Maisie Trollette and Scott St Martin sing “The Best of Times” from “La Cage Aux Folles” at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern-taken from the TV Documentary- “Vivat Vivat Regina”. Thanks to David Rumelle for sharing. Also – here is a clip with an interview we did with David Raven (AKA Maisie Trollette) about ‘Trolling’.
Paul remembers the charity sports days held around the back of the RVT on Vauxhall Pleasure Gardens.
Here’s an advert we found from the early 1980’s which announces the re-opening of the Royal Vauxhall Tavern after ‘extensive re-docoration’. I wonder if this was when the bar was moved and the stage area added? Interesting to see mime and drag advertised as 7 days a week, including Sunday morning.
Simon talks about the ‘save our pub’ demos, that took place in the 1990’s when the RVT was threatened with demolition. Here’s a link to an article in from The Pink Paper dated 2nd October 1998.
Going through the Hall Carpenter Archive in London, there is a lot of articles written in the 1980’s highlighting the number of police raids and entrapment cases going on in gay bars at the time. Here’s a few examples.
I’ve just been reading Paul O’Grady’s Biography, which is broken down into 3 books. There’s some very interesting recollections of the RVT. The part below is from the second book ‘The Devil Rides Out’ when Paul was performing as part of the drag group ‘The Glamazons’. “At the Royal Vauxhall Tavern, in what felt like a rough part of sarf…
The project is moving along nicely – we did one of our first interviews last week with Bette Bourne and Paul Shaw. Bette used to go to the RVT in the 1950’s and remembers the bar being split into 3 sections, one of them being just for ladies. We’ll be posting the interview in the next day or so….
Filmed as part of Duckie’s Vauxhall Bacchanal last year. Built in 1863, this legendary London pub is 150 years young. How far back does it’s queer identity and its reputation for drag shows go? Rupert Smith investigates with Neil Bartlett, Stuart Feather and Maisie Trollette.