Bay Area drag performer blends Bollywood flair with American pop
A drag artist born and raised in the Bay Area has traveled the world sharing his unique take on the performance style by pulling from Bollywood and American pop music. During Pride month, he reflects on the journey to become his most authentic self after years of feeling like he didn't fit in his community.
"The intersection of queer and culture and identity have always been there," said SNJV. "Drag is simply taking all of those references, putting them in the blender and allowing it to come across in a way that tells a story with truth and fabulousness."
SNJV started performing at the age of three but as child he struggled with how to fall in line with gender roles. He was born on the peninsula and grew up there until middle school, then he moved to Hayward. His family is from Fiji and India and as a Pacific Islander watching Hindi films and listening to U.S. pop stars, it wasn't easy to pursue his own style that challenged traditional values.
"It took a lot of trauma, it took a lot of pain, it took a lot of suffering," he told KPIX when discussing the need for therapy and meditation.
He chose to use "SNJV" as his performance name after years of hearing people not know how to say his real name in school. It was part of his motivation to become a performer, and leave people with an impression that made them want to learn his name. He took out the vowels out of his given name to create "SNJV" and uses it professionally for all his work as a dancer and choreographer.
"I started to learn how to sort of reject Bollywood's notions of how the binary should be expressed," he told KPIX. "I credit that from a keen sense of observation of American pop culture, I'm a child of, you know, Janet, Madonna, Britney, all these provocateurs that have taken what society has put on them and broken it apart and say I'm going to really show you what I can do."
His process for creating a routine begins well before he reaches the stage or practices in a dance studio. His favorite trail in the East Bay allows him to not only get exercise and enjoy nature but begin to create a performance piece while listening to music and the wind.
"This is my favorite rehearsal space," SNJV said of Coyote Hills in Fremont. "This space is very special to me because it is the foundation for all of the performances I bring to the world."
He wants his form of drag to be seen as an academic study, and for people to appreciate that the exaggeration they see is for an intentional effect. During Pride he feels gratitude and a happiness for life, especially because of the struggle others in the LGBTQ family have faced to feel the same way.
"We're all one, what connects us all is the breath that we get to breathe every single day to be here," he said. "I reflect on my journey as a storyteller not by the accolades or success or the stages but the amount of peace in solitude that I feel within."
