Cassandra Cass is the kind of woman who seems to have stepped out of a dream and decided to make that dream real. An
actress, showgirl, burlesque performer, glamour model and television personality, she has spent decades creating
herself as both a woman and an artist, with a career that has taken her from the drag bars of the American Midwest
to the stages of San Francisco and, eventually, to Hollywood. Audiences came to know her through productions
including CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (2004), Trantasia (2006), Wild Things (2010), What's the T? (2012), Strut
(2016) and Hooked on the Look (2017). But behind the larger-than-life blonde bombshell is a story that began with a
little girl in Iowa who simply knew there was another version of herself waiting to emerge.
Cassandra was born and raised in Des Moines, Iowa, in a family with four boys. From childhood, she gravitated toward
traditionally feminine toys and activities, including My Little Pony and Cabbage Patch dolls. Her mother encouraged
her to explore those interests, while her father initially struggled to understand and accept her femininity. Her
mother would eventually become an important figure in Cassandra's life, and her death from cancer would leave
another lasting mark on her story. As a teenager, Cassandra discovered the world of drag and began sneaking into gay
bars to perform. Drag gave her something precious, a place where femininity was not something to hide but something
she could explore, celebrate and transform into art. At approximately 18, she left Iowa for Florida and began
attempting to live as a woman. The reality was far less glamorous than the dream. She struggled to find employment
while presenting as a woman and was even confronted with offers of sex work, which she refused.
After returning to Iowa for a time, she continued her transition and underwent cosmetic procedures, including
rhinoplasty and facial and body procedures. Her journey eventually brought her to San Francisco, where she initially
worked as a bartender before becoming a professional performer. She performed at venues including AsiaSF and became
closely associated with Sunday's a Drag at Harry Denton's Starlight Room. There, she developed the glamorous, highly
stylized persona that would become her signature, elaborate costumes, towering hair, dramatic makeup and an
unapologetically exaggerated vision of femininity. Even her name carries pieces of the people and experiences that
shaped her. "Cassandra" combines Casey, her former name, with Sandra, her mother's name, while "Cass" comes from her
drag mother, Dena Cass. It is a name that carries both her past and the woman she created from it.
Cassandra gradually expanded beyond the stage into acting, modeling and television. She appeared as Pink in the
episode "Ch-Ch-Changes" of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (2004) and created a series of pin-up calendars, including
Cassandra Cass: Fantasy Girl 2006 (2005). She eventually produced four calendars celebrating herself as a glamour
and pin-up model. In Trantasia (2006), the documentary about the World's Most Beautiful Transsexual Pageant,
Cassandra appeared alongside a group of transgender women whose lives and personalities became part of the film's
enduring legacy. The experience brought her a wider audience, and she later competed in the pageant herself in Las
Vegas in 2007. In Wild Things (2010), an eight-episode Showtime reality series, Cassandra joined Maria Roman and
Tiara Russell on a remarkable road trip across the United States. The women took on a variety of jobs and activities
while trying to raise money for Maria's brother, who was suffering from kidney disease.
The series exposed Cassandra to a much wider audience, but it also revealed some of the complicated realities of
becoming a transgender woman in the public eye, including the painful reactions of people close to her. She
continued to explore the realities of transgender life in What's the T? (2012), a documentary that followed five
transgender women and looked beyond transition itself, examining identity, relationships, passing, visibility and
the everyday experience of simply living one's life.
For years, San Francisco was Cassandra's professional home. She became known as a showgirl and burlesque performer,
entertaining audiences with a deliberately extravagant vision of femininity. Eventually, however, another dream
called. Cassandra moved to Los Angeles and began trying to establish herself in Hollywood, effectively starting over
in an industry where she had to convince people that there was a place for someone like her. Her Hollywood journey
led her to Slay Model Management, the transgender modeling agency founded by filmmaker Cecilio Asuncion. Cassandra
worked with the agency both as a performer and behind the scenes, helping other transgender women navigate the
modeling industry. She later appeared in Strut (2016), the Oxygen reality series following transgender models
represented by Slay Model Management. The series won the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Reality Program that
year. Television continued to document Cassandra's extraordinary approach to beauty and femininity. In Hooked on the
Look (2017), her extensive cosmetic transformation and career as a burlesque performer became the subject of an
episode, while Gown and Out in Beverly Hills (2019) followed her pursuit of haute couture in Beverly Hills.
