A report by Kirk Cohall, Terrence Fraser and Ingmar Kuitert for City Limits.

“Sundari-The Indian Goddess”, a film by Kirk Cohall, portrays Sundari, an Indo-Caribbean drag performer, as she prepares to perform at the Caribbean Equality Project’s 5th Annual Love is L.O.V.E.: Living Our Values Equally show on February 22, 2020.

Sundari is originally from Guyana and currently resides in Far Rockaway, Queens. She has been performing since 2012 after being discovered at the Raj Kumari Cultural Center, where she was the first Indo-Caribbean/Guyanese drag queen to perform in a non-LGBTQ+ musical production in Queens.

In this show, Sundari’s does a dance called the Mudra, a fusion of Hip Hop and Contemporary dance styles, as a tribute to the Mongol Empire in India.

During her preparation for the performance, Sundari provides an intimate look at her process of getting into drag while also giving insight into Indo-Caribbean drag culture in New York City. She describes the need for people like her to continue to break barriers and educate the community about some of the hardships endured by LGBTQ people of color.

Sundari is currently the only Indo-Caribbean drag queen who uses performance as a tool to help promote the intersectionality of Caribbean arts and culture with the community of LGBTQ people of Indo-Caribbean descent in New York City. Sundari expresses the importance of sharing her culture with the greater New York City area and encourages more Caribbean LGBTQ people of color to advocate for tolerance and equality.