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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Ryan Gilbey

Cowbois review – all guns blaze in wild queer western

Channelling the spirit of Divine in a Grotbags wig … LJ Parkinson (centre) in Cowbois at the Swan theatre.
Channelling the spirit of Divine in a Grotbags wig … LJ Parkinson (centre) in Cowbois at the Swan theatre. Photograph: Sarah Lee/The Guardian

A sleepy US town in the late 19th century: the husbands are away, the wives are stewing, the sheriff is sloshed and there’s a bandit on the loose. Jack Cannon’s the name, and queering the wild west is his game. Strutting into the saloon looking like the lost third member of the White Stripes, Jack (played with panache by Vinnie Heaven) is a non-binary transmasc gunslinger who has the whole town agog with his snake-hipped jiving.

Cowbois at the Swan theatre
Disco pizzazz … Cowbois at the Swan theatre. Photograph: Sarah Lee/The Guardian
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