John Epperson

John Epperson (born April 24, 1955) is an American drag artist, actor, pianist, vocalist, and writer who is mainly known for creating his stage character Lypsinka.

As Lypsinka, he lip-synchs to meticulously edited, show-length soundtracks culled from snippets of outrageous 20th-century female performances in movies and song.

After graduating from Belhaven, he got a job playing piano in Colorado, but in 1978 he moved to New York City and became a full-time rehearsal pianist for the American Ballet Theatre in 1980.

[2] Lypsinka first appeared in 1982, and for the first time Off Broadway in September 1988 when Epperson's act was a late-night addition to the bill of Charles Busch's Vampire Lesbians of Sodom at the Provincetown Playhouse in New York.

In Winter 2004, in a different drag role, Epperson played the Wicked Stepmother in the New York City Opera's revival of Rodgers-Hammerstein's Cinderella in a cast with Eartha Kitt, Dick Van Patten and Renée Taylor.

The second disc of the set also contains a short feature about Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, titled Blind Ambition, with contributions from Busch and Epperson.

[citation needed] Epperson wrote a play, My Deah, his version of the Medea tale transplanted to Mississippi which debuted at the June Havoc Theater in New York in 2006.

[2] In 1999, Epperson appeared in a non-drag role in the critically acclaimed verbatim play Messages for Gary written by Patrick Horrigan and produced by Paul Lucas.

[5] Epperson appears in a speaking role in the 2010 film Black Swan as a rehearsal pianist for a fictional New York City ballet company.