Considering that Rise of a King’s origin began with a project called Don't Tell My Mother, the fact that actor and drag king Vico Ortiz ended up putting the finishing touches on it and rehearsing it in their mother’s living room is both a hilarious irony and perfectly encompasses the spirit of the solo show. “I'm not looking for perfection. I'm looking for humanity,” they tell PRIDE.
The whole endeavor is outside Ortiz’s typical wheelhouse. Best known as an actor in beloved projects including Our Flag Means Death and Vida, or for their podcast Today in Gay (which they co-host alongside Nay Bever), Ortiz was ready to stretch and explore their talents. That and share a new, intimate side of themselves through the journey of becoming theirdrag king alter ego, Vico Suave.
The show, which debuted at FUERZAfest, NYC’s Latine LGBTQ+ arts festival in May, is making its way this week to the West Coast for the Hollywood Fringe festival, where it debuts at Greenway Court Theatre on June 12. The Fringe is produced by Celebration Theatre, Southern California’s oldest queer theatre, and Rise of King is a perfect fit for their programming as it’s been described as a “whimsical, astrological, gender-bending journey through [Ortiz’s] childhood, using drag as a tool to both untether and re-root themselves.”
Vico Ortiz in a promotional image for ‘Rise Of A King’
Ana Paula Teixeira
The idea to write a show about kinging was first proposed to Ortiz by an agent years ago, but the actor was resistant at first. “I'm like, ‘I'm not a writer. But thank you so much for your thoughts on this. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm going to just keep being an actor and doing my thing and just people write for me and I perform it,’” they recalled. But then a chance offer by Nikki Levy to do a show called Don't Tell My Mother, in which performers share stories from their past they would never want their mom to hear, set off a spark in Ortiz who both loved the experience and working with Levy.
Fast forward a couple of summers later and Ortiz was ready to dive into writing their first solo show, again with the support of Levy, but with a twist. “Instead of being like, ‘don't tell my mother,’ I kind of thought of the theme ‘my mother wouldn't want me to tell you,’” they share.
They began writing and it quickly blossomed from a short piece to a full-on show. “I was like, oh, there's, there's something here. I could expand on the story between me and my mom, using drag as a vehicle to tether these stories,” they explain. By December they were nearly finished writing and “now I'm fucking doing it,” says Ortiz.
Of course, it wasn't quite that simple. For one thing, the wildfires that ravaged Los Angeles in January forced Ortiz out of the city and, in their case, to return to their family's home in Puerto Rico to complete the project — which turned out to be a blessing in disguise.
“What was so magical ... was going through albums and then actually looking at the dates and having [these moments in my life] confirmed as canon,” they say. Seeing the confirmation of their memories and experiences set to film was validating and revealing for Ortiz.
Val Vega
“Looking back at photos from like ‘94 or ‘93, I’m a toddler, and my parents are the ones that are dressing me up, the ones that are putting me in ‘drag,’ right?” says Ortiz. “Part of that magical process, too, was ... discovering how queer I've always been,” and sharing those epiphanies with their parents.
“My mom told me some stories,” Ortiz remembers. “She was like, ‘I caught you in so many halfway trans moments. I caught you in so many queer moments... One time, I walked into the room and you were standing on top of your brother’s bed with his [Spider-Man] underwear on, looking at yourself in the mirror. And I was like, ‘Oh, my God... look at these boxers,’ [and] having the best time.”
Although Ortiz says when it came to rehearsing the show in front of their family, well, the nerves kicked in. “There'll never be anyone who's gonna make me more nervous to perform in front of than my family,” they admit.
Aside from those nerves, the biggest challenge for Ortiz was simply narrowing down the story to create a narrative. “The challenging part was just figuring out which stories were going to nourish the fire of the pulse of the story,” they recall. “I wrote a bunch of different stories that could have been a little bit of sauce on the plate, but it was getting a little bit like, ‘Oh, there's too many sauces.’”
The process also held up a mirror for Ortiz, who discovered they are still unpacking their identity. “Even now, as I keep figuring out who I am in this world, I have moments where I fall into the pattern of like, ‘I should be doing this. I should be doing that, because this is what I was told,’” they admit. “And then I'm like, ‘Wait, hold up. Now I'm chasing these people's acceptance and expectations of what I should be doing, rather than choosing for myself.’”
Kinging was a part of Ortiz’s journey of self-discovery to help hold a mirror up to their gender. “One of the things that I discovered in drag and in exploration of my masculinity in that way, was that my masculinity is inherently feminine, and my femininity is inherently masculine,” they explain. “Both of these things work together, and when I've been trying to repress one in order to do the other, that's when I feel off balance.”
Val Vega
Ortiz also feels that performing as Vico Suave and sharing their nuanced approach to masculinity can be both confronting and freeing for the audience. “My masculinity is soft. My masculinity is tender. And that's how I begin to reclaim these definitions of it,” Ortiz continues. “If there's a toxic masculine guy watching the show, they'll be like, ‘That's a faggot, right?” And I'm like, “Yeah, it’s true — and also that could also be an expression of your masculinity, if you allow yourself to lean into that softness, into the vulnerability of your masculinity. That’s so beautiful and adds so much more to your experience.”
Ultimately though, Ortiz is just excited to share their story through the whimsy and joy of drag when the show makes its West Coast premiere this week. “Life is full of magical surprises, and when we release the expectation of perfectionism, we allow ourselves to witness it,” says Ortiz. “It's like a little warm hug with rip-off pants.”
Rise of a King makes its West Coast debut at the Hollywood Fringe on Thursday, June 12, with additional performances on Monday, June 16, and Wednesday, June 18 at Greenway Court Theatre.Tickets are on sale now. (ASL-interpreted performance on Monday, June 16).
