Inside the Continental Pageant’s Legacy of Glamour and Resistance

Sequins, choreography, towering wigs, and months of preparation culminate each year at the Continental Pageant, one of the country’s most prestigious drag and female impersonation competitions.

The Continental Pageant, a female impersonation pageant, began in the 1980s under Chicago business owner Jim Flint. The pageant system is divided into six divisions: Miss Continental, Mr. Continental (for male contestants), Miss Continental Plus (for participants weighing over 220 pounds), Miss Continental Elite (for participants 45 and older), Mr. Continental Newcomer (performers with fewer than five years of experience), and Miss Continental Newcomer. 

“I started going with my little fake ID before I was 21, and I just fell in love with it … When I first went, I was like, this is something. This is amazing,” said Milani Ninja, a former Miss Continental Plus and Miss Continental contestant, about her introduction to The Continental Pageant. 

The pageant is the largest in the Midwest and attracts contestants from all around the world every year to Park West Theater, located in the city of Chicago. Inspired by Miss Gay America and Miss Universe, the pageant was created to be more inclusive of trans women who wanted to compete.

“[The] Miss Gay America Pageant is for drag queens, but you had to be not transgender. If you had any hormones, any surgery, any silicone, any indication that you were trans or in the process of transitioning, you were not allowed to compete. So, Jim Flint saw it as discrimination against trans women, so he decided to create his own pageant, he created Miss Continental,”  Ninja said. 

Before performers can compete at a national level, they must first win a preliminary competition. 

“It’s kind of like winning state or regionals,”  Ninja said.

Similar to Miss Universe, the pageant includes a bikini and talent section. Contestants take months to prepare for the talent portion, including choreography, custom dresses, props, and makeup, often self-funding their performances. 

“You have to have some sort of talent … what can you do up there that maybe no one else can? Or, how can you elevate it,” said Angelise K. LaRue, a contestant in the Mr. Newcomer division this year. 

What does it take to win the prestigious Miss Continental crown? As stated by Ninja and LaRue, poise and professionalism.

“They call it the golden standard … it’s not about the way you look, but more about how you carry yourself,” LaRue said. 

“They want somebody that's going to elevate and treat this pageant as a business,” Ninja said. 

The winner of the pageant wins $2,000, though contestants say the value comes from recognition, exposure, and improving their art.

“If you win Miss Continental, you become more famous, more well known … you get to travel the world, performing at preliminaries, different venues, different cities, different states, now, different continents. There's Miss Europe Continental, there's Miss South Africa Continental, they're going to have Miss Mexico Continental …  and you know, once you win Miss Continental, you can raise your booking [performance] fee. It gives you [credibility] to charge more,” said Ninja. 

LaRue added that even participants who lose receive valuable feedback.

“They'll bring your scores. What can you work on? And you know, you do want to try again next year. And if you think it was just a one-time experience, at least you experienced it,” LaRue said. 

As for the future of The Continental Pageant, the two queens envision different futures for the pageant. 

For Milani Ninja, “Before [RuPaul’s] drag race, you would see 40, 50, something, like 60-something girls competing, and now it's a little bit harder. You see 20, 30, sometimes in the teens … I would love to see Continental being shown on national TV, international TV. Because imagine … people that watch it from other countries decide to watch it on, let's say, Netflix or Hulu, and then next thing you know …  I'm gonna fly in person, because I want to watch it in person,” 

LaRue has a different goal for the pageant: “I want to take it in the direction of advocacy … I love doing what I do, so much that I know that I can melt those two worlds together… For me, I see myself… going to an AIDS launch, being in the White House … I want to see myself in those faces … because the regular continental pageantry, the original [participants] … they paved it. They built the bricks. They did everything for us newcomers to run on it. That's how I see myself, reigning, paying homage to what they have done.” 

Although LaRue and Ninja expressed concern about political attacks targeting LGBTQIA+ communities, they also said pageants remain essential spaces for connection, visibility, even mental health.

“Competing for a pageant … puts structure back into their lives,” Ninja said. “They're like, ‘You know what? No, I want to win this … I'm gonna better myself to make sure that I am competing at my best.’”

For contestants like Ninja and LaRue, the stage is not only about winning and recognition, but about honoring those who paved the way while creating hopeful and lively spaces for the next generation. It makes us stronger because the communities that are being affected from the outside, that's when we come in … and we show the world … whether you're trans, whether you're gay, whether you're rejected or being pushed away from home for who you are, [it] made us strong enough to compete,” said LaRue.

Through glamour, performance, and perseverance, Continental continues to prove that pageantry can be both an art form and an act of resistance that will continue to grow.