Panti Bliss in a twist

Rory O’Neill says people are expecting him to be a freedom fighter on political issues but there’s more to him than that.

NO one wants to bang a national treasure,” Panti says early on in her first stand up show, High Heels in Low Places, using language more profane than I am willing to repeat. And while her tongue may be firmly in her cheek, Rory O’Neill — the sir beneath the her — has learnt that no one wants to be insulted by one either.

“People don’t expect me to be funny,” he tells me in the Morrison Hotel, post-show. “They expect me to be a freedom fighter all of the time and are hypersensitive when you poke fun at ‘their group’ with some silly, off-hand gag. When they go to a drag show people should expect to be slagged off, but now all they want are the serious political speeches.”