Leigh Shannon has been a drag icon in Orlando for decades. After getting his start in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky, Shannon — whose real name is Martin Fugate — came to Central Florida and was given his first booking by drag legend Carmella Marcella Garcia at the Parliament House in 1980.
Shannon would work at Parliament House for years, as well as become a staple at Southern Nights, where he was show director for four years; La Cage in Kissimmee where he performed several celebrity impersonations; and now at Hamburger Mary’s, where Shannon has been going strong for the last 14 years with her cabaret dinner show.
Along with entertaining sold-out crowds with his drag performances, Shannon has owned and operated Ritzy Rags Wigs & More, a boutique and wig shop that sells wigs, theatrical makeup, cosmetics, jewelry, accessories and more, but specializes in medical-grade wigs designed for cancer patients.
After operating in the Mills50 District for more than 30 years, the shop was moved to College Park last year in the same neighborhood Shannon has lived with his husband for 15 years.
It is also the same district last year in which Shannon ran for, and eventually withdrew from, the city commissioner seat held by Robert Stuart. At the time, Shannon announced via social media that he was withdrawing from the race “due to unforeseen circumstances.” In an interview with Watermark in September, Shannon said it was because of a health scare.
“I’m doing very well and I’m feeling fine,” he said at the time. “It’s nothing long lasting and it’s not going to kill me but it was scary in the beginning. It drained me for about five weeks and I lost major time from the campaign, major fundraising time, and plus it took a lot of my stamina.”
Now as he prepares to celebrate his 46th year as a drag entertainer with an event at Hamburger Mary’s in Orlando Jan. 29, Shannon sat down with Watermark to talk about his years as an entertainer, what happened with his health and the future of his political career.
WATERMARK: How did you develop your drag persona Leigh Shannon and the impersonations that you do?
Leigh Shannon: I developed Leigh Shannon because my drag mother, Peaches Le Pit. She told me “You look like this drag queen outta Texas named Shannon Lee, so let’s just call you Leigh Shannon.” I liked that because back then what would happen in Louisville is you’d be out at Zayre’s or Kmart and someone would be like, “Oh hey there, Ester T.” So at least with Leigh, if someone called to me, it was a generic name.
Believe it or not, I was the dancer of the show. I was the character person. Always trying to do a little Annie Lennox or Dolly Parton when she came out with “Here You Come Again.” I just happened to put on a curly, blond wig and a purple dress and someone said, “You look like her.”
When I got hired at La Cage I tried out as Dolly Parton and they said, “No, you don’t look enough like her. It’s nice but no.” So they hired me as a Patsy Cline look-a-like, and I did look like her. Then they let me do Stevie Nicks in the show and they kept telling me, “We already have a Bette Midler but you really look like Bette Midler.” So I started doing Bette Midler just in the clubs and it actually stuck. Now I’m known for doing look-a-like shows.
How many celebrity drag impersonations do you do?
Dolly Parton with a Kenny Rogers puppet. I do Stevie Nicks, I do Better Midler and Elton John currently. But back in the day when I was younger and slimmer, I would do a bunch of different ones. I still do Patsy Cline too.
In and out of Central Florida’s LGBTQ community, you are as well known for your wig shop as you are your drag persona because of your work supplying wigs to cancer patients. How did you come to own a wig shop?
It was 33 years ago I walked into a store called Ritzy Rags on Mills Ave. and met this lady, Nancy Gillman, who was running this consignment shop. She had bought the business for her and her daughters, but they had walked out on her. She had a room in the back and we liked each other so I said let me put a few wigs and jewelry and dresses in the back and we called in Baubles by Leigh.
It got popular and then we started getting cancer patients coming in, crying and they said a local place called Wigvilla was the only place to go and they were uncaring. So I told Nancy we needed to spruce the store up, so we dropped Baubles by Leigh and made the store nicer.
She retired 15 years later and I took the store and made it Ritzy Rags Wigs & More. I got rid of most of the consignment and made it more boutique. We started to cater to a lot of cancer patients and it got very emotional. We became very popular also with the queens and the local art. The ballet — the Russian Ballet and the Orlando Ballet — we do their makeup and hairpieces.
On top of entertaining and running a business, you also sought to get into politics. You announced in June 2021 that you were going to run of Orlando City Council. When did you decide you wanted to get into politics?
About 10 or 12 years ago, I’m one of those people who love my neighborhood and I like for it to gel, and I never felt like College Park was meant to be Lake Eola or New York City. I saw a lot of things happening and the growth wasn’t going properly.
I talked to Mr. Stewart a lot and got to talking to neighbors and had been thinking about running. I almost ran in the campaign before his last one but I supported Asima [Azam]. I thought the last term would be Stewart’s last and he decided it wasn’t but I told him I’m not getting any younger and I want to do it so I decided to run.
I knew the stigma of the drag queen entertainer and what that would mean to some but I thought before I dropped out of the race it was helping me in a lot of ways.
When you made the announcement you were running, you leaned into your drag persona.
I did because I thought what does it matter? That’s how many people know me. I was excited about running because I think it’s time we get new blood in there. I don’t think a commissioner should be in office four or five or six terms. I think it’s ridiculous, it’s not supposed to be a career job. You’re supposed to be a keeper of the district for a little while then hand it down. Stewart has promised me he is going to leave after this term. Now whether it is me who runs next time or someone else, there needs to be new blood in there.
I guess it is fair to say you support term limits for Orlando commissioner seats?
