If you added up all the money Bruce Winter has raised for Kansas City charities over five decades no doubt there would be a lot of numbers in that total.
He did it as his drag persona Melinda Ryder, a star on the local drag scene who has entertained Kansas City audiences for a remarkable 51 years.
Regulars at Hamburger Mary’s know the city’s “original redhead” for hosting Thursday night charity bingo which raises thousands of dollars for different causes every week.
Now Winter, who turned 70 in March, is in need of assistance himself and is about to get some big-name help.
The three-time cancer survivor was diagnosed with cancer again in March. He was transferred this week to a Kansas City rehab center after nearly a month in the hospital.
Bruce Winter, who has entertained Kansas City audiences for 51 years as drag entertainer Melinda Ryder.
(Instagram/Melinda Ryder)
Last month more than 20 local drag entertainers put on a show to raise money for his medical bills. One of Winter’s friends, who happens to be one of Broadway’s original “Dreamgirls,” singer Jennifer Holliday, heard about the fundraiser.
“She knew Missie B’s had done a big benefit. She said ‘I need to come to Kansas City and do a show,’” Winter’s husband, Kirk Nelson, told The Star.
The Tony and Grammy winner will appear in an evening of conversation and music at 7 p.m. Tuesday at Hamburger Mary’s. All proceeds go to Winter for his medical expenses. Kansas City entertainment journalist Michael Mackie will host.
Filmmaker John McCrite is making a documentary about Melinda Ryder’s career that will show behind the scenes of this latest health struggle. McCrite is known for the 2024 documentary “Pink Belt” that followed Aparna Rajawat, India’s 16-time national martial arts champion.
Holliday is currently criss-crossing the country celebrating the 45th anniversary of “Dreamgirls.” which debuted on Broadway in December 1981.
She was 21 when she won a Tony for her performance as Dreamgirl Effie White, who sings the showstopping song, “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going.”
Holliday met Winter several years ago while she in town for KC Pride events.
Winter went through six months of chemotherapy after his first cancer diagnosis of Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma in 2002. During treatments he continued to perform and work at his day job at NKC Health Hospital, formerly North Kansas City Hospital.
He was in remission for about two and a half years before the cancer returned, Nelson said, necessitating an excruciating stem cell transplant that put him in quarantine for nine months afterward.
The cancer came back a year later. Another stem cell transplant. Nine more months of quarantine followed a lengthy hospital stay, which meant no work, no shows.
“Then he got well,” said Nelson. “And it’s been 21 years since the second transplant. So he’s been good. Then this started up.”
Bruce Winter as Melinda Ryder.
(Instagram/Melinda Ryer)
Last year The Museum of Kansas City marked Melinda Ryder’s 50-year drag career with an exhibit of her costumes, photographs and other memorabilia. It paid homage to Winter’s skill as a female impersonator and years of philanthropic work and advocacy on behalf of Kansas City’s LGBTQ community.
The exhibit was called “Arrive As A Star, Leave As A Star.”
“Melinda Ryder is more than a drag queen — she’s a Kansas City icon, a trailblazer who painted the town with glitter and grit, building a stage where there was none and lifting a community with every performance,” friend Devion Mornett told Out in STL magazine in St. Louis at the time.
He called Melinda Ryder, the winner of state and national drag pageantry titles, “the ultimate and ever-reigning ‘it girl’ of Missouri!”
Winter last performed at Hamburger Mary’s on March 5. His health started going downhill a few days later, around his 70th birthday. He was in St. Louis with family over his birthday weekend when he fell ill. He had a slight fever. Something felt wrong, Nelson said.
It was. After weeks of a roller coaster ride of getting sick, feeling better, hospital stays and multiple doctors’ appointments he was diagnosed with prostate cancer.
“The doctors did tell us, if you’ve got to have cancer this is the one to have,” said Nelson. “He’s really good right now … he’s on the mend and feeling good and starting on the treatment for the prostate stuff.”
Winter will be in rehab for the next seven to 10 days, longer if necessary, Nelson said.
He will retire from his day job at the hospital at the end of June, but fans haven’t seen the last of Melinda Ryder.
Winter wants to be strong enough to perform by August 1 when friend and fellow drag entertainer Charity Kase comes to Kansas City. They have a duet planned.
“His goal is to get back to performing,” said Nelson.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com ’
