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\f0\fs24 \cf0 My name is Rudy Flesher and I\'92m from Mt. Laurel, New Jersey. Oh sparkles
are already flying, girl. I think the kind of story of my *** experience was going
from very involved in my church and dealing with a minister who was fired actually for
being a lesbian to being the first out rugby player at my school and somehow transforming
from a hard-hitting, beer-drinking athlete into like glamazon drag performer in Philadelphia,
so it\'92s been a crazy ride. So something actually probably most people don't know is
that Rudy is not my given name. It's a name I got playing rugby, based on the movie Rudy,
where he's small and scrappy but he hung in there. Nicknaming is a huge thing in rugby.
I got the name Rudy because I broke my nose in one of my first games. All I knew is that
they were cheering for me because I was bleeding and that they were excited and if I could
stop the bleeding in 15 minutes I could get back in the game. That\'92s one of the rules
of rugby. So I refused to go to the hospital, I insisted they cut a *** in half, shoved
it up my nose, threw me right back in the game, and I had never seen the movie Rudy,
so when my teammate Scooter nicknamed me, at that point, I was pretty toasted it was
the after party, I drank more than usual because my face was throbbing from taking a hard skull
to my nose. And he points out, and was like, dude, and he gets everyone's attention first
so all eyes on me, and dude, he's Rudy because he's scrappy. And later on, moving to Philadelphia
I was presented the opportunity to start doing drag performances so this transition from
I\'92m going to be the biggest baddest guy I can, to I\'92m going to master walking in
6-inch heels and a 22-inch corset. I wanted to embody being sexy and I started to but
didn\'92t know how to do it and didn\'92t know how to be sexy and be a part of masculine
and feminine. To me they were somehow separate. To be feminine would be to stop being sexy.
So just being out there in a small black cocktail dress showing off my really beautifully built
hairy quads from running a marathon is so empowering and so liberating. I think Notorious
OMG brings it all together. People talk about me having the character of Notorious OMG,
I don't think it's the character, it\'92s just Rudy turned to 11. But I really think
it's the combination of rugby and running and being, learning to be comfortable with
my body. And the best, best, best part about it was the first show I ever did was for the
Liberty City Kings and I\'92ve never done traditional drag, I've never shaved my chest
or my beard, I\'92ve never worn a wig, I call it gender *** royalty, it kind of brings
together burlesque and leather and all these *** looks and combines them. And pictures
start going up on Facebook and I'm like oh what's everyone going to say, I\'92m wearing
leather boots, leather jock strap, and a corset, and literally the first 3 people to say positive
things about my first drag performance are my rugby teammates who are my friends on Facebook.
So there's this appreciation of, oh maybe we're all a little sadistic and masochistic
because you have to to play rugby, it's 80 minutes of one of the roughest sports in the
world with no pads, you\'92re wearing shorts and a jersey and a mouth guard and that\'92s
it. But I think they saw this other kind of physical extreme of this tiny corset and these
heels and I don't know, they were proud of me, and, oh, that's so awesome that you're
expressing yourself, I don't know how you wear that corset, that's so badass. And so
to have this outpouring of love and support from all of these straight rugby hooligans
was just the most affirming and unbelievable experiences that a drag performer who was
also an athlete can have.}