Barbette (19 December 1899 – 5 August 1973)
Barbette was a circus aerial performer and female impersonator, born Vander Clyde Broadway on 19 December 1899 in Texas, USA.
Barbette’s fascination with aerial performance started at a very young age, when his mother took him to a show. Soon after he started practising and performing in the fields around his home during harvest to earn money to attend circus shows.
Barbette started to perform after leaving school aged fourteen, in an act called The Alfaretta Sisters, impersonating a female performer. Following this act, he performed with the Erford’s Whirling Sensation troupe, hanging from a spinning apparatus by the teeth, until in 1919 he debuted as a solo act under the pseudonym Barbette at the Harlem Opera House. Barbette performed in the high-wire and trapeze dressed as a woman and revealed his male gender at the end as part of the act.
In 1923 Barbette started to tour around Europe. It was in England and Paris that he achieved most fame and appeared in some of the cities’ most iconic venues including the Casino de Paris, the Moulin Rouge, the Folies Bergère, the Empire, London Palladium and the Alhambra Theatre. He alternated the vaudeville scene with the circus also performed with Bertram Mills, Circus Medrano and Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey.
While working at the London Palladium, Barbette was found engaged in sexual activity with another man. Homosexuality was illegal at the time, so he lost his contract and was never granted a visa to work in England again.
Poor health caused by chronic pain ended Barbette’s career as a performer at the turn of the 1940s. After this he became an artistic director and aerialist trainer for a number of circuses and worked as a consultant for the film industry, famously coaching Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis on gender illusion for the film Some Like It Hot. He also created the aerial ballet for Disney on Parade, which toured Australia from 1969 to 1972. Barbette returned to his family home in Texas after this where he committed suicide by overdose on 5 August 1973.
Barbette served as an inspiration to a number of artists during his lifetime, including Jean Cocteau, Albert Goldbarth and Man Ray and was part of Josephine Baker, Anton Dolin, Mistinguett and Sergei Diaghilev’s circles. Barbette was also in films in the 1930s including Le Sang d’un Poete (The Blood of a Poet) and Jumbo. He continued to be an inspiration for others after his death including Alfred Hitchcock, performance artist John Kelly and play writers Bill Lengfelder and David Goodwin. He is also believed to be the inspiration for the film Victor and Victoria.
Queer Up North
As excitement builds towards the launch of the Queer Up North 1992–2002: Celebrating Manchester’s LGBTQ+ Heritage digital archive, we’re delighted to announce a series of events exploring the festival’s legacy and its lasting impact on LGBTQ+ culture, community and activism.
Bringing together artists, academics and those involved in the original festival, these conversations will reflect on Queer Up North’s pioneering role in shaping queer cultural life, while asking what we can learn from its history today.
Events
Generations of Love
Thursday, 24 September – 6.00pm – 8.10pm / Manchester Central Library Performance Space / Free – BSL interpreted
How can we build community through culture? How important is intergenerational connection? Join this panel discussion with John McGrath, Claud Cunningham, Gavin Barlow and Phoebe Patey-Ferguson.
How do we build community through culture, and what can Queer Up North teach us about creating spaces for connection, creativity and belonging?
The discussion will be followed by a Q&A and informal drinks reception.
Causing Trouble
Tuesday, 29 September – 6.00pm – 8.10pm / Manchester Central Library Performance Space / Free – BSL interpreted
What should we learn from the past, or should we disregard the archive and start anew? Join this panel discussion with Cheryl Martin, Alyson Campbell, Topher Campbell and Robert Pacitti.
Queered Up Now
Wednesday, 30 September – 7.00pm / Space 2, Contact Theatre / Pay What You Can £5 / £10 / £15 – BSL interpreted
Writers Louis Glazzard, Ella Otomewo, and Okechukwu Nzelu give their personal takes in responding to stories from the archive. Hosted by Andrew McMillan. Presented with Manchester Literature Festival and Contact.
The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert / It’s Queer Up North: Saving the Show
Friday, 2 October – 6.00pm / HOME / Tickets: £11.15, £9.15 concessions
Celebrate the launch of the digital archive with this one-off screening of the Australian road movie musical, first previewed in Manchester at Queer Up North in 1994, and the first chance to see a new documentary short about the festival by film-maker Brett Chapman. Followed by a party in the HOME bar with DJ Kath McDermott.
Good Enough – a Call Out to Gay, Bi and Trans men over 50
Share your story – written or voice recording. No arts background needed.
A memory. An object. A moment.
Something specific and true.
There is no right kind of story. There is no story too small or too ordinary.
You can contribute anonymously – your name will never be attached to anything without your explicit permission.
No closing date – this is a long-term conversation, ongoing into 2027.
Who This Is For
This is for you if you’re a gay, bi or trans man, and any part of this connects.
• You’re over 50 and rarely see your experience reflected in arts or theatre work.
• You’re living with mobility constraints, health issues, or other barriers that often put cultural spaces out of reach.
• You’re not publicly out – or not fully – and you navigate that carefully, every day.
• Your experience of being gay, bi or trans was shaped by working-class life, or by communities where that identity had no language or no room.
• You lived through the AIDS years and carry what that time left.
You’ve survived. You’ve adapted. You’ve built strategies for getting through. And you’ve rarely been asked what that cost.
If that’s you – we mean you. Submit your story online here.
Bridgewater Hall Concerts
We are extremely grateful to the Bridgewater Hall for the Community Members Scheme. During the last season from September 2025 to June 2026 the scheme has enabled 67 different people from Out In The City to attend 36 free concerts.
Some of the concerts will be recorded and broadcast across the nation on BBC Sounds and BBC Radio 3. In a world that is increasingly divided, it’s quite something that 2,000 people can gather in a room – joined by millions more over the airwaves – and experience the power of live music together.
The concerts – free of charge – are advertised under “Next Outings” on our website. So keep an eye out – https://outinthecity.org/next-outings/