feel like you were her best friend.”

'Living that dream’

These qualities were what got Mr. Bell voted Grand Duchess of San Francisco in 2010, in an annual contest to benefit charity. During her one-year reign, Cookie and her court raised more than $35,000. Mr. Bell was featured in the 2005 documentary “Blood, Sweat & Glitter,” which followed four drag performers as they prepared for the Miss Trannyshack contest.

“Cookie Dough was my best friend, and I’m heartbroken by the whole thing,” said Steven Grygelko, who was also featured in the film as Heklina, and co-produced with Mr. Bell “The Golden Girls Live,” which has run for nine years in San Francisco. Grygelko was also the upstairs neighbor at an apartment building in the Lower Haight where Mr. Bell had lived for almost 20 years.

Edward Robert Bell was born in San Francisco on Nov. 8, 1963, and raised in Glen Park. He graduated from Balboa High School in 1981. In the early 1990s he got a job as the light technician for Josie’s Cabaret and Juice Joint.

“He’d say, 'Someday I’m going to be up onstage,’” Chu said, “and he was living that dream.”

Weekly drag show host

He became sober in March 2000 and debuted as Cookie Dough later that year at “Fall Follies,” a sober drag show in the Castro. He was best known as the host of “The Monster Show,” a weekly drag night in its 10th year at the Edge, a bar in the Castro.

For years, Mr. Bell worked as a nurse’s aide at San Francisco General Hospital.

“Ed Bell was the kindest, most wonderful partner that anyone could imagine,” Chu said. “For the entire 14 years that we were together, there was not one day that I did not want to come home.”

A memorial service is pending.

Sam Whiting is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: swhiting@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @samwhitingsf