Interview: Dominus Von Vexo, producing the UK’s first Drag and Burlesque Festival in Birmingham

Dominus Von Vexo is House of Allure’s multi award-winning drag and burlesque producer, teacher and performer. This year, Dominus is taking on an exciting new challenge; producing the UK’s first Drag and Burlesque Festival. They took some time away from their busy schedule to speak to Midlands Rainbow all about the festival, which comes to Birmingham this winter.

“The festival is an idea I’ve thought about for a while,” Dominus explains, adding that their busy work schedule and the logistics of such a big undertaking had held it from becoming a reality, until now.

Birmingham Drag and Burlesque Festival comes to venues across the city from 5^th – 8^th November. Tickets are on sale now!

When asked why 2026 is the right time to hold a Drag and Burlesque Festival, Dominus continued: “As I'm sure you know, the industry, and just entertainment events in general, are really struggling at the minute. We need to try and grow new audiences so, I was just like, well, how about we take a gamble and go so much bigger than we have before?

“Let’s just take that leap of faith, whilst everyone's struggling more, and try and bring a little bit more visibility to what we do.

“So, that was the initial action thought into it… We need something to lift up what we're doing.

“As a producer in general, I care a lot about the industry, I care a lot about the community. I want the festival to be a reflection of what I stand for and what I do.”

Birmingham Drag and Burlesque Festival will feature a range of events across multiple venues including alternative life drawing at Eden Bar, The Allure Games at The Old Joint Stock, and The Follies Grandé at The Old Rep, among many other events.

“People should expect the spirit of drag, burlesque and cabaret in some of its rawest forms... the diversity of it, the creativity of it, the glamour of it, and the kookiness of it.”

As well as shows aimed at audiences, the offering also includes programming designed for performers themselves including The Producer Panel (now fully booked); a free discussion panel, Q&A and performances supported by public funding from National Lottery through Arts Council England.

“Teaching is also a big part of what I do,” Dominus explains. “and I like mentoring. So, when putting together the festival, I had to think ‘okay, who's it going to attract?’ My current view of the festival in its infancy is, ‘how can this essentially serve many people?’

“It's naturally going to attract a lot of performers, and while shows can be inspiring there's definitely other things that we can add to the programme to really try and enrich what we do in that sense.”

Over 400 performers submitted their reels in hopes of being part of the inaugural Birmingham Drag and Burlesque Festival. Dominus said “it was a joy” to view them all as they came in, and begin putting together line-ups with the support of a panel of other performers.

“There was a lot to go through. Each show requires different things; each has a slightly different theme, so you have to consider things in terms of ‘will this fit in the space?’, ‘Do we have song clashes with other numbers’, all of those kinds of types of things.

“I try to bring a level of excellence to what we're doing, but also give opportunities to newer performers as well.

“So yeah, it was tough, but it was a real joy to go through and watch everyone. It's a real testament to the performers.”

“I'm really, really proud of the casting; we've got a great variety of shows. Obviously, we can't always cater to every possible person ever, but I think we've got a really good mix in there that reflects what global burlesque is, but also specifically what UK burlesque is. I think the UK can get very underrepresented sometimes in more international spaces in terms of the creativity that we offer.

“People should expect the spirit of drag, burlesque and cabaret in some of its rawest forms. I think the festival will be fair representation of what our industry has to offer, the diversity of it, the creativity of it, the glamour of it, and the kookiness of it.”