World of Wonder

World of Wonder World of Wonder also manages the global rights for all international versions of RuPaul’s Drag Race and consults on Drag Race Canada (BBC Three).

World of Wonder is the pioneering international entertainment creator of groundbreaking Emmy Award-winning feature and television programming, films, and unparalleled documentaries and series that give a voice to outsiders and marginalized communities. The world’s foremost LGBTQ+ and drag entertainment brand, World of Wonder is the multi-award-winning LA based media company that has been bringing

the best q***r talent, stories and counterculture to mainstream audiences for almost two decades. Founded in the UK in 1991 by executive producers Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato, World of Wonder produced pioneering and headline-grabbing programmes such as The Adam and Joe Show (CH4), Power Le****ns (Sky One) and Housebusters (CH5). Expanding state-side in 1994, the team went on to produce award-winning factual entertainment, reality television and documentary content to critical and commercial success; as well as launching a specialist SVoD service and producing popular live conventions, podcasts and merchandising. Television highlights include: Emmy® Award winning RuPaul’s Drag Race (VH1/Logo), RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars (VH1), RuPaul’s Drag Race UK (BBC3), Million Dollar Listing LA & NY (Bravo), Dancing Queen (Netflix), Werq the World (WOW Presents Plus) and Gender Revolution: A Journey with Katie Couric (National Geographic). Nine of World of Wonder’s documentary films have premiered at the Sundance Film festival including Becoming Chaz, Party Monster and Whirlybird - which took home 2020's Sundance Institute | Amazon Studios Producers Award for Documentary Features. Other award-winning films and documentaries include, Mapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures, Monica in Black and White, and Emmy Award-winning documentaries, The Last Beekeeper and Out of Iraq (all currently available to watch on WOW Presents Plus). Expanding its digital footprint, World of Wonder launched its specialist subscription on demand (SVoD) service, WOW Presents Plus. Landing in the UK in 2017, the SVoD is also available in America and 160 other countries and features World of Wonder content; including various titles across the Drag Race brand, digital series such as UNHhhh and Morning T&T and many of its documentary and film content. World of Wonder also produces RuPaul's DragCon, the world’s largest drag culture convention. Welcoming more than 100,000 attendees across LA and NYC in 2019 (with Vegas scheduled for January 2021), the company expanded internationally in 2020 with RuPaul’s DragCon UK taking place in London to a sold-out crowd. World of Wonder also co-produces the official RuPaul's Drag Race: Werq the World Tour, and the official RuPaul's Drag Race UK Tour. Co-founders Randy Barbato and Fenton Bailey authored The World According to Wonder, celebrating decades of production and have been honoured with the IDA Pioneer Award, named on Variety's Reality Leaders List, and chosen for the OUT100 list for their trailblazing work in the LGBTQ+ community. World of Wonder was also selected for Realscreen's Global 100 list, which recognises the top international non-fiction and unscripted production companies working in the industry today. World of Wonder creates out of a historic building/gallery space in the heart of Hollywood.

"Drag is my work clothes. I only put it on when someone pays me."Harris Glenn Milstead – October 19, 1945Milstead was f...
10/19/2025

"Drag is my work clothes. I only put it on when someone pays me."
Harris Glenn Milstead
– October 19, 1945

Milstead was famous for his "Divine" persona, with her outrageous antics. He was Divine for the paycheck. Openly gay, he did not consider himself to be a drag queen, transgender, nor tr*******al. He thought of himself as a character actor.

Milstead was self-conscious about his weight as a kid. When he was teenager years (when he became friends with John Waters) he avoided going out, but when he did, he wore a big raincoat to hide his body.

Milstead, John Waters, and their friends loved the underground club scene in Baltimore. The moniker "Divine" was given to Milstead by Waters, after a character in OUR LADY OF THE FLOWERS (1943) by Jean Genet, about q***rs living on the edge of society in Paris. Milstead absolutely adored his new name. Waters emboldened Milstead to make Divine be outrageous, saying that Divine should be the "Godzilla of drag queens".

