The Drag Trade

Richard O'Brien presents a history of cross-dressing on stage, from the Elizabethan practice of casting young men in female roles, to Victorian music hall, World War Two PoW camps and the modern drag scene. Rachel Holmes, Richard Eyre, Mark Rylance and Billy Crudup, who stars as a 17th-century female impersonator in recent film Stage Beauty, offer their perspective on the phenomenon, providing an insight into the social function it performs