From the outside, the Wild Card looks like any other east Valley bar. The area is dark, and the small building stands across from a tattoo parlor.
But inside, a disco ball illuminates the wooden tables and booths, and a red curtain is pulled back to reveal a drag queen singing along to a Joan Crawford medley. Welcome to Saturday night at Chandler's only gay bar.
I ventured into a pretty empty Wild Card (801 N. Arizona Ave., Chandler) at about 8 p.m. Saturday night with (strangely) my mom, Deby Brite, brother, Robby Brite and roommate, Kim Weidner.
Now, don't get the wrong idea - I don't usually hang out at gay bars with my family. But on this particular night, my mom was accompanying her friends from work to watch the drag show, starring their boss's brother, Chris (stage name: Mya).
The show wasn't set to start until 10 p.m., so we had a good two hours to taste the local flavor.
So to start, my mom ordered us a round of Sex on the Beaches. While the drinks were very tasty, the cherry and pineapple juices definitely overpowered any taste (and feel) of alcohol. This was unfortunate, because you can imagine the extreme awkwardness of being at a bar with your parent.
After about 30 minutes of enjoying the scenery (the cool lights hanging above the booths look like dryer hoses with colored lights on the ends, and Bettie Page-esque photos hang in the bathroom), flirting with the cute gay bartender and engaging in exhausting conversation with my mom's coworkers, I was ready for another drink.
I spent $10 for two beers for my brother and me. Robby's draft beer was so huge I could hardly lift it. I thought the mildly over-priced drinks were going to be the worst thing about Wild Card. I was wrong.
By the time the drag show was supposed to start, we were already ready to leave. The atmosphere was laid back and there were pool tables to pass the time, but the overwhelming smell of smoke and massive amounts of people awaiting the show got old.
Once the show actually started (30 minutes late), the situation only got worse. Mya was the first to perform, and it was entertaining to watch her embarrass my mom's boss. But then she started talking to a bachelorette party in the front of the crowd and things got really wild. The things Mya told the bride-to-be about what to do to her future husband would have made Pamela Anderson blush. Needless to say, my mom was ready to leave in about five minutes. And as we snuck out the back door, none of us complained.
On the ride home, I longed for the simple days of drag shows at places like Hamburger Mary's where the drag queens sang, danced and cleanly embarrassed the straight males in the audience. (Sadly, the Mary's near campus on Scottsdale Road closed more than a year ago.) But that won't stop me from trying out Wild Card again someday... maybe on Drag Queen Bingo Thursday nights.
Reach the reporter at tara.brite@asu.edu
