Conversations with Pastiche Queen

Today we’d like to introduce you to Pastiche Queen

Hi Pastiche, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I moved to LA in June of 2019 for grad school. I didn’t have any expectation to stay here once I got my Master’s, but life had other plans for me. My third week in Los Angeles, I went to The Greenway Court Theater and attended my first night at Da Poetry Lounge. To say I was instantly hooked would be an understatement; this was one of the first places I’d ever been where I didn’t have to carve my own niche, where it felt like there was a slot I slipped right into, where there was an immediate sense of community and belonging.

I’m staring down the barrel of my sixth year here, and that feeling never changed. The Lounge is just as much a cultural lighthouse now as it was then, and there’s no signs of that changing any time soon. During my time there, I honed my craft and sharpened my pen to precision, I became a key member of the First Ever All-LGBTQ Slam Team in the country–The West Hollywood Slam Team–and I’ve taken home championship titles on a local and national level. I’m a published author, a teacher, a community builder, and I’ve genuinely come to believe that you get out of this place what you put into it.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Being queer, indigenous, trans, straddling the frontera between English and Spanish, having the realities of our socio-economic status laid bare before us, there wasn’t really a full deck of cards dealt to me from the jump. I’m the first person in my family to go to college, and that is a tremendous privilege I do not shoulder lightly. I come from a not-so-nice part of Denver, but I was able to go to a great school and really took my education seriously.

I was a speech and debate kid; wearing those little suits in high school were some of the only times I felt like I had any agency or control over my life. As I got older, that suit turned into a full face of makeup, a wig, and some heels. It was always drag, but I was finally calling it that too. So much of drag is bending, breaking convention, experimenting; I wanted to do it all. It honestly helped that I was a poor drag queen because it taught me how to truly make something out of nothing, how to take literal trash and turn it into treasure. Isn’t that what happens when we turn our experiences into poetry too?

I’ve found success onstage, on screen, on the page, and in competition with other likeminded artists around the country. I’ve done it as an unapologetically trans and mixed person speaking from my unique point of view, and I am so grateful that I’m able to now teach and coach folks to have that same experience.

The world of Slam Poetry, so much like the world of drag, is filled with people hungry to be seen, to tell their stories, to win. Sometimes, people’s drive to compete outweighs their ethics as competitors. The Slam World is incredibly accepting and mostly lovely, but it also comes with its own share of folks more-than-happy to play dirty, to be shady. I wish more people were willing to let their writing and performances speak for themselves, but competition can breed insecurity as much as it cultivates community. I think if folks put as much creative energy into honing their craft as they did into stabbing each other in the back, maybe they could bring home a trophy.

I’m so grateful to be part of a team dedicated to the craft of spoken word, and whose singular goal is uplifting the myriad experiences that answer poetry’s call. I believe all poetry is a reminder to someone else in the universe that they are not alone.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I’m an indigenous / latin playwright and a director with a background in Politics and Queer Theory, so I bring that perspective into all aspects of my writing and creative direction.
In Los Angeles, opportunity has struck more often for me as a poet than anything else, so most folks know me here as a slam poet, a writer, a competitor, but my heart has always belonged to the theater, to bringing text to life, to the spirit of collaboration.

I’m most proud of the work I’ve done in the theater–don’t get me wrong, the slam poetry accolades are nice, and they bring me more opportunities to show off my work, but there’s a stark contrast between the kind of preparation that goes into putting on a play with a full cast and the prep of crafting a slam poem by yourself or with a small team. I prefer claps in the house over snaps in the dark, and I think the world of live theater has so much untapped potential in Los Angeles for up-and-coming artists to take advantage of. I think gatekeeping only slows down our communal growth, so if at any point I can remove a barrier for someone else to enter, I’m going to do it.

My ability to be on time and switch effortlessly between artistic modalities has always set me apart: I’m a poet, playwright, author, director, actor, drag queen, stage manager, sound and projection designer, teacher, coach; I love wearing all the hats! I’ve put a lot of work into being one of those Los Angeles poly-hyphenates who is actually proficient at every hyphen they list.

Where we are in life is often partly because of others. Who/what else deserves credit for how your story turned out?
I really wouldn’t be here in this way without my writing fam, both Da Poetry Lounge community as well as The West Hollywood Slam Team. Success is the intersection of preparation and opportunity; I’ve been so lucky to have a community that consistently has my back, shows up to support, and puts their money where their mouth is. Figuratively and literally, these folks have supported me from the moment I arrived in LA to the present moment doing this interview.

More big picture, of course, my mom and my abuelos, the people who raised me, who put so much time and energy into making sure I had a fair shake at this thing. So many seeds were planted and they’re still continuing to grow and flourish.

And my boyfriend, Ben, who has seen me go from theater-goblin mode to starving-author mode to national-touring-artist mode and been along for the ride supportive and smiling the whole way. I could’ve spent these last few months so scared of what’s to come, but instead I’ve had so many moments invigorated with this sense of gratitude, of stability. Things I know I wouldn’t have if I were doing this thing on my own.

Pricing:

• Send me a DM or E-mail for booking info
• Playwriting Workshops & Commissions
• Poetry Workshops & Features
• Performance Coaching
• Theatrical Directing

Contact Info:

• Website: https://thelosangelespress.com/%20pre%20order%20trans%20velociraptors/
• Instagram: https://Instagram.com/PasticheQueen