THREE performers take it in turns to writhe and high-kick dangerously towards the low ceiling. Most drinkers continue to chat among themselves. It is early for such an energetic show—just 7:30pm on a Thursday—and in any case the drag queens’ messy mix of bikinis, leotards and wild wigs is not the main attraction. The patrons in this rowdy gay bar in Manhattan’s West Village are really just waiting for the television screens to be tuned to the right channel.

Everyone is here to watch “RuPaul’s Drag Race”, a reality-television show. The contestants are drag queens who strive for a crown by creating bewitching makeup designs, concocting shocking costumes, plotting dance routines that satirise pop stars and shooting shards of wit at their queer peers. This all happens under the judgement of RuPaul, one of America’s most famous drag queens. After ten years on air, “Drag Race” has accumulated a mass of rituals, principal among them a weekly congregation in bars for public viewing parties. Robin, a regular, says: “I know what to look for: atmosphere, screaming and subtitles.”

While fans in living rooms across America see a two-dimensional rendering of the show, fans who turn out to a bar are treated to extra sparkle. Live drag queens narrate the show, adding salty quips of their own. When one contestant on the show flops a jazz dance routine similar to Emma Stone’s in “La-La-Land”, one commenting queen says: “That was 50 shades of basic.” (Your correspondent might have called it bla-bla-bland.) Patrons squeal with delight at the gags and stuff dollar bills under the queens’ gaudy straps as they sashay around during the commercial breaks.

“Drag Race” is a surprise success in American television. Last year’s season finale posted a 200% rise in viewing figures from the previous year. Viewers tune in for the colour and the drama. In contrast, the recent reboot of “Will & Grace” highlighted how bland television depictions of queer life can be. The sitcom fails to depict the subversive nature of people who charge through life messing with expectations of gender and sexuality, best exemplified in drag queens. “Drag Race” realises that the art-form of drag is rebellious, that it brings marginalised people together, and requires a confidence that is both fragile and out-sized. “If you can’t love yourself, how the hell you gonna love somebody else?” asks Ru in one of his many catchphrases. The queens form a sisterhood through the show, but the format also forces them against each other. (Some criticise “Drag Race” for overlooking the strain of the competition in favour of jokes or shocks.)

The sisterhood element, at least, continues a model established in gay bars during the 20th century as they took root in major cities and towns, providing a living room where people of minority sexual and gender identities could feel at home. Unsurprisingly, subversive venues incubated a subversive artform. Bars even took on an overtly political role: gay activists raised money over beers in Los Angeles in 1952 to fund a legal defence of Dale Jennings, a man charged with soliciting sex from another man. It is no surprise that a drinking den, New York’s Stonewall Inn, became the cradle of the modern gay-rights movement when drag queens kicked back against police intimidation in June 1969.