Mondays on Bourbon Street are a drag, or at least they were when Mark Lanpher first started working the weekday shift at Oz roughly a decade ago.<\/p>\n
He was miserable watching tourists stumble into the typically rowdy gay bar to find an empty dance floor, usually prompting them to turn and leave. And though Oz touts daily entertainment, Lanpher said Monday nights tended to feature the same one or two drag queens telling the same jokes every week.<\/p>\n
\u201cI made maybe $50 a night,\u201d Lanpher said.<\/p>\n
When Lanpher\u2019s apathy and general lack of sparkle became apparent to his boss, they agreed he should find something to get excited about. A lifelong karaoke enthusiast, Lanpher thought maybe a weekly karaoke event would attract a wider audience and perhaps even some regulars on Mondays.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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<\/p>\n Monday night “Drag Karaoke” at OZ at 800 Bourbon Street in New Orleans, Monday, June 15, 2026.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n He also thought Oz could do more to tap into the Crescent City\u2019s massive pool of drag queens. Fighting drag with drag, he created a roster of queens to host the karaoke night on a rotating basis, like a lazy Susan brimming with rhinestones and wigs instead of pantry essentials.<\/p>\n In 2017, Lazy Susan Karaoke<\/a> was born. (If you\u2019re thinking Lazy Susan would also be a great name for a drag queen, it\u2019s already taken.)<\/p>\n The weekly event kicks off at 8:30 p.m. each Monday at Oz and features a rotating lineup of attention-loving, snarky hosts in drag. With a roster that was at one time 30 queens long, Lanpher said it draws fans hoping to see their favorite queens perform and vocalists gunning for a chance in the spotlight on a weeknight when most dancefloors on Bourbon sit vacant.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Lanpher, who has since left Oz to attend nursing school, said the event has grown in popularity over the past decade \u2014 by the time he left, he was closing his Monday night shifts with $200 to $400 in tips \u2014 and has become a way for up-and-coming drag performers to gain valuable exposure and experience.<\/p>\n Joey Olsen, who performs regularly across the city as Debbie with a D, credits Lazy Susan Karaoke, in part, for his meteoric rise to drag queen stardom.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n New Orleans drag performer Debbie with a D in New Orleans, Friday, July 25, 2025. Debbie\u2019s real name is Joey Olsen seen here in his costume closet. (Staff photo by John McCusker, The Times-Picayune | NOLA.com<\/a>)<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Olsen landed a Lazy Susan hosting gig about six years ago as a brand-new drag queen. As he honed his skills, he was promoted to a monthly slot \u2014 the last Monday of each month \u2014 and later went on to become a full-time drag queen, earning Gambit\u2019s Best Drag Performer title<\/a> and queen of Krewe of Armeinius in 2024.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n On Memorial Day, Olsen kicked the event off with a dazzling rendition of \u201cCircle of Life\u201d \u2014 yes, from \u201cThe Lion King\u201d \u2014 strutting in a rhinestone-encrusted pink leotard, and often holding the mic out to members of the audience for impromptu solos. It\u2019s one of his favorite warm-up songs, he said, something everyone knows.<\/p>\n \u201cSometimes people have great voices, sometimes they have great attitudes,\u201d Olsen said, raising his eyebrows meaningfully. \u201cAnd either way, it\u2019s fun to interact with people and make them feel good about their moment on stage.\u201d<\/p>\n Olsen and the crew at Oz work hard to keep Lazy Susan Karaoke decidedly unserious.<\/p>\n Olsen asks participants questions, only to pull the mic away before they can answer. He repeatedly gets up, walks up the stairs to the stage, and then backs away to sit back down at the end of a particularly long-winded ballad. A bartender named Josh belts out \u201cDrift Away\u201d by Uncle Kracker \u2014 of all things\u00a0\u2014\u00a0from behind the bar while pouring drinks. And the DJ, Andrew Martinez, teases Olsen with well-timed sound effects and fog machine theatrics.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Martinez organizes the set list so it maintains the appropriate banger-to-ballad ratio, finding appropriate lighting for each song and fielding requests to cut the line. It’s a thankless job but vital to the survival of any karaoke event. Hidden in an enclosed DJ booth at the back of the bar, Martinez said he\u2019s well aware his job has certain parallels to Oz\u2019s namesake.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m the man behind the curtain,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Monday night “Drag Karaoke” at OZ at 800 Bourbon Street in New Orleans, Monday, June 15, 2026.<\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n
\n STAFF PHOTO BY DAVID GRUNFELD<\/span>
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\n STAFF PHOTO BY JOHN MCCUSKER<\/span>
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\n <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\nThe great and powerful Oz<\/h3>\n
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