Walter Cole (center), in character as Darcelle, celebrates his son's birthday during a show at his club, Darcelle XV Showplace. (Motoya Nakamura/2007)

By Lee Williams | For The Oregonian/OregonLive

Darcelle XV Showplace, home to the World's Oldest Performing Drag Queen, turns 50 this year.

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Walter Cole, also known as Darcelle, in August 1986

. (Michael Lloyd/1986)

On a weekday afternoon in the quiet club, Walter Cole, 86, the Portlander who's been slipping into Darcelle's heels for half a century, tears up numerous times remembering the performers and patrons who've come through.

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Darcelle XV Showplace. (Jamie Francis/2007)

The gay friends who ventured into the club from the east side, afraid to "come across Burnside because this was Skid Row," Cole says. The sons and daughters laughing alongside parents they'd just come out to. Recently, the same-sex couples with wedding rings.

But ask Cole if he had a 50-year plan when he bought Demas Tavern in Old Town in 1967 and he bursts into laughter.

"I didn't have a two-day plan! It was a shabby Skid Row tavern," he says. "I walked in here and opened up the door and wept. I thought, 'What have I done?' But that didn't last long."

Cole, who ran four other businesses at the time, including a downtown coffee shop and jazz club, quickly grasped the ins and outs of the bar industry. And how to put on a show.

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Darcelle (Walter Cole) performs at Darcelle XV. (Motoya Nakamura/2007)

Before the scarlet gowns, sparkling eyeshadow, huge wigs and shoulder-sweeping earrings, Cole's productions took place on a table in the back of the club. Inspired by local cabaret figure Gracie Hansen, Cole and his longtime partner, Roxy Neuhardt, fine-tuned those shows into bigger, bawdier triumphs.

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Darcelle (Walter Cole) prepares to perform before a live audience. (Ross William Hamilton/2010)

"I learned how to talk with the microphone. I learned how to put myself together. And look — it's happened," Cole says. "Over the weekend we had over 300 people for four shows. And that's every weekend, week after week."

Not too shabby for a Linnton-area lad the other kids called "sissyboy."

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Darcelle (Walter Cole), in December 1996. (Ross William Hamilton/1996)

The reward isn't just packed houses. In January, Guinness World Records sent a team to Darcelle XV Showplace for a Facebook Live event honoring Cole as the World's Oldest Drag Queen Performer. "Darcelle XV," an Oregon Public Broadcasting documentary, won a Northwest Regional Emmy Award in June. The Darcelle XV AIDS Memorial, a granite sculpture honoring Oregonians who've died from HIV/AIDS, was unveiled at Lincoln Memorial Park Cemetery in August.

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Walter Cole, who typically performs as the drag queen Darcelle, presents his one-man show, "Just Call Me Darcelle," in 2010. (Michael Lloyd/2010)

For the club's 50th anniversary, Cole is adding a play to its programming. The musical "Pageant" starts Sunday, Sept. 24. Produced by Triangle Productions, "Pageant" is a rare theatrical event at the nightclub. The most recent was Cole's one-man show "Just Call Me Darcelle," in 2010.

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Kevin Cook, also known as Poison Waters, is part of the cast of "Pageant." (Handout photo)

"Pageant" spoofs beauty contests – the kicker is that the cast is all male, though except for Kevin Cook, also known as Poison Waters, the "contestants" aren't professional female impersonators. The parody makes perfect sense at Darcelle's when you consider that for 35 years, the club has hosted the La Femme Magnifique International Pageants to determine "the most glamorous – not beautiful, it's glamorous – female impersonators," notes Cole.

The musical has proven popular for Triangle Productions: The upcoming engagement is the company's fourth presentation in 13 years.

"I still have my heels from when we did it back in 2004," says Shaun Hennessy, who's reviving his role as Miss Deep South. "We had nearly sold-out houses every night."

