'RuPaul's Drag Race' Winner Debuts 'Travesty'

07:56AM / Thursday, August 20, 2026Print Story | Email Story

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Adams Theater presents the New England Tour debut of "Travesty" by "RuPaul's Drag Race" Season 9 winner Sasha Velour on Aug. 29, at 7:30 p.m. at the '62 Center for Theatre and Dance.

Visit here for more information.

According to a press release:

Internationally beloved drag icon Sasha Velour is coming to Williamstown, with her new theater show, Travesty, which traces the secret queer history of a single spot throughout time: a witch burns in a field; a clown builds a theater; an underground gay bar rises up against the police. As Velour embodies different characters through a series of jaw-dropping lip-syncs, she invites you to take part in the cycle of existence, resistance, and camp that IS drag. Part performance art, part history, part call to action, Travesty will have you screaming at the top of your lungs, dancing in the aisles, and inspired to "change the muthaf*ckin' world!"

Velour is known for her unique fusion of lip sync performance, video art, and storytelling. She is the winner of Season 9 of RuPaul's Drag Race (2017), the founder and host of New York City's legendary drag revue NightGowns (since 2015)–considered one of the best drag shows of all time–and has toured two celebrated one-queen theater shows around the world, "Smoke & Mirrors" (2019-2022) and "The Big Reveal" (2023-2025).

The presentation of "Travesty" will also include a curated talkback at the Adams Theater on Sunday, Aug. 30. Hosted by Berkshire's drag producer Bella Santarella, the conversation will focus on the craft and significance of queer art, creating an open space for local youth and residents to engage with the work.

This collaboration between the Adams Theater and Williams College is made possible by a New England Foundation for the Arts' Crossroads grant.

Velour's first one-person show, "Smoke & Mirrors" (2019-2022), toured to 90 theaters around the world, including the Folies Bergère and the London Palladium. Her second, "The Big Reveal" (2023-2025), toured to 63 theaters, with hit runs at Steppenwolf.

Her namesake production company, House of Velour, has produced live shows and video for HBO, Quibi, NY Fashion Week, MAC Cosmetics, Audible, Lyft, Absolut Vodka, La Jolla Playhouse, and more.

In 2023, Velour released a best-selling book, "The Big Reveal: An Illustrated Manifesto of Drag," which explores the untold history of drag, interwoven with stories from her life as a young queen (Harper, 2023).

In 2017, Velour gained international attention when she competed on and won the 9th season of RuPaul's Drag Race, the same year the competition won its first Emmy.

In 2020, she executive-produced her own limited TV series, an adaptation of "NightGowns," directed by Sophie Muller and co-produced by The Documentary Group, which received a RealScreen Award. In 2023, she joined the cast of HBO's Emmy and Peabody Award-winning "We're Here," which was nominated for two Critics' Choice Real TV Awards, Best Ensemble Cast and Best Structured Unscripted Series (won). In 2025, she served as a head judge on "King of Drag," the first televised drag king competition in history.

As an illustrator and designer, Velour has produced several comic books and an anthology about drag called "Velour" (2013-2018). She drew the Google Doodle for Marlene Dietrich in 2018 and created a self-portrait for the cover of The New Yorker in 2023.

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Discrimination Against Muslim Americans Persists 25 Years After 9/11

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
07:00AM / Saturday, September 12, 2026

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — Dozens of Muslim Americans were among people killed in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

Untold numbers of Muslim Americans have suffered countless acts of discrimination in their aftermath.

"Of course, you'll find several accounts of Muslims from all over the U.S. describing how they went from the unknown kids in the school to being stereotyped or ridiculed for their Muslim names," Sidra Mahmood recalled recently. "However, many Americans forget that the victims of 9/11 were also Muslim Americans.

"I can't forget the time when a classmate broke down in sobs when 9/11 came up in our classroom at the Islamic seminary I went to in Texas, because her father's best friend who was like an uncle to her, died on 9/11."

Today, Mahmood is a chaplain at Williams College. In 2001, she was growing up in Karachi, Pakistan, when terrorists forced two passenger jets into the Twin Towers in lower Manhattan and another plane into the Pentagon outside Washington, D.C. A third plane, which terrorists hoped to crash into a D.C. landmark, was brought down in western Pennsylvania after passengers and crew fought back against the hijackers.

The attacks, which ultimately claimed 2,976 lives, horrified people around the world, including in Mahmood's native land.

"I remember being aghast like anyone who witnessed the fall of the Twin Towers in real time," she said. "However, even as a child, fear gripped me about the possibility of war, especially once we learned that Afghanistan, right adjacent to Pakistan, would be attacked by the U.S. My mother had told me about the 1971 war between India and Pakistan when she remembered hiding in the dark after bomb sirens would go off in Punjab after intentional blackouts.

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