Today is the birthday of the 2014 Eurovision winner Conchita Wurst

For the world, the image of the singing "bearded woman" that sparked the 2014 Eurovision final has, to put it mildly, faded somewhat. Therefore, understanding the true identity of Austrian Thomas Neuwirth is doubly interesting.

Let's be clear that Neuwirth has not been, and is not currently (though, since he has disappeared from the media radar, this cannot be said with certainty) in the process of, as they say, "transitioning" to a different gender. Conchita Wurst is merely his stage persona, just as Verka Serduchka is the stage persona of Andrey Danilko.

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Incidentally, Danilko, as Serduchka, took second place at the Eurovision Song Contest seven years before Neuwirth, so it's possible that this event prompted Neuwirth to undergo a gender transition on stage. On the other hand, the tradition of "drag queens," that is, men portraying women on stage (usually in cabaret), is over a century old.

In any case, Thomas Neuwirth only became Conchita Wurst in 2011 after achieving little success as a man. As Conchita, things progressed more quickly – in 2012, he placed second in the Austrian Eurovision selection, and in 2014, Austria sent him as its representative to Copenhagen without having to compete.

Contrary to popular belief, Neuwirth's victory in Copenhagen wasn't due to his outrageous performance, although it clearly played a role in the audience vote. He also took first place in the jury's vote, which, naturally, wasn't based on his stage persona, but on his song "Rise Like a Phoenix," a genre that has often won Eurovision.

Then came the political chaos surrounding the "bearded woman," a familiar theme and one in which Neuwirth himself, willingly or unwillingly, took part. And when politicians forgot about him, it turned out that the general public forgot about him as well, although, of course, in the first years after his victory, he participated in large-scale events in defense of the LGBT community.

And the reason for this political activism isn't just Conchita Wurst's, but also the fact that Neuwirth, an openly gay man from a remote Austrian village, was bullied from childhood. (A telling detail: he only went to the bathroom at school during classes, when no one was there.)

Nowadays, little is heard about Neuwirth as an artist, except that a few years ago he confirmed that Conchita is only his on-stage persona, and at home he's a "lazy boy." Even on stage, he decided to try his hand at being a "tough guy," as evident in his photographs.

As for his personal life, there's even less information, which is understandable—Neuwirth was forced to announce he was HIV-positive because one of his former partners blackmailed him into revealing it for money. There's little reason for publicity, to put it mildly.

Photo: YouTube