‘Thirsty Thursday’: The antidote to the shortage of uptown drag performances

“Thirsty Thursday,” hosted by drag queen Moxy Cillin every Thursday night at Suite Bar NYC, is a hidden gem in the Morningside Heights drag performance scene you did not know you were missing. 

Photo by Sasha Zimet/The Barnard Bulletin

By Sasha Zimet

December 14, 2025

As I was walking along Amsterdam Avenue on my way to pick up dinner at Roti Roll, I stopped in my tracks to look at a paper poster flapping about, loosely taped onto a red building, just next to my favorite dinner spot. The poster was awash in hues of neon pink and featured a glamorously fierce drag queen right in its center: “Thirsty Thursdays with Moxy Cillin,” it read. 

Immediately, I was intrigued. As a fan of everything drag, I had previously thought that besides watching “RuPaul’s Drag Race” behind the pixelated sheath of my laptop screen, taking the 1 downtown was my only option for seeing New York City drag queens perform. Yet, there was a drag show happening right here on my block. How had I not known about this? Why does it seem like no one is talking about this? To get to the bottom of this hidden drag treasure, I decided to go to “Thirsty Thursday” myself, interview Moxy, and find out more about this elusive, local drag scene. 

Suite Bar NYC, the bar with the red facade where “Thirsty Thursday” takes place weekly, has actually been a long-time venue for drag performances. Suite opened in 2004, replacing the previous gay bar in the area that had just closed down, Saints and Sinners. It immediately instituted itself as a disco-themed haven for queer culture. One of the most regaled alumni from “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” Bob the Drag Queen, actually listed the bar as one of her favorite spots in New York City, noting it was “one of the only uptown gay bars left.”  

Since then, Suite has been a vital institution for maintaining a strong gay nightlife scene uptown, featuring many drag shows and queer nightlife opportunities alike, such as the comedy show “Femme and Friends,” another one of Cillin’s events called “Karaoke Tuesdays,” and “Fridays with Victoria Chase,” another drag show staple provided by the bar.    

According to Cillin, “Thirsty Thursday” is nothing new and has actually been a consistent pillar in Suite’s breadth of events. “‘Thirsty Thursday’ just celebrated its two-year anniversary in October,” said the drag queen, fresh off a two-hour-long performance where she both sang live and lip-synced to numbers from the Broadway musical “Wicked.” 

In fact, each show Cillin does has a pop-culture-centered theme. The night I went, Cillin was swathed in soft baby pink and sported a light-blonde wig — dressed for a drag rendition of Glinda for her celebration of the movie release of “Wicked: For Good.” The “Wicked” themed performance is not the only themed drag show Cillin has hosted. Past themes have ranged from Halloween, Christmas, trends, and other soon-to-be-released blockbuster movies. Cillin said that a reason why she uses such mainstream themes is to incentivize a wider audience to notice and attend her shows, bringing attention to uptown drag: “We love to jump on bandwagons and bring drag up here because there’s really not a lot of drag uptown anymore,” noted Cillin. “So anything we can bring up here — bring drag and gay nightlife uptown — any way I can do that, I’d love to.” 

With drag shows being few and far between in Morningside Heights, “Thirsty Thursday” has become an essential to cementing queer culture in uptown nightlife. The initiative, however, was pioneered by Moxy Cillin herself. She began officially performing drag six years ago, though the glamour and design associated with the art was a constant in her life: “I’ve been doing drag officially almost for six years, but I’ve really been doing drag my whole life,” said the drag queen. “I’ve always played with wigs and things since I was seven years old doing community theater.” 

Yet, when living near Morningside Heights, opportunities for Cillin to perform drag were scarce, prompting her to take matters into her own hands in 2023 and approach Suite with a plan to host a drag show of her very own. “I used to live nearby and I came in one night really late when the bar had cleared, and I saw a stage, and I saw an opportunity,” said Cillin. “So I had an interview the next day and that next week, we started ‘Thirsty Thursday.’” By her own grit and determination to perform, Cillin began one of the sole drag shows uptown, inserting queer culture as a dynamic voice in local nightlife for both avid patrons and students alike. 

Cillin’s “Thirsty Thursdays” are largely dependent on its student crowd. According to Cillin, the Barnard and Columbia student scene makes up a majority of her audience. “I have a lot of Columbia students attend my shows here, and when they are done with school, it’s a little slower,” she said. “Definitely anytime school is in session, it’s my business.” Columbia and Barnard students seem to be taking notice of Cillin’s dynamic and robust drag performance, instituting “Thirsty Thursday” as a new and upcoming student staple for a night out. 

Photo by Sasha Zimet/The Barnard Bulletin

For Moxy Cillin and audience members alike, “Thirsty Thursday,” one of the few drag shows gracing the uptown area, is more than just a bar or night-out activity: “It’s a community,” said Cillin. After witnessing an eager crowd plead with Cillin for an encore after her kinetic drag-off-Broadway “Wicked” rendition, I can attest that the community is already booming and eager for new members to join. So, quench your thirst each Thursday night, and become a part of the community surrounding Moxy Cillin by attending a fantastically fierce drag performance, right here on Amsterdam Avenue at Suite NYC.