King for a Day

Experiential Workshop with Danica Lani

Danica Lani: Photographer Tanja Bruckner

Danica Lani is The King Coach and founder of Kings of Joy. Since December 2020 she has mentored more than 150 first-time Drag Kings, and has performed as her own Drag King persona, Dario di Bello, since 2011. Her work uses Drag Kinging, movement, embodiment and performance to explore masculinity and gender, grounded in the belief that we do our best living when we're 100% at home in our own skin.

Lean into your masculinity, as far as you'd like to go, and see what you discover.

King For A Day is a beginner-friendly, embodied Drag King workshop where you invent a larger-than-life version of yourself and bring it to life through movement, persona and play. No dance experience or drag background required. You don't need to identify as a man, as masculine, or even necessarily as queer. The only invitation is curiosity about masculinity and about yourself.

Through conversation, embodied exploration and movement, you'll begin building a Drag King persona that's entirely your own. Along the way, you'll experiment with masculine expression on your own terms, take up space, and break free from constraints around gender that may have quietly shaped how you move through the world. The workshop culminates in bringing your newly created Kings together for a playful, boy-band-style group routine, learned together on the day.

This is masculinity explored, not performed for approval. There's no correct way to do it. Come and see what yours looks like.

KINGS OF JOY - PERFORMANCE

Kings of Joy is a Sydney Drag King community founded by Danica Lani, who has mentored more than 150 first-time Drag Kings since December 2020. A Kings of Joy performance is a joyful, bold and theatrical embodiment of queer masculinity in all its forms. Each King creates their own larger-than-life persona and expression rather than fitting one prescribed model of what masculinity should look like. Expect playfulness, heart, spectacle and a genuine celebration of what becomes possible when people are given permission to move beyond the gender constraints they inherited.