Culture
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Glamour, Defiance, and Camp Devotion: ADIRA Drag Festival 3.0 Asks “Who’s Your Diva?!” in Berlin

Returning to Berlin for its third and most expansive edition yet, ADIRA Drag Festival is redefining the boundaries of queer performance culture across the city this October. Having made history in 2024 as the world’s first-ever Arab Drag Festival at Club Gretchen, followed by a monumental 2025 gathering at Festsaal Kreuzberg, co-founders Hassandra and Zuher Jazmati are broadening their scope. For 2026, the platform expands beyond Arab* identities to encompass the vibrant, interconnected diaspora of the East Mediterranean—uniting Turkish, Kurdish, Greek, Cypriot, and SWANA voices from Berlin, Athens, London, and Paris.

@adira.part

Staged under the provocative title “Who’s Your Diva?!”, this year’s festival turns a loving, razor-sharp lens onto the transcultural phenomenon of the diva. Through drag, theatre, satire, and unvarnished excess, ADIRA dissects how queer communities construct secular saints out of larger-than-life pop figures.

“Queers have long practiced a particular kind of alchemy: claiming heterosexual pop stars, biblical figures, or legendary singers, and transforming them into their icons,” explains Hassandra, Artistic Director of ADIRA. “A paradox lies at the heart of this tradition: most of these icons never belonged to the communities that crowned them. It is from this tension between devotion and distance that the Drag Ensemble takes shape.”

At the center of ADIRA 3.0 is a thrilling structural tension: a diva is, by definition, a creature of absolute isolation—one spotlight, one mic, demanding total adoration while casting everyone else into the dark. What happens when twenty of these mythic figures are forced to share a single platform?

From Haifa Wehbe and Despina Vandi to the immortal Bülent Ersoy, divas are imperfect, scandalous, camp, delusional, politically fraught, and profoundly human. Across two dynamic acts at HAU Hebbel am Ufer (HAU1) on October 30, twenty artists will inhabit, revere, and dismantle these idols. Act I: The Antechamber sees the entire ensemble navigate stolen spotlights, backstage feuds, and fleeting alliances in a multi-layered choreography. Act II: The ADIRA Games, hosted by Vienna’s Sanad Qutaishat, unleashes an East Mediterranean spin on the beloved Snatch Game format—a satirical battlefield where legendary divas fight to out-sing, out-shade, and out-drama each other live.

The festival ripples across the entire city through a multi-venue program of radio broadcasts, community archiving, film, and late-night club sweat:

ADIRA Drag Festival 3.0 — Program Schedule

  • October 18 | 14:00 – 17:00 | WikiBär (Köpenicker Str. 45, 10179 Berlin)

    Wikipedia Workshop with Thomas Schallhart: A community sprint dedicated to properly documenting and preserving Arab pop divas on Wikipedia.

  • October 23 | 15:00 – 17:00 | Refuge Worldwide (Niemetzstraße 1, 12055 Berlin)

    ADIRA Radio Takeover: Sonic dialogues bridging the East Mediterranean with guests Ilgaz Yalçınoğlu (Kudur) and Trashkila Rania (Drag Riots).

  • October 30 | 18:00 – 22:00 | HAU1 (Stresemannstraße 29, 10963 Berlin)

    Main Stage: ADIRA Drag Festival 3.0 — “Who’s Your Diva?!”: The two-act theatrical drag ensemble centerpiece.

  • October 30 | 23:00 – 06:00 | ÆDEN (Schleusenufer 3, 10997 Berlin)

    The Official Afterparty: High-energy club release featuring xanax_attax, Sherryaeri, SU, SaHHar, Dania Najari, DumTak, Sao Moustafa, DJ Ay Ay Ay, and surprise guests.

  • October 31 | 18:00 | SİNEMA TRANSTOPIA (Lindower Str. 20/22, Haus C, 13347 Berlin)

    Closing Gathering: Screening of Treat Me Like Your Mother by Mohamad Abdouni, followed by live music from Anthony Hüseyin, shared meze, and reflections with the curatorial team.

Performers

DJs

A project by ADIRA & Critical Queer Solidarity e.V. Funded by: Musicboard Berlin GmbH. In cooperation with HAU Hebbel am Ufer.

Event Information

  • Festival: ADIRA Drag Festival 3.0 — “Who’s Your Diva?!”

  • Dates: October 18–31, 2026

  • Main Show: October 30 at HAU Hebbel am Ufer (HAU1)

  • Tickets & Full Info: Available via hebbel-am-ufer.de and @adira.party