The film that made Divine a star is PINK FLAMINGOS (1972) where Divine plays a woman who has earned the moniker "the Filthiest Person Alive". There's an infamous scene with Divine eating dog doo, and not fake turds, but fresh, steaming poo. When Waters told Divine about the scene, Divine thought he was kidding. Waters convinced Milstead that this was a big opportunity for Divine to make film history. Waters writes that Divine and crew had to follow that dog for three hours until he finally gave a s**t.

HAIRSPRAY (1988) was a big turning point in Milstead's career. He plays "Edna Turnblad", mother of Ricki Lake's "Tracy Turnblad", a 1960s-era chubby teenager who dreams of being a dancer on a local television show, who also fights against racial segregation.

In 1988, a week after HAIRSPRAY opened, Milstead was staying at a hotel in LA. After dining with friends and returning to his room, he died in his sleep. His death was attributed to an enlarged heart. That's correct, Divine died of a big heart. Milstead was just 42 years old.

Milstead was an actor of genuine talent and considerable charm, with crack comic timing and an uncanny sense for slapstick.

Photo by Waring Abbott

"They say a woman's place is to wait and serve under the veil, submissive and dear. But I think my place is in a ship fr...
10/18/2025

"They say a woman's place is to wait and serve under the veil, submissive and dear. But I think my place is in a ship from space to carry me the hell out of here…"
Laura Nyro
– October 19, 1947

Some performers shun the spotlight and find a back road to success; Laura Nyro is a perfect example. Living with chronic stage fright, she never found more than a cult audience with her solo career; but when her songs were covered by Barbra Streisand, Frank Sinatra, Three Dog Night, or Blood, Sweat & Tears, effortlessly reaching the Top 10 in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

You may have missed Laura Nyro's obituaries when she left this world. Her death didn't bring the same type of media coverage that pop icons like Elvis Presley, John Lennon or Janis Joplin had when they passed. In fact, you may not even know her name. That's a shame.

Nyro was still in her teens when she wrote: WEDDING BELL BLUES, AND WHEN I DIE, and STONEY END. By the time she was 21 years old, she had already produced a meaningful and large catalog of songs, a stronger body of work than most pop songwriters have in a full lifetime. But she never had a hit that she recorded as herself.

Nyro was a distinctive songwriter who created her own world with her music, and she possessed a delicious vocal style that was soulful, with deep feeling, fused with Blues, Jazz, Gospel, Folk and Broadway.

Nyro's first album, MORE THAN A DISCOVERY (1966), was recorded when she was just 19 years old (Madonna was 25 when she released her first album). It was a remarkable debut, but it brought her little attention as a performer.

Ironically, Nyro's own bestselling single was a cover of Carole King and Gerry Goffin's UP ON THE ROOF.

Nyro was taken from this world by that damn cancer in 1997. She was only 49 years old. The same ovarian cancer claimed the life of her mother at the very same age. She left behind her partner of 18 years, artist Maria Desidero.

Calling all queens! Casting for Season 19 is officially OPEN! 👑If you have the Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve, and Talent...
10/18/2025

Calling all queens! Casting for Season 19 is officially OPEN! 👑

If you have the Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve, and Talent it takes to become America’s Next Drag Superstar, we want to hear from you!

💌 Apply now at http://worldofwonder.com/casting
‼️ DEADLINE: Nov 14th 2025

"The closer we come to the negative, to death, the more we blossom."Montgomery Clift – October 17, 1920In the early 194...
10/17/2025

"The closer we come to the negative, to death, the more we blossom."
Montgomery Clift
– October 17, 1920

In the early 1940s, Montgomery Clift met 38-year-old jazz singer and heiress to the Reynolds To***co fortune, Libby Holman, who was obsessed with the 21-year-old actor, even financing a play for him. His relationship with the bis*xual Holman caused him to anguish over his own q***rness.

He was friends with and an inspiration to James Dean and Marlon Brando. They formed a trio of brooding, intense young performers that were trying out a new style of naturalistic acting personified by The Actors Studio.

Clift went to Hollywood but felt he was undervalued there as an actor. Yet, he was, in fact, extremely accomplished at his craft and very well-regarded by studio execs, critics, and other actors. Don't forget, he received four Academy Award nominations.