Now I like [Orlando Mayor] Buddy Dyer, but including him. He’s done a lot of good but it’s time to go. It’s time to run for senate or governor or whatever, but I don’t care how good of a person you are after a while you start to feel entitled to things. Let’s say a local bakery gives you a free doughnut because you won, well after four or five years, you start to feel you are entitled to a free dozen.
It’s just the way they think. “I’ve done so much good for the city so I deserve those doughnuts.” I think we all would get an ego doing that job for so long, so it is time to either step down or move up. I’d say it is time for four or five of those commissioners leave.
As it stands right now, do you plan to run again next term?
If my health does well. So far they have found nothing wrong with me. On my heart, my carotid artery, anything like that. They told me it would take three to six months to get back to myself. It has been three months and three weeks and I’m a lot better.
It was a struggle but I might. It depends who runs. I would have gladly supported Nicolette Springer [in the last race] but I feel like she was not telling everything she truly believed. She would slide around the issues. I want someone who is going to answer the damn questions. Tell us what you truly believe, doesn’t mean we have to agree on everything but at least let us know where you are coming from. At least with Stewart, I know where he is coming from. And he did say that I helped him change his vote on Rosemont. So at least I did some good running.
You mentioned your health concerns, which is why you dropped out of the commissioner race last year. Let’s talk about what happened.
I was working on the campaign with my husband at 10 p.m. at night. We have a guest house and I walked out the door there and he looked at me funny when I stood up because I kind of lost my balance and caught myself. So I sat down and asked him to grab me two aspirin. I took them and I was having vertigo, and I should have gone right to the hospital that minute. I went the next day.
The first scan saw nothing but then they did an MRI and said that I had a stroke. That first week I couldn’t even write my name and I was thinking, “how am I gonna paint a face?” I was going through all of these emotions. I took two weeks off from doing my show and took a few nights practicing painting my face and I started being able to write my name again and everything has improved. I am about 95% back to myself. I didn’t tell anyone the details of what happened except close friends.
Why didn’t you want to tell people at first what happened?
The emotional stress after it happened has been exhausting. I felt if I told anyone, including the owners of Hamburger Mary’s, that I had a stroke that they would think I was broken. No matter what anyone says, they think you’re broken. So I decided I wasn’t gonna tell a soul.
The campaign was still going on. I took about eight days, I talked to some of my campaign people and they said you can’t even tell you had a stroke, you can still run. I had already lost a bunch of time not campaigning, fundraising. I said, “no, I can’t lie to people.” It was the hardest decision because I worried people would say, “See, you were just doing it for attention,” “You weren’t serious about running” or “You couldn’t hack it.” So we just left it at I had a health issue.
I started thinking about it over the last month or so and thought people deserve to know why and I don’t care that people know now. I have researched strokes and I was blessed that it was a minor one and I’m blessed that I didn’t have anything permanently wrong. I’ve decided to tell my story now and I’ll let people think what they think.
I feel like a lot of people don’t know, if I had gone to the hospital that night they may have been able to reverse it with a shot. If you go within four hours of having the stroke they have a shot that can reverse many strokes, not all of them, but that’s something I don’t think a lot of people know. If you have a pain late at night and you think I’ll just go to my doctor in the morning, it’s too late.
If it’s a stroke or a heart problem, you’ve got to go now. I live six blocks from the hospital; I should have gone.
Physically you said you are doing much better now. How has the mental health been since the stroke?
I was in a full-blown depression and I really kept most of that to myself.
Even from your husband?
Yeah, mostly. Then finally, like six weeks in, I said to him “I’m struggling.” He’s a quiet guy and I think he thinks I’m Superman, but I blame myself because I always act like such a strong person. I was struggling. I’d wake up and I would just sit. I had a dentist appointment and I cancelled it twice because I would think, “why bother, you’re probably gonna die from the stroke.” I’d get a pain in my arm and automatically think I’m having a heart attack. I was sitting there, looking at a bottle of pills that I have been saving for the apocalypse and thought if you have a major one you better keep one hand handy. Those were things that were going through my mind but they were just thoughts I was having.
For one thing I would never want to burden my husband ever. I don’t want to go into a home. I’m from the country where people kept their seniors at home no matter what. But it was a major depression that ended about a month ago. It was something I had to get through, every day. I’m still a go-getter but I make time for myself now, I take my time and I’m just gonna do it that way from now on. The biggest thing is I don’t want negativity in my life. I want it positive and I have no intention of going away.
You have a show coming up later this month to celebrate 46 years as an entertainer, and the show is also a benefit for a local stroke victim.
I was very lucky to have a mild stroke, I can’t imagine what it would have been like if it was a massive one like Cherylann [Murphy Ponziano] had, who we are doing the fundraiser for. Part of the proceeds from my show for my 46-year anniversary will go to her. I also started a GoFundMe for her. I may also auction off one of my costumes. I want to see what ways I can help raise money for her.
She is back working at Publix two days a week but she is struggling. And I thought if I did decide to tell people, what more do I want to do? When I do fundraising I like to do it personally for individuals. I like to give to people directly. She is right here, from our neighborhood, where I live, where I have a business, we both had strokes. I thought that would be a good way to raise awareness. She is doing better but she has a long way to go.
“Leigh Shannon Celebrating 46 Years in Showbiz” will be at Hamburger Mary’s in Orlando Jan. 29 starting at 8 p.m. Call for reservations at 321-319-0600.
