“I’ve never been on a date”
Travis Shaw prepares for private life as he retires diva alter ego Foxy De-Rossi
“This is where they first started doing the pride events here.”
It’s a warm June morning. Travis Shaw is standing in the bandshell of the recently renamed Lheidli T’enneh Memorial Park, on the banks of the Fraser and Nechako rivers in Prince George.
He’s thinking back to sixteen years earlier, when he first discovered Foxy De-Rossi.
“Oh god, when did it start? It started a long time ago. I was fifteen,” he recalls.
“It was a talent contest and my friend was wanting me to enter and I didn’t know and she said ‘just put on a dress and do this and sing a song,’ and I’m like ‘OK’ and then I won and I was on the cover and it just kind of started like that.”
For the last decade and a half, Travis Shaw has been better known as Foxy De-Rossi, a biracial diva decked out in mascara and high heels. It’s not the path you might expect for the adopted son of a mill worker growing up in northern British Columbia, but Travis says his confidence comes from his parents.
He says in their younger days they were hippies, his mom burning bras while his dad performed as a country and western singer
“I grew up with green stages, backstages, side stages, and him singing guitar and stuff. So it was just natural to be an entertainer.”
But Travis’ style of performing was not the sort of thing you would find in your average country bar.
“My mom has pictures of me like in a turtle neck pulled down as a dress
and things like that. And my auntie gave me high heels for birthday and stuff, so… they raised me to by myself, whoever I might be.
“It just so happened that I turned out to be gay and I was part of that whole movement, and it’s just something I’ve used as a stepping stone to become the person I am today.” That “whole movement” is the fight for same-sex, bisexual, transgender, and queer rights in Canada.
When Travis first performed as as Foxy De-Rossi, he was in high school.
Same-sex marriage was still illegal in Canada, and while his parents might have accepted who he was, many of his peers did not.
“I was one of five non-white kids out of the whole school, and out of those five kids I was the gay one.”
“The harassment was just the normal things like ‘faggot’, ‘queers’, and all those other crap. Like, see for me I grew up with those kind of words and I went with it and I made it work for myself. But once I got older and I realized it was bullying it wasn’t supposed to happen and I was like, ‘well, that’s a lot of crap I had to go through.’”
Aside from his family, Travis found strength in his alter ego. While Travis Shaw is shy and soft-spoken, Foxy De-Rossi is loud, proud, and the centre of attention.
“It takes shape when I’m painting up my face, or I’m the shower shaving. Then there’s more confidence. I think more of like a mask I hide behind, like ‘I can do this’ and I know I can get away with it.”
As Foxy, Travis became an advocate. He helped form the first gay-straight alliances in the Prince George school district, creating safe spaces that he never had as a student.
He also joined the fight for marriage rights, and when British Columbia became one of the first provinces to legalize same-sex weddings in 2003, Foxy performed at a ceremony held in the same park where the persona was born a few years earlier.
But even as attitudes across the country were changing, there was still room for controversy.
In 2010, Dan Rogers was the mayor of Prince George. He frequented a coffee shop where Travis worked, and as the two got to know each other, Rogers attended a gay-straight alliance meeting alongside Foxy De-Rossi.
“Certain people in the community voiced that they thought Dan Rogers was a family man, and they didn’t want to involve their families with him if he’s supporting gay people,” Shaw says, calling it the worst press he ever received.
“All kids are our future. So why are we trying to hinder and cripple and break kids now who are going to be our doctors, police lawyers, things like that. So, for me, I didn’t understand why there was such a backlash, but then it is Prince George and at the time it was still a little behind the times.”
As Travis was attracting controversy as an activist in Prince George, Foxy De-Rossi was attracting attention as a performer playing shows in places like Toronto, Edmonton, and Vancouver. In 2012, De-Rossi was named “Ms. Gay Vancouver” and Shaw fondly remembers sharing the stage with well-known drag queen RuPaul.
But this summer is Foxy De-Rossi’s last.
In 2013, Travis was diagnosed with a brain tumour. He’s had multiple surgeries, and no longer has the energy to perform like he once did. He says he wants to go out on his own terms, putting on the sort of farewell show he knows he can do.
He’s also approaching this challenge the same way he’s approached every challenge he’s faced.
“For me I’ve always looked at the things like what do I have to learn from it? There’s lots to learn and it proved to me how strong of a person I am.”
Shaw is just thirty-one years old. That’s old enough to remember same sex marriage being illegal, old enough to remember when Prince George city council refused to recognize Pride celebrations, and old enough to have seen his persona of Foxy De-Rossi go from being a source of controversy
to being a performer at this year’s family friendly Canada Day celebrations in the park.
He’s playing the main stage in the same bandshell where De-Rossi first came to life in 1999. Shaw says when he takes the stage, it will show him just how far his city has come.
So now that Foxy the pioneer and provocateur is being retired, what’s the next challenge for Travis Shaw, the person?
“I’ve never been on a date,” he laughs. “So, yeah ask for a guy’s number. I’m too shy.”
Travis Shaw will perform as Foxy De-Rossi as part of the Canada Day celebrations in Lheidli T’enneh Memorial Park in Prince George at 5:20 on July 1. His final performance will be at Vancouver Pride celebrations on the August long weekend.