Poor Clift was an isolated, tortured, closeted gay man. The characters he played were often also lost and confused souls. Although he was gay, he had his closest relationships with several female actors, and the closest of all was with dazzling beautiful Elizabeth Taylor.

Taylor and Clift were both passionate, vulnerable, and young, and they felt a bond the moment they met. Taylor claimed that he took her breath away the first time that she ever laid eyed on him. Taylor and Clift were basically lovers minus the s*x part. They remained besties until the end of his life. Clift: "I love men in bed, but I really love women!" He did have an affair with Taylor's pal Roddy McDowall, who attempted su***de after they broke up.

In 1956, after leaving a party at Taylor's place atop one of those winding LA canyons, Clift drove his car into a telephone pole. When he was taken from the wreckage, his beautiful face was swollen twice its size, his jaw was broken in four places, his nose in two, his cheekbones were cracked, and his front teeth were missing. He used downers, and booze to dull the pain.

His expressive acting, beautiful face, and his personal life were never the same after that car crash. Clift made 16 films before the crash and 16 films after.

Photo by Stanley Kubrick

"There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about."Oscar Wilde – Octob...
10/16/2025

"There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about."
Oscar Wilde
– October 16, 1854

It has been 125 years since he left this world, yet Oscar Wilde remains the quintessential q***r gentleman, nearly as famous for his lust for a certain peaches-and-cream young man as he is for his literary output. Here we are in the 21st century and his portrait is the most widely recognized LGBTQ symbol after the Pride Flag.

Wilde was obsessed with beauty from an early age. This was a major theme in many of his works. THE PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY (1890) is basically an ode to the beauty of men, written in an era where being q***r was a crime punishable by imprisonment. Wilde was quite brave (or brazen) to write such a novel. Although no actual act of so**my is mentioned in the book, it's still dripping with homoeroticism and gay innuendo. At the time, reviewers were critical of the novel's decadence. One London newspaper wrote that is was: "Unclean, poisonous, and heavy with the mephitic odours of moral and spiritual putrefaction". Wilde responded: "If a work of art is rich and vital and complete, those who have artistic instincts will see its beauty and those to whom ethics appeal more strongly will see its moral lesson."

In 2017, Oscar Wilde was among the more than 50,000 British men who were pardoned by Queen Elizabeth II for the crime being gay.

I hereby nominate Wilde as the Number One Gay Icon of All Time. His birthday should be an international holiday. Let us celebrate with some of his witticisms:

"America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between."

"Be yourself; everyone else is already taken."

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."

"I can resist everything except temptation."

"Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go."

"Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess."

1882 photograph by Napoleon Sarony

"Give a man a mask and he will tell you the truth."Oscar Wilde – October 16, 1854Here we are in the 21st century and hi...
10/16/2025

"Give a man a mask and he will tell you the truth."
Oscar Wilde
– October 16, 1854

Here we are in the 21st century and his portrait is the most widely recognized LGBTQ symbol after the Pride Flag.

Wilde was put on trial in 1895 and sentenced to two years hard labor for the nebulous crime of "Gross Indecency". He had the Marquess of Queensberry prosecuted for criminal libel. A "Marquess" is a British noble ranking above an Earl and below a Duke, and this particular Marquess guy was the father of Wilde's lover, Lord Alfred Douglas.

The Marquess left his calling card at a gentlemen's club where Wilde was a member. On it was inscribed: "For Oscar Wilde, posing somdomite". Wilde, encouraged by Douglas and against the advice of his many friends, charged the Marquess of Queensberry with libel, with the note basically being a public accusation that Wilde had committed the crime of so**my.

The trial was a sensation. Salacious details of Wilde's private life were there for anyone to read in the newspapers, with details about the Victorian gay underground in London. Wilde's experiences with rent boys, crossdressers, and all-male brothels were made public. The men involved were interviewed and coerced into appearing as witnesses since they too were guilty of the crime to which Wilde was accused.

Wilde dropped his charges against his lover's father. This led to his being arrested, and after two trials Wilde was convicted, sentenced, and jailed from 1895 to 1897.

