‘Death Is A Drag’ Event Celebrates Funeral Traditions, Performance

HIALEAH, FL — When archaeologist Malachi Fenn first befriended drag performer Karla Croqueta, they realized they shared a unique common interest: cemeteries and funerary rituals.

Now, they’re working together to organize Death is a Drag, an evening of drag performances and presentations about funeral traditions and historic cemetery preservation through the Florida Public Archaeology Network, Fenn’s employer.

The free show takes place Sunday from 7 to 8:30 p.m. at Unbranded Brewery, 1395 E. 11th Ave., Hialeah. Register in advance here.

Growing up in the Miami area, Croqueta sometimes worked with a family friend who owned a funeral home and thought it might be a career she’d like to pursue. She even earned an associate degree in mortuary science from Miami-Dade College.

Croqueta’s instructors and mentors in the field told her that it would be a great fit for her in some ways, but also said that she had “too big of a heart to do this job,” she said. “That turned out to be true.”

After six months of an internship in the field, she realized it was “very morbid” and “a sales job at the end of the day.”

Still, she appreciates that world, she said. “I always thought it was cool. I like the theatrical part of it, the makeup, the embalming.”

As an archaeologist with FPAN, Fenn has long been drawn to funeral rituals, and said they wanted to create a Halloween event that touched upon these traditions and also educated people about historic cemetery preservation.

Usually, the Halloween events they organize are geared more towards children, so they were excited to organize a program solely for adults.

“We decided it might be a good idea to combine the historic cemetery preservation workshop with a drag show,” Fenn said. “It’s like the typical ‘think-and-drink’ event that you see in Miami pretty often.”

Both Fenn and Croqueta will present on the topic.

“It’s not every day do you have a drag queen who studied mortuary science talking about how life is a drag,” she said.

Croqueta plans to speak about the similarities between performance and funeral rituals.

“I’m going to be giving a talk on how everything in funerals is so directly related to performance,” she said.

In Judaism, for instance, mourners sit shiva after the death of a close loved one.

“It’s so performative,” Croqueta said. “It’s like, ‘I’m grieving so hard right now that I can’t do anything, and you have to tend to my needs for me.’ It’s beautiful, but performative.”

As for the Catholic church, “everything in Catholicism is a show,” she said.

Croqueta and drag artist Opulenceeeeee will also perform before and after the presentations.

Fenn said that they’ll speak about American burial traditions in various historic periods.

Their focus will be cemeteries, though.

“What can we learn from gravestones and how they’re designed, the challenges that historic cemeteries face in terms of preservation, and the type of things we can learn from cemeteries as outdoor museums,” they said.

FPAN frequently hosts cemetery cleanups and historic preservation workshops throughout the Miami area and other parts of the state. Learn more about the organization’s Cemetery Resource Protection Training workshops, which include both in-field and classroom training, here.