At the Third Annual Doll Invasion, Trans Joy Was the Revolution
“The heels on the doll go clack, clack, clack,” lilts a voice in front of me as dolls find their seats in a cascade of neon jerseys, five-inch heels, Doc Martens, and patterned sarongs. We’re on a bus parked on Third Avenue in Brooklyn, and soon we’ll travel past the skyscrapers, then the strip malls, to arrive at the Sayville Ferry Service for the second day of the Doll Invasion.
Now in its third year, the Doll Invasion is an annual fundraiser benefitting trans-led organizations Queer Art and Advocates for Trans Equality that also creates opportunities for trans people to enjoy the Fire Island Pines, usually an expensive and complicated trip, for free. (Allies are also welcome, and can purchase tickets or volunteer.) What started as one day is now a weekend-long celebration with music, sunshine, swimming, dancing, DJs, performances, and trans joy.
Lizzy Annoni, 35, is sitting next to me on the bus; she’s traveled from Austin specifically for this event. Yesterday, Day 1 of the Doll Invasion, was her first time on Fire Island; she’ll be one of many first-timers visiting throughout the weekend.
“I was able to go in the pool and take in the environment and people-watch and just feel really comfortable,” Lizzy says. “We don t really have anything like this in Texas, even in Austin, which is kind of progressive.” She hasn’t really gone swimming in gender-affirming swimwear there, especially after a trans woman in Austin was attacked at a swimming hole this summer. “I feel like there s no judgment [at Doll Invasion], because everyone s on the same page…we just all want to have a good time, be loved and seen,” she continues. The bus arrives at the ferry terminal, and the next stop is the Pines.
What’s powerful about the Doll Invasion, and events like it throughout queer history, is that in the face of darkness its creators instead look toward the light, providing opportunities for connection and strength in togetherness. As Audre Lorde said, “The sharing of joy, whether physical, emotional, psychic or intellectual, forms a bridge…we begin to demand from ourselves and from all our lives pursuits that they feel in accordance with that joy.” Create joy, and you might just create a revolution, too.
So the Doll Invasion is not just a place of safety, it’s also a place of bliss, and actively so. “Fun is a critical need. It s too easy, actually, to relegate trans people and the trans community, especially in a year like this one, as a cause,” says Fran Tirado, founder and Overall Mother of the House of Doll Invasion and editor-in-chief of Them. “Trans people are so much more than a cause. We actually throw really fabulous parties. We have great taste. We re all hot and we re all cunt.”
And then, on a more serious note: “We re in a unique cultural moment where—it s always been true, but particularly right now—they re trying to kill us, and I don t say that in a hyperbolic way,” Tirado notes. “But fun never dies, and what we create never dies, and trans cultural production never dies, and that s why we do what we do.”
Trans advocates have long worked toward having an equitable presence in the Pines specifically, which has developed a reputation for muscular cisgender gay men and a not-so-subtle whiff of exclusion. “Invasion is the key word here,” says fashion designer Willie Norris, Doll Invasion’s creative director. While there’s no doubting Fire Island’s beauty, Norris adds, for many it’s been rendered inaccessible, in terms of both cost and culture. This is something the Doll Invasion team is working to change. (The theme of this year’s event is “Wet Hot Transexual Summer.”) As the ferry docks, a hot pink sign shouts, “Welcome, Dolls!”
Doll Invasion draws inspiration from the Invasion of the Pines, an event also challenging the Pines’ status quo. When beloved Cherry Grove drag queen and trans woman Teri Warren was denied entry to the Blue Whale, a venue in the Pines, for being in drag in 1976, it shook her community. In response, activist and drag artist Thom Hansen, a.k.a. Panzi, gathered his friends to invade the Pines in drag on July 4, 1976, and take up space on Teri’s behalf. Guests loved it, much to the chagrin of the owner. From then on, boarding a ferry in Cherry Grove in dazzling drag before arriving in Pines became an enduring tradition.
“I feel like this is the year where Doll Invasion shows up as a bona fide institution, proper organization, and tradition within the island as an homage to the history of the Drag Invasion back in the ’70s,” Tirado says. “As Ita [Segev], our fundraising captain, often says, Doll Invasion is putting the T into the 120-year LGB history of this island as a safe haven for queer people. But this year in particular, I feel like we have totally, in our standing, decided that this will be every single year and must be a part of the island s history.”
Arriving for Day 2’s big pool party at the Tryst Pool Club, I marvel at the location: Mere feet away is the Blue Whale. Could Teri Warren have imagined that an event begun in her name would not only go on for 50 years, but also inspire another event meant for people exactly like her?
Ceyenne Doroshow, a godmother of trans activism for some 40 years, is herself in awe. Did she ever think an event like this would exist when she started? “Hell no,” she says, clad in a peacock print and matching eyeliner as she sits in a lifeguard chair. But the beauty of the Doll Invasion is that it “shows a community of human beings that we are loved,” she says. “It s hard to create when you notice so many things oppressing you, but these kids have made it a beautiful thing.”
Ambient beats swirl from the speakers as bodies settle into chaises and couches or into the pool’s bright blue water. Over the course of the weekend, well over 1,000 people would traverse the Pines for Doll Invasion alone—including the Day 1 festivities at the Pines Club, home to the famed Pines Party. Among the guests are Tommy Dorfman, Prabal Gurung, Chelsea Manning, Julio Torres, Martine Gutierrez, Countess Luann, and so many more.