On May 19th, 1897, Wilde was released from Reading Gaol Prison, outside of London. He was in terrible health, but he had gained a spiritual renewal. He left England the next day and traveled to France, where he spent his last three years in exile. He took a new name –"Sebastian Melmoth", after Saint Sebastian, the patron saint of q***rs. He wrote two long letters to the editors of the London newspapers describing the brutal conditions of English prisons and advocating prison reform.

For a dandy like Wilde, prison had not been easy and he died a broken man, destitute and debased.

She is not Clare Boothe Luce (1903 – 1987) the conservative politician who also wrote the play THE WOMEN (1936), notable...
10/15/2025

She is not Clare Boothe Luce (1903 – 1987) the conservative politician who also wrote the play THE WOMEN (1936), notable for its all-female cast. This Luce is Clair and she was in 1903.

She starred on Broadway and in London from 1923 until 1952, including with Fred Astaire in the Cole Porter stage musical GAY DIVORCE (1932). During the London production, Luce was injured doing the "Table Dance" number, a routine which was also in the film version titled THE GAY DIVORCEE (1934), ending to her stage dancing career. Luce: "I actually felt more sorry for Fred than I did for myself, despite the horrendous schedules of rehearsals that he kept up."

Astaire tried to get Luce cast for the film version of THE GAY DIVORCEE but RKO chose contract player Ginger Rogers instead. In his memoir STEP IN TIME (1959), Astaire writes that Luce was the inspiration for the revolutionary NIGHT AND DAY dance routine in the film.

Luce took dancing class as a child and ran away to New York City at 16 years old. She cast in THE ZIEGFLED FOLLIES OF 1927 before being paired with Astaire.

She played Curley's wife in the Broadway and London stage versions of OF MICE AND MEN (1937) by John Steinbeck, and after doing the show in London, she stayed there during World War II taking roles is Shakespeare plays to much success. In England, she got through the London Blitz and entertained British and American troops. In 1942 she played Kate in THE TAMING OF THE SHREW in London and became the first American female to play leads at the Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford-on-Avon.

She only made a few films, including UP THE RIVER (1930), with Spencer Tracy and Humphrey Bogart in their movie debuts.

She danced with Astaire, performed on Broadway and London stages, but because someone with a similar name came along, the spotlight turned away from her. That one letter difference in the spelling of their first names didn't prevent newspapers from using one of their pictures for the other, even her hometown newspaper forgot her when she died at 85 years old in 1989.

Portrait by Edward Steichen

Candied Camera LIVE! is coming to LA! 🎥 Cavern Club Theater presents (David’s Friend, Unitard) and her new tongue-in-c...
10/15/2025

Candied Camera LIVE! is coming to LA! 🎥 Cavern Club Theater presents (David’s Friend, Unitard) and her new tongue-in-cheek variety show blending guests, monologues, video clips, and go-go boys galore.

📅 Oct 25 (8PM) & Oct 26 (3PM)
📍
🎟️ Tickets at cavernclubtheater.com

“Nora Burns opened the door for Oprah Winfrey!” - Michael Musto

“I ate this show up!” - Mrs. Mouth

“I see Candied Camera in your future!” - Miss Cleo

"Remember this: No one is looking at your imperfections; they're all too busy worrying about their own."Isaac Mizrahi –...
10/14/2025

"Remember this: No one is looking at your imperfections; they're all too busy worrying about their own."
Isaac Mizrahi
– October 14, 1961

Isaac Mizrahi's style is smart, timeless, and very cosmopolitan. He won the Council of Fashion Designers of America Award, plus a special award for his groundbreaking documentary UNZIPPED (1996).

He has dressed many notable women on our pretty blue spinning orb including Hillary Clinton, Oprah Winfrey, and Michelle Obama.

Born in Brooklyn, the son of a children’s clothing designer, Mizrahi attended New York City's High School of Performing Arts and Parsons School of Design. After graduating, he was asked to be on the faculty of Parsons. Mizrahi had a role in the musical film FAME (1980), set in the world of his high school alma mater. He was recognized as the Outstanding Student Designer at Parsons with Calvin Klein, Donna Karan and Oscar de la Renta as the panel of judges. After graduation he went to work for Perry Ellis.

