Pride pageant winner talks performing, pride and living authentically 

“Here I am!” sang drag queen Penny Cillin, twinkling tiara atop her head and sparkling sceptre in hand after being crowned Mx. Canada Pride. 

At the Atlantic Pride Pageant on March 14, nine drag performers competed for the title of Mx. Canada Pride 2025. Mx. is a gender-neutral alternative honorific to Miss or Mister.

After a fashion runway, a question and answer section and a talent show, Halifax’s Penny Cillin took home the crown and the opportunity to perform at Halifax Pride 2025 and represent Halifax at Canada Pride 2027.  

Known in the Halifax drag scene for her edgy, alternative style, Penny shocked the judges by announcing in the introduction to her performance that she had decided to do something “a little more pageant.” 

Dressed in a green gown and a silky wig, Penny began with This Is Me, an emotional ballad from The Greatest Showman. As she reached the song’s chorus, a clap of thunder boomed from the speakers, and Penny looked around in mock shock as an angel and a devil entered the stage.  

“With drag numbers, you have an idea, and you think to yourself, ‘Oh this is crazy and stupid, I’m going to do it on stage,’ ” Penny told The Signal. “But it’s always a little bit of a gamble whether or not an audience is going to get these weird, concept-y numbers.” 

The angel and the devil ripped away Penny’s gown and wig, revealing a shredded grey dress with fishnet tights, and Penny burst into an impassioned rendition of AC/DC’s Highway to Hell. The judges leapt to their feet, throwing their hands above their heads.  

“Sometimes performing is just better than any drug,” Penny said. “The adrenaline rush is crazy, and you’ve never felt better in your life.” 

As the music faded out, the audience erupted in a standing ovation. Tights ripped and knees bloodied from her performance, Penny looked out over the crowd, catching her breath as she began to cry.  

“It was a shock,” said Penny. “I knew it was going to go well, because I had planned that number out so well, but I did not see the standing ovation coming. It was crazy.” 

Not one to be boxed in by the expectations of a pageant, Penny’s edgy performance captured her idea of pride: living authentically.  

“When you’re a drag performer, especially an alternative drag performer, you always know that you’re on the edge of society,” said Penny. “And knowing that gives you a sense of freedom to do whatever you want and live however you want. It’s very refreshing, and I think I very much embodied that in my number.”  

When Penny came out as queer in high school, she scoured popular culture for queer role models and discovered RuPaul’s Drag Race. 

“I saw it and I went, ‘Oh yeah, that’s what I want to do,’ ” she said.  

When she turned 19, she dove into Halifax’s gay club scene.  

“It was dirty, it was gross, it was so much fun,” said Penny. “I had a hot pink bowl cut, no eyebrows, and a whim and a prayer, and I just started showing up to the club in looks.” 

Throughout her drag journey, Penny has experimented with different styles, but says she inevitably comes back to the “vampy, evil queen esthetic.”   

“As an alternative drag performer, you don’t always fit in, even in the drag scene,” said Penny. “I’ve done a lot of pageants, and I’ve always come just very, very close to winning, so to finally be given my flowers for what I have contributed to the Halifax drag scene felt very very good.” 

When Penny heard that she had won, she cried.  

“It proved to me that an audience loves what I do, but also, other drag performers live for what I do,” she said. “Being entertaining for the general population is amazing, but I want drag performers to look at me, and be like, ‘Wow.’ Maybe that’s vain, but I’m a drag queen, so you know, it comes with the territory.” 

After receiving her crown and sceptre, Penny dried her tears and victoriously high-kicked, shimmied and lip-synched her way through a triumphant performance of Barbra Streisand’s Don’t Rain On My Parade. As she struck her final pose, the audience once again rose in a standing ovation. 

“That wasn’t for y’all, that one was for me,” Penny said to the crowd, raising her sceptre above her head and cheering. 

“I would love to say that I do drag for the weirdos and all the kids that don’t fit in, but I don’t. I do it for myself,” Penny told The Signal.

“Drag, performing, entertaining, it makes me feel so good. It’s nice that I am representing the weirdos and freaks, but inevitably, you can’t do drag for other people. You have to do it for yourself.”