Split Personality
Along with his alter-ego, Summer Camp, party promoter Shea Van Horn is determined to make the D.C's nightlife scene even more weird, wild and wondrous than it already is
Photography by Julian Vankim
MW: So you haven’t heard back from the show?
VAN HORN: No. My guess is it’s a no this time around. But it doesn’t discourage me at all. It actually inspires me more. It’s fine if nothing else comes out of it other than the fact that it really re-inspires me to perform more often. It’s such a joy to perform and to be funny and sometimes irreverent and somewhat controversial.
MW: So you have renewed interest in performing in drag?
VAN HORN: Watching RuPaul’s Drag Race inspired me. I’ve done drag on and off now since 1995. And friends have asked me over the past few years, “Would you audition?” And I always said, “No, because reality TV shows scare me because you’re basically at the hands of editors.” And I’m sure that casting agents cast individuals they know will make good TV — whether you’ll freak out on camera or be a bitch and cause drama. I’m sure they set up situations to bring those elements out of people. So there’s a certain fear that I have about that. But at the same time I feel like, what have I got to lose?
MW: What inspired you to do drag in the first place?
VAN HORN: When I was studying theater in Seattle in the ’90s, I met Ryan Landry. And he had a theater company working with Dan Savage — when was directing theater he went by the name Keenan Hollahan. The two of them were doing a show in Seattle, a production of Women Behind Bars by Tom Eyen. Divine — who is my biggest inspiration — when he took a break from doing film work with John Waters, he was in this play, which is kind of cultish and notorious for that. And they were doing a production of it at a bar in Seattle. I auditioned for it and I got cast as Ada, a pyromaniac. And it’s all these women in jail, a sendup of ’50s bad girls in prison-kind of movies. It was a hoot. So in addition to all of my theater studies I was doing at school, I started doing these drag shows and drag plays with this group and people that were in that scene. So I got turned on to this whole scene that was happening in Seattle — not only drag, but over-the-top, campy, weird performance art. Really absurd type of stuff.
MW: What attracted you to that?
VAN HORN: I don’t know, I’ve always been drawn to theater, and to nightlife and going out. Whatever left-of-mainstream scene that might be happening in a city is always appealing to me. The people that were involved in that production team just had a certain edge to them that was really appealing. Irreverent, very politically minded. Just really absurd. Everything I saw was just so captivating and entertaining and funny — watching people’s minds work, taking some song and then they hear it in their mind, and they come up with some entirely weird way of presenting it on stage that you might not have thought of. It’s very fascinating to me. And then I moved to D.C. and it all kind of stopped for a while. Until Crack.
MW: But growing up, were you constantly performing?
VAN HORN: Sometimes I look back and it might have been that I was just different, and it probably was on some level that I was gay but not really having an understanding of what that was yet. I think that’s what made me different, made me weird. I had lots of energy, but at the same time I was kind of shy. Still am. As myself, I’m not always wanting to be the center of attention. As Summer Camp, sure. I think it’s often the case where somebody with a very large stage personality isn’t necessarily the biggest personality in real life. I don’t walk into a room and want to be the center of attention. Unless I’m very comfortable with the group. And I’m typically more comfortable with smaller groups.
I love to take risks and I love to be in front of people doing things, but I like to be in control. So, when I go to a party, I’ll feel a little bit uncomfortable if I don’t have a quote-unquote role. If I’m DJ’ing or hosting, then there’s a role and I can sort-of fall into that and it’s a little bit easier.
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