For the “Gaze”: The Savannah Performance Community Celebrates Pride Month
By Gwen Leahy
For the “Gaze”
The Savannah Performance Community Celebrates Pride Month
“Pride is love. Open, honest, continuous love within a community built on understanding, compassion and kindness.” - Magnolia Minxxx
Autumn in Savannah is like a love letter from Mother Nature; a sweetly perfumed and lipstick-stamped apology for the months of sweltering heat and insects the size of compact sedans. Locals are finally free to leave the confines of their air conditioned homes, unabated by the environment we claim to love (while simultaneously using it as a litmus test to measure the grit of our visitors). With that, comes a resurgence of our cherished events-culture. Fall festivals, pumpkin patches, community picnics, you name it, Savannah locals have found a way to make them happen in abundance. However, while all October events in our town are a source of joy city-wide, there is one that sits near and dear in the hearts of our performance community: The Savannah Pride Festival.
Touting a theme of “chosen family,” our city’s 27th Annual Savannah Pride Festival is set to take place on October 24th in Forsyth Park. This event is going to be packed with live performances and entertainment from start to finish, spanning a drag queen story hour to pop-up performances from the city’s multitude of talented drag and burlesque performers. That being said, this event is about more than just death drops and rhinestones… It is about community.
Magnolia Minxxx, the Savannah Pride Center’s events manager, is most excited about the community outreach opportunities that will be showcased at the event, such as their veterans support group, youth group, and officiant services. Furthermore, the Center recently unveiled their inclusive healing clinic, which offers services such as STI testing, hormone replacement therapy, PrEP/PEP, gynecology, and general check-ups to LGBTQIA+ Savannians in need. Minxxx also implores individuals to reach out for any support, stating, “Make the leap! We don’t accept hate and will always protect against it as much as we can… We love and appreciate openly.”
Such an event, of course, does not come without its hurdles. Minxxx noted that, as with every nonprofit, their main roadblock in making positive change is funding. “We love what we’re able to do, but the more funding we’re able to achieve the more we’re able to grow the services we have, along with adding others that we would love to attain. We genuinely just want to give back to this beautiful community we love that’s given so much to us.” When asked how the community can show support, she states simply, “Donate, follow, share our efforts, and attend!”
For more information on The Savannah Pride Center and The Savannah Pride Festival, please go to https://savannahpridecenter.org/. Also, if you want to fill your Pride Month with more LGBTQIA+ entertainment, please see the following performances around town:
October 10th | As We Are Pride Concert @ The Otis S. Johnson Cultural Arts Center | 3:00 PM
October 10th | Queerprov @ Front Porch Improv | 10:00 PM
October 16th | Dark Desires @ Coastal Empire Beer Co. | 10:00 PM
October 17th | 3rd Annual Pride Ball @ The Venue Savannah | 5:00 PM
October 24th | Pride Fest @ Forsyth Park | 12:00 PM - 11:00 PM
October 31st | Marty Milquetoast’s Halloween Extrevaganza! @ Victory North | 8:00 PM
