Retro Video — Rene de Carlo at Finocchio’s, 1980
David de Alba, one of the last performers to star in fabulous female impersonation shows at Finocchio’s in San Francisco, is determined to keep that glamorous time alive. Back in 1980 David’s long-time partner Paul Ryner recorded video of many of the stars of the show. Over time most of those videos have disappeared but fortunately for those interested in the heyday of female impersonation now and then they surface. This is one of those videos from that long gone time. It was put on YouTube by David’s cousin Mario and David sent us the URL. It features Rene de Carlo who was billed as Finocchio’s own “International Dancing Star.”
Rene de Carlo was a dancer and was born in Mexico. He specialized in doing comedy dance routines. In this video the band, that’s right, they had a live band, backing de Carlo consisted of Bill Bullard at the piano, Mark on sax, and Shep at the drums. The MC is Carroll Wallace. The quality is not great in some spots as the lighting is not what you needed with a 1980’s era video camera but you can see enough to appreciate the show.
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David de Alba, who styled all of Rene’s wigs, is performing on November 8, 2015 at the Jewel Box Theatre, located in the Erotic Heritage Museum (3275 Industrial Road, Las Vega, NV 702-794-4000.
Category: Impersonation, Transgender History
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