The Story of O Bar
Photographer Amanda Villarosa pays tribute to her uncle’s gay bar, home of spectacular performances and a source of community support, in the Philippines capital of Manila
I’ve always thought of my uncle Ramon as a trailblazer. He’s been openly queer for as long as I’ve been alive, and though he’s faced personal challenges, he’s stayed true to himself. Close to two decades ago, he opened a gay club in Manila called O Bar with his late partner Rupert. Named for the street where it was originally located—Orosa Street, which honors the inventor of banana ketchup, Maria Orosa—it’s now a cornerstone of the queer community in Manila.
My uncle jokes that at the beginning, he and Rupert knew nothing about running a bar. They just served drinks and played music. In fact, at first they hired drag performers just as a way to attract customers, but it soon became a way for them to nurture local talent. "We realized that drag is also theater,” my uncle explains. “If actors need to be trained and rehearsed, we thought that drag queens needed that too.” So he and Rupert hired professional dance teachers, as well as language and drama experts, to perfect the artists’ lip syncing and performance skills. One of their divas, Precious Paula Nicole, won Season 1 of the Philippines' RuPaul's Drag Race!
O Bar also offers free HIV testing, PrEP medication, and other health counseling in coordination with the local department of health—the only bar in the Philippines that does so. They take care of their older drag queens, assisting in special fundraising events to help them cover expenses.
Recently, I went to Manila and visited O Bar, which is now in the Ortigas neighborhood of the city. It’s come such a long way, growing from 1,300 square feet to 4,500—“proof of the continued support [from] the gay community,” my uncle says proudly. Shot all in one evening, during the eventful hours of midnight to 4 AM, these photographs attempt to document the artistry and spectacle of O Bar’s performers.
At one point, Bernie Barrantes and the backup dancers (known as the O Men) fully recreated Rihanna's Super Bowl performance to a T—she donned a fake baby bump and even performed on a floating stage!
As the evening continued, all I wanted to do was freeze each performance and capture what it felt like to behold what my uncle has created.
Ramon.