Drag queen by night, single dad by day


Chicago man breaks gay and straight stereotypes

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Marcus Parker lives in California with three children. He grew up in Chicago. (Bob Chamberlin, Tribune Newspapers /September 1, 2011)



By the time Marcus Parker left his hometown of Chicago in 2005 for California, he was well known around the city's drag-queen show circuit as Flame Monroe, the 5-foot-8, stacked diva with the crimson wig and extra-blue comedy act.

What most people wouldn't guess about the flamboyant Parker, who returns to Chicago this weekend for several shows, is that he's a devoted single father who is careful to tone down the color around his young children.

When he takes his son, 8, and two daughters, ages 8 and 4, to school every morning, he wears an Ace bandage around his size 36CC breast implants along with army fatigue clothing to further camouflage his curves.

"I also hunch my back to draw in my breasts," Parker said. "My kids know their daddy is super special. But other kids can be cruel. So out of respect for my children, my son in particular, I don't dress in drag during the day."

Long before Lady Gaga's "Born This Way" became an anthem for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people, Parker had no doubt that he was born a boy who also felt very much like a girl.

He knows that his mere presence upsets some people. Over the years, he said he's faced prejudice from inside and outside of the gay community.

This, in part, has shaped some of his views. He hopes his children aren't gay.

"I will accept them, absolutely, but being gay is too hard," he said.

And he doesn't support gay marriage.

"Gay people don't know what to think of me when I say that," said Parker, who is bisexual. "I just don't think it's right. In my heart and with the scriptures I read in the Bible, I don't believe that an ordained minister should marry a gay couple. I do believe completely in civil unions.

"I don't think it's right when a (gay) couple has lived a life together and family members step in at the last minute to take (possessions) or make decisions. But gay marriage? No. The only reason gay people want to get married is because they can't. Let them, and the divorce rate would be higher than (that of) heteros."

I told him it sounded like he wasn't completely comfortable with his own sexuality.

"Well, the Bible says that if I lay down with a man, I'm a sinner — so I have been a sinner," he said. "We all are sinners, and one sin is no greater than the other. No, I love who I am and I know who I am. I just don't think marriage between gays is right."

Parker grew up on the South Side in the now-razed Ida B. Wells housing project. He attended the same elementary school as I did — we only reconnected recently — and I recall vividly that most of us children knew he was different long before we knew words like "effeminate," "gay" and "transgender."

Parker rarely played sports, but he jumped double Dutch rope better than most of the girls. He was petite and cute and walked like a girl, which in our neighborhood also meant he had to fight and that, too, was like a girl. And yet he was outgoing and self-assured with a tough exterior.

What most of his classmates didn't know was that in the projects, he was viciously teased by young toughs and called a "sissy." He said his home life was troubled, and he was often left home alone to care for his brother, who was 12 years younger.

He said he loved television awards shows such as the Oscars and the American Music Awards because even though he couldn't sing or dance, he always knew he wanted to be a performer.

"I remember the first time Diana Ross was hosting the American Music Awards and every time they went to a commercial and came back, she'd have on a new outfit," he said. "My mother had big wigs and beautiful high-heeled shoes and dresses. I would dress up and put on makeup when she left. When I was about 14 and my brother was 2, I put on my first show, pantomiming a song for him. He was my audience."

Parker got his first set of breast implants when he was 23 and still thinking he might want to live his life as a woman, he said. He went to Tijuana, Mexico, and paid $1,600. He began taking female hormones to further feminize his body.

"I wanted a beautiful body," he said. "My star was rising quickly, and the Flame Monroe name was resonating around the circuit. I wanted to be able to fit into the bustiers and hit the stage and not have to worry about padding."

Parker often includes his life story in his comedy act, he said. In one, which would make most people blush, he talks about how sex with a married couple convinced him to keep his male parts.

He jokes about his coming of age in the housing project, and speaks lovingly about his brother's acceptance. He also talks about having had four breast surgeries and having lost one breast for eight weeks after an infection.

Although he includes stories about his children in his act, his most poignant reflections about them come off stage. He said they saved his life when his girlfriend — the mother of two of the children and the love of his life — left them.

"I thought being an entertainer was my greatest job until I had my children," said Parker, who is their biological father. "My kids saved me from certain death and destruction. When their mother left, I was so depressed. But I had to change a Pamper or fix a bottle or get up because my baby was crying. I had no other choice."

When he doubted whether he could be a single parent, he said he thought about the children he encountered when he was young who were homeless, or whose parents had abandoned them.

"I just didn't want anybody else raising my kids," he said. "According to society, some people think I've compromised my manhood. But the true measure of a man is not how he looks.

"This is me. I cut their umbilical cords, and I signed their birth certificates. They don't know any other father."

dtrice@tribune.com



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