Wellington Pride Festival launched it’s programme on Friday night with a packed house of over 100 people at Wellington’s Ivy Bar. A teaser evening of what is still to come, those in attendance were treated to performances from special guests who will perform throughout the festival including Timothy Taffy, Neil Thornton and evolving Drag Queen Claire Voyant. Hosted by Amanduh la Whore, the evening was the launch of the printed festival programmes. Festival Director and Out Wellington Inc co-chair Adrienne Girling says, “It is an important year with the 30th anniversary for the Homosexual Law Reform and the 30th anniversary of Out in the Park. Our community wants to commemorate this important milestone, celebrate our achievements, but also should look into the future of what still needs to be done. With the opening ceremony at Parliament on 5 March we want to look into all those aspects.” The festival is run by Out Wellington Inc, which is has been running Out in the Square/Park since 2008. This year the committee decided to expand the events to nine days of celebration to commemorate the 30th anniversary of Out in the Park as queer Fair and the 30th anniversary since the Homosexual Law Reform in 1986. Neil Thornton started the night at Ivy Bar with some of his jokes from the comedy night ‘Laughing Out Loud’ which runs on Thursday 8 March. Evolving Drag Queen Claire Voyant performed 2 songs from the The Ruby Slipper Revue: a glittering and gay variety show which is on at Fringe Bar on Sunday 13 March. French chansons are the world of Toby
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Wednesday, 10th February 2016 - 6:57pm