Vicki Marlane (1934 - 2011) performer

After being raised by alcoholic farmers in Minnesota, Vicki started as a dancer in a Minnesota gay bar in 1950. Vicki was then employed by Hedy Jo Star and toured the carnival circuit as a female impersonator. She also worked for a while as an alligator women.

She worked and was arrested as a call-girl in Florida. She toured nightclubs across the US sometimes using the name Mister Peel. Vicki settled in San Francisco and played a variety of clubs.

After surgical completion in the early 1980s she retired temporarily and went to live in San Diego with a friend. When the friend died she returned to San Francisco, where in 1998 she organized a show called Girls Just Wanna Have Fun who performed in the Tenderloin. This later became the The Hot Boxx Girls . She was known as the Lady with the Liquid Spine for her body flexibility while lip syncing.

In 2003 she was a Grand Marshall at San Francisco Pride. She performed at Imperial Court events and in Trannyshack. In 2009 she was named Best Drag Queen by SF Weekly, and a documentary, Forever’s Gonna Start Tonight, was made about her life and performance.

She died at age 76.

++In 2014 San Francisco renamed the 100 block of Turk Street after her.

• Michelle Lawler (dir). Forever’s Gonna Start Tonight. With Vicki Marlane. US 54 mins 2009.
• Malia Wollan. “Kicking Back and Kicking Off the Heels”. New York Times, November 29, 2009. www.nytimes.com/2009/11/29/us/29sfroutines.html.
• Jay Barmann. “Local Legend and Pioneering Transgendered Performer Vicki Marlane Dies at 76”. SFist, July 5, 2011. http://sfist.com/2011/07/05/local_legend_vicki_marlane_die.php.
• “Vicki Marlane, 1934-2011”. San Francisco Bay Guardian, 07.05.11. www.sfbg.com/noise/2011/07/05/vicki-marlane-1934-2011.