Interview: Daniel Franzese
Videographer: Dylan Mars Greenberg
Photos: Karla Moheno, Esther Canata
Graphics: Jaclene Sini
Story: Daniel Franzese
Styling: Fay Marks
Makeup: Raina Love
Hair: Perfidia
One of New York city’s beloved performers turns Times Square into her stage in a video that serves up sex, spectacle, and a deliciously cheeky bite at the industry.
Some artists wait for the red carpet to roll out. Bridget Barkan wears hers between her legs.
Strutting through Times Square with a giant red merkin trailing beneath Broadway’s marquees, Barkan makes an entrance that turns tourists into camera operators and the sidewalk into a stage. It’s outrageous, funny, and rooted in the New York that raised her: glitter pasties on 42nd Street billboards, cabaret rooms, and artists who keep the city alive.
In the video premiering on LADYGUNN, a ’70s femme fatale fantasy meets backstage intimacy and an industry send-up in which Barkan becomes the cake, ready to be served. Joining her are longtime collaborators and fellow New York creatives, including The Illustrious Blacks and Dusty Childers.
After a year touring as Scissor Sisters’ co-lead singer, Barkan brings that big-stage confidence into a world of her own making. What began as a cheeky play on words became a reminder of who she is—and a celebration of the people she creates with. Industry approval can take a number.
Below, longtime friend and former roommate Daniel Franzese catches up with Barkan about public spectacle, seduction with a wink, and making art with the people who already know you’re a star.
Bridget Barkan, we’ve known each other for so long, and you still managed to show me something new. This video is a whole world. What was the first image you imagined for this song?
100% me, scantily clad in Times Square with a giant red merkin trailing between my legs and rolling out in a red carpet in front of Broadway marquees.
Were all the tourists like, “What the hell?”
So many people were watching and filming. This one little old lady started clapping like, “Good job, sweetie. Look at you. You’re a star.” I’m like, “I know! But not everybody has figured it out yet!”
Most people ask someone to take their picture in Times Square, but you went and made everybody an extra. What does performing there give you that a closed set never could?
A lot of unexpected characters! I’m used to it. I grew up in the hood, went to school there. I’ve been doing performance art on these streets for years. Pretending to drop a contact lens in a crowd, singing for money or making out with girls in front of pro-life protests.
We lived together when we were younger. I’ve seen a little more than the public gets to see of you. This video moves between public spectacle and backstage intimacy. Where do you feel most like yourself?
Well, you know, on the couch! No, I can be myself in many places. Alone in nature. But I’m the most heightened, tapped-in version on stage. It’s where I feel connected to the Creator and humanity.
Let’s discuss your look—because she has arrived! Who were you becoming when you put that look on?
The strippers and nudie movie girls I’d see on billboards on 42nd Street with glitter pasties. I’d go home and draw little hearts on all of my Barbies’ boobs. I thought they were Broadway stars. I wanted to be just like ’em.
The wig is by Perfidia, downtown legend for Hedwig and a ton of drag icons. I wanted to tap into a ’70s femme fatale porn star vibe—something out of an old Russ Meyer movie.
You spent the last year touring as the co-lead singer of Scissor Sisters. What did performing for those huge crowds teach you that you brought into this video?
It gave me a lot more confidence and vitality to be as wild and fearless as possible. The Scissor Sisters are this iconic vessel of queer freakdom. They get my level of theatrics and were just like, “Here’s Bridget. Wind her up like a doll and let’s watch her spin.”
The press conference scene was killing me, and at the table where cake was being served.
Yes, I was the cake! Being fed to Gods and Kings is a little nod to the lizard elite cannibalism, hah! But more so, it’s about how industry takes pieces of the artist, using our light to juice up their power structure. So I made fun of it in resistance. Our light is meant to be focused on how we can help each other.
It’s appealing to see a powerful woman who’s okay to be sexy and still let you laugh, like what you do as the MC at the burlesque club Duane Park. How do you balance seduction with a wink?
Honestly, before my parents got divorced, they told me they had two things that worked: great sex and humor. I guess I’m just a product of that.
There were some moments that were super fashion editorial, and others like somebody’s lost footage.
We shot some of it on film, places I grew up in NYC—from 55th Street to the Lower East Side, also my preschool, my high school, my first cabaret show venue, “Don’t Tell Mama.”
It feels like a breadcrumb trail of your life.
Follow the trail I’m leaving for you little kiddies! But not to my witchy gingerbread house—no, this house is just full of wigs, instruments, and love.
I’m always interested in whose New York I’m looking at. What is your version of the city that the postcards leave out?
The artists. The cast in this video are folks I’ve collaborated with or admired for years. Like The Illustrious Blacks, my creative partner Dusty Childers, burlesque performers, comedians, and actors. They are literally die-hard NYC artists, keeping this city alive.
Did the video or song uncover something that you didn’t realize you were singing about?
At first, it was a cheeky play on words, and then it became more about creating a spell for me to remember who I am. Then it became even more about community—it’s the people that I get to create with that are important to me, not being validated by the industry.
You spent a lot of time bringing your talent to other people’s worlds, and I love getting to step into one with your name on the door. Because you’re a star to me. Where do you want to take your own music next?
This song and a few others coming out soon were recorded old school to tape, all in one take, then we built on it. With the way AI and technology are advancing, I continuously want to get more raw and real and let my imagination go far, wide, and deep in its visual expression.
Well, I can’t wait. More, more, more Bridget!