A Kiwi drag queen who became a familiar figure on Sydney streets
will be buried there after dying of kidney failure.
The iconic transvestite and performer, Carmen, has died aged 75 in
Sydney's St Vincent Hospital.
A gay rights advocate, former Wellington mayoral candidate and former stripper, Carmen had battled with poor health for months before finally succumbing to kidney failure early today.
"Even as recently as Monday night she was lucid and coherent and had a strong will to live," her close friend and guardian Jurgen Hoosma said.
"But since her fall her mood and outlook had been adversely affected. She had put on some weight but overall her health has been in a downward spiral throughout the year," Hoosma said.
The news Carmen died today is still sinking in for New Zealand's and the world's first transgender MP, Georgina Beyer.
"I've shed quite a lot of tears this morning," the former MP told ONE News.
"She fits into those characters like Barry Crump, John Clark/Fred Dagg."
Born Trevor Rupe into a family of 13 in Taumarunui, she took the name Carmen after entering the sex industry in Australia on leaving the army in the late 1950s.
Becoming Australia's first ever Maori drag performer, Carmen took the name from Dorothy Dandridge's character in the movie Carmen Jones.
Returning to New Zealand in the late 1960s, she became an entrepreneur and owned several businesses in Wellington, including a notorious massage parlour. It was rumoured to be frequented by everyone from politicians to police officers.
Despite homosexuality being illegal in NZ at the time, sexual
liaisons could be organised at Carmen's. Interested patrons would
arrange their coffee cups in particular ways to show what kind of
liaison they wanted: a heterosexual, gay, transsexual, or drag
queen encounter.
In the event of a police raid, Carmen had created an elaborate
system of doors and stairways that offered patrons various escape
routes.
"We had a secret door so you'd never know who was going up there, " she said in a 2001 interview.
"We had plenty of famous people but I'm terrible with names - although I always remember sizes."
Carmen was hauled before Parliament's privileges committee in the mid-1970s for hinting that several MPs were gay.
It was a far more triumphant return 20 years later.
Beyer said today: "It was wonderful to take her through the front door and have her seated in the place of honour at Bellamys. And Helen Clark, and the leader of the opposition and all the MPs came during the dinner break and paid their respects."
Running for mayor in 1977, Carmen campaigned for a number of changes including hotel bars to be open till midnight or later, the drinking age to be lowered to 18, prostitution to be made legal and abortion to be decriminalised.
She also campaigned for homosexual acts to be decriminalised, sex education to be made available in schools for 14-year-olds and for nudity to be allowed on some beaches.
All the issues she campaigned for are now legal.
"I enjoyed doing the campaign. I had (businessman) Bob Jones help
me. I haven't seen him in years. He's probably better looking than
me now," Carmen said in a 2009 interview.
Despite being in her 70s, the well-known performer was still pushing the envelope. In 2008 she led the Decade of the Divas float at the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras aboard her mobility scooter, topless.
She will be buried at Sydney's Rookwood Maori Cemetery.