In 1987, he launched Isaac Mizrahi New York with a store in Soho. In 1988, Audrey Hepburn wore Isaac Mizrahi for a Revlon lipstick ad.
Unzipped, the funny behind-the-scenes documentary that revolves around Mizrahi's Fall 1994 collection where he combined a self-described "Hollywood-Eskimo-Mary Tyler Moore" look with Ouija board derived advice like "do******ix mixed with Hitchcock" into a collection. It opens with Mizrahi at a newsstand as he reads reviews of the previous night's showing. The critical feedback, read in voice-over by Mizrahi: "Was this collection half full or half empty? That was the obvious question after Mizrahi’s show Thursday night. What he dubbed a mix was more of a mess…" Mizrahi is devastated by the assessment.

UNZIPPED shows him dealing with intense depression, meticulously planning a comeback as he looks for inspiration, finding it in a classic Hollywood films, and then his process of selecting materials, fumbling, and then going back to the drawing board, again, again and again. It is an entertaining, yet powerful film.

Mizrahi also has a well-received cabaret act. He sings and dances!

His favorite show is, of course, World of Wonder's RUPAUL'S DRAG RACE

Start your engines, Michelle Visage! 👀🌏 Drag Race Down Under vs The World coming to WOW Presents Plus (Stan in Australia...
10/14/2025

Start your engines, Michelle Visage! 👀🌏

Drag Race Down Under vs The World coming to WOW Presents Plus (Stan in Australia)

"Throughout my work is the idea, over and over, that we must all learn to respect one another."Cornel Wilde – October 1...
10/13/2025

"Throughout my work is the idea, over and over, that we must all learn to respect one another."
Cornel Wilde
– October 13, 1912

Not to be confused with Oscar Wilde or Cornel West, this darkly handsome guy with a gorgeous smile, beautiful voice, and remarkable physique (which he took great pride in) is the modestly talented Cornel Wilde, an Olympic fencer when he was first discovered. In 1940, Laurence Olivier hired Wilde as fencing coach for the Broadway production of ROMEO AND JULIET, with Olivier and Vivien Leigh. He played Tybalt in this production, which led to a Hollywood contract.

Wilde's break out year was 1945. He played Frederic Chopin in A SONG TO REMEMBER, a totally camp film with Merle Oberon as George Sand and Wilde as composer Frédéric Chopin, which inexplicitly brought him a Best Actor Oscar nomination. Also in 1945 was the great noir LEAVE HER TO HEAVEN starring Gene Tierney, a twisted film about a monstrous woman so possessive of her husband that she kills his crippled brother and unborn child. Wilde gives a restrained performance.

Some of his fun films: FOREVER AMBER (1947), ROAD HOUSE (1948) and GUN CRAZY (1950).

For crazy camp cinema check him out as the crippled trapeze artist in Cecil B. DeMille's THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH (1952), the worst film to ever win an Oscar for Best Picture. Wilde has one of the greatest campy lines when he faces Charlton Heston and says with an awful French accent: "You are CIRCUS!"

Wilde guest starred in one of the funniest I LOVE LUCY Hollywood episodes, when Lucy dresses as a bellboy to sneak into the hunky actor's hotel room, and hilarity ensues.

Thankfully for Film History buffs, Wilde appears shirtless in most of his films. In 1966, at 54 years old, Wilde starred in THE NAKED PREY which he also directed, playing man being tracked by African tribesmen while wearing only a loin cloth, still looking buff.

Cornel Wilde died in 1977 at the age of 77. He was one of the s*xiest leading men of the 1940-1950s.

Need help? Ask Love Connie! 💖 Got a burning question about life, love, work, or how to truly sparkle? ✨ Drop your questi...
10/13/2025

Need help? Ask Love Connie! 💖 Got a burning question about life, love, work, or how to truly sparkle? ✨ Drop your questions for the legendary in the comments below!

Your favorite self-help guru will be sounding off with her responses in a future Q&A later this season on I Feel Love Connie S3. Don’t be shy—Connie is ready to help you thrive!

Address

6650 Hollywood Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA
90028

Opening Hours

Tuesday 12pm - 4pm
Wednesday 12pm - 4pm
Thursday 12pm - 4pm
Friday 9am - 4pm
Saturday 9am - 4pm

Telephone

+14706646527

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