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Sissyboy performs during their first anniversary show, "Sissyboy is Offensive and Wrong!" at Wonder Ballroom. (Motoya Nakamura/2006)

Back then, in addition to "Pageant" and the female impersonators at Darcelle's, drag could be found almost nightly at the gay club Embers Avenue. The Washington Park Amphitheater was, and is still, the site of the summer drag show and charity event Peacock in the Park. And 13 years ago, the punk comedy troupe Sissyboy routinely played the Wonder Ballroom and smaller nightspots, like Holocene.

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Drag clown Carla Rossi. (Ken Salaman)

Now the golden anniversary of Darcelle's Showplace arrives as drag performers jump into mainstream venues regularly: Drag clown Carla Rossi's Queer Horror film night at the Hollywood Theatre. Poison Waters at McMenamins' Mission Theater for Drag Queen Bingo. National touring acts from the TV show "RuPaul's Drag Race" at Revolution Hall, Newmark Theatre, Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall or the Aladdin Theater.

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This year so far, stars with names like Sasha Velour, Shea Coulee, Farrah Moan and Bob the Drag Queen have played these venues. And just about every other month, a national touring drag act lands at the Aladdin.

"We’ve enjoyed the opportunity to diversify our audience by hosting emerging national and regional drag performers at all our venues," says Frank Rinaldi, director of marketing at True West Concerts, which owns the Aladdin and co-owns Revolution Hall.

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"Hocum Pokem,” a drag parody of the 1993 movie "Hocus Pocus," hits the Aladdin on Saturday, Sept. 30, and "RuPaul's Drag Race: Werq The World Tour," stops at Revolution Hall, Sunday, Oct. 15. Both shows are sold out.

The "Hokum Pokem" cast includes the fifth-season winner of "Drag Race," Jinkx Monsoon, who was born in Portland and lives in Seattle.

Monsoon’s friend Anthony Hudson, who performs as Carla Rossi, says, "Jinkx had to fight for years just to get paid, just to get booked in Portland, and she's from here. Seeing her now touring her shows around the world — she sold out Off-Broadway for four months with her show 'The Vaudevillians' — it's amazing to see her actually living her Patti LuPone/Bernadette Peters fantasy in drag."

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Carla Rossi/Anthony Hudson. (Nancy Mankin)

So why are drag acts suddenly hot tickets?

"It's the kids," says Hudson. “I think that gender play, and that outlet for fabulousness, is something that is such a youthful kind of millennial phenomenon.”

“It's become a thing where kids who are afraid, the weird kids in small towns, like I was, I think their outlet is to sit at home and stream 'Drag Race.' "

"Plus," he adds, "really good marketing."

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Darcelle (Walter Cole) in June 1974. (Michael Lloyd/1974)

At Darcelle's, Cole has no doubt that drag is now a permanent part of mainstream entertainment.

"You've got to remember that Milton Berle and the movie 'Mrs. Doubtfire' and these other people brought it to mainstream attention," says Cole. "I don't think it can go back in the closet again, no matter what. Same-sex marriage, it broke that horrible barrier."

Cole looks to a wall covered in photos of drag performers. "Those people, some of them, are still in show business somewhere," he says proudly.

"We opened our doors and we had the (nerve) to keep going even when it wasn't the thing to do," he says. "And now it's the thing to do."

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Joe Healy in Triangle Productions' 2017 production of "Pageant: The Musical. (Courtesy of Triangle Productions)

WHERE TO SEE DRAG

"Pageant, the Musical"

When: 5 p.m. Sunday and 7 p.m. Monday, Sept. 24-Oct. 9

Where: Darcelle XV Showplace, 208 N.W. Third Ave.

Tickets: $20; trianglepro.org or 503-239-5919; 21 and older

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Darcelle XV & Company Female Impersonator Shows

When: 8 p.m. Wednesday-Thursday and 8 and 10:30 p.m. Friday-Saturday

Where: Darcelle XV Showplace, 208 N.W. Third Ave.

Tickets: $20; darcellexv.com or 503-222-5338; 21 and older

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Queer Horror Annual Halloween Short Film Festival hosted by Carla Rossi

When: 9:30 p.m. Friday, Oct. 27

Where: Hollywood Theatre, 4122 N.E. Sandy Blvd.

Tickets: $8-$10; hollywoodtheatre.org