Cassandra has never been shy about the fact that her appearance is carefully constructed. She has undergone
extensive cosmetic procedures and deliberately cultivated an exaggerated glamour aesthetic, with comparisons ranging
from Dita Von Teese to Jessica Rabbit. For Cassandra, beauty is not simply about looking attractive. Fashion,
makeup, hair, surgery and the body itself have all become part of her artistic vocabulary, a way of creating the
woman she sees in her imagination.
Yet beneath the glamour is someone who has spent much of her life questioning the categories other people wanted to
place her in. Cassandra has said that she dislikes being confined by labels and prefers to be simply Cassandra. She
has also described living openly, pursuing her career and refusing to make herself smaller as a form of activism.
For her, visibility can be powerful precisely because it challenges expectations of what a transgender woman is
supposed to look like, how she is supposed to behave and what she is supposed to want. Her story has not been
without heartbreak. Cassandra has spoken openly about becoming estranged from family members after her transition
and about the complicated relationship she has had with her father. Yet alongside the losses, there has been an
extraordinary determination to keep moving forward, from Iowa to Florida, from San Francisco to Hollywood, from drag
performer to showgirl, actress, model, television personality and mentor to other transgender women. And perhaps
that determination is best captured in Cassandra's own words when she looks back at her life: “I wanted to be on TV.
I did it. I wanted to be in pageants. I've done it.” After almost two decades since Trantasia first introduced her
to a wider audience, we sat down with Cassandra to look back at the woman she was, the woman she fought to become,
and the dreams she is still chasing.
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| “I wanted to be on TV. I did it.” |
Monika: Cassandra, welcome to The Heroines of My Life! You have lived quite a glamorous life, with showgirls,
burlesque, television, pageants and Hollywood all playing a part. When you look back at everything you have done,
which version of Cassandra makes you smile the most?
Cassandra: Thank you for choosing me, Monika. I was reading some of your interviews, and I was just super impressed
by how you approached everybody. It’s truly my honor.
Looking back on my life and some of the things I’ve done, what makes me smile the most, truthfully, is that I did
it. I started out in Iowa, this broken child from a broken family, and I had this dream of coming to Hollywood. I
wanted to be on TV. I did it. I wanted to be in pageants. I’ve done it. Just the fact that I did it.
Monika: It is hard to believe that it has been almost twenty years since Trantasia. When you look back at that
film today, what is the first memory that comes to your mind?
Cassandra: It’s really, really hard to believe it’s been 20 years. When I look back, the first memory that comes to
mind is just how groundbreaking everything was.
Monika: When Trantasia was being filmed, did you have any sense that it might become an important document of
transgender women and the entertainment world of that era, or did it simply feel like another crazy chapter in
your life?
Cassandra: I definitely knew that something was special and that the pageant was special. I remember being in ninth
grade and opening up the National Enquirer, and I saw Gianna still. She was this amazing showgirl, and I knew when I
heard about the pageant that, because she was going to be a part of it, it was going to be something big. I mean, I
had literally just been on CSI: Las Vegas.
Originally, I was not chosen to be one of the people they were going to follow. I had just done a photo shoot, and I
covered a car that I rented with pictures. The people who were doing the documentary saw that in the parking lot,
and they were like, “Who’s that girl? That’s really how they decided to choose me.
Monika: You shared the film with some extraordinary women, including Erica Andrews, Mimi Marks, Maria Roman, Tiara
Russell and others. Did participating in Trantasia create friendships or connections that stayed with you over the
years?
Cassandra: I had read Maria’s take on how all the girls got along and everything. That really wasn’t my take. I felt
a very, very competitive nature. Everybody was there to win. I, of course, was younger and didn’t really understand,
and I really hadn’t come into my own as a performer. I remember going to the press room, and right before we walked
in, Erica Andrews elbowed me out of the way. So when it opened, she was the first to arrive. For me, it was very
showgirl.
As far as friendships, no, I did not build any deep friendships. I have to admit that I’ve always been the type of
girl who’s had her eye on the prize. I have a very, very hard time trusting people. So no, I really did not build
any deep friendships. Now, Maria and Tiara from Wild Things, that’s a different thing. That definitely, I felt, made
us closer.
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| “I wanted to be in pageants. I’ve done it.” |
Monika: Those women became an important part of your life at one stage, but your story was shaped by people much
earlier than that. You have said that your mother was supportive of your feminine interests when you were young.
When you came out, did your mother embrace you as her daughter? And do you feel any connection to her in the way
you look, carry yourself or even in your style and mannerisms?
Cassandra: My relationship with my mother was incredibly tricky. I was very close to my mother up until the age of
eight, then she got divorced and pretty much abandoned the family. I was forced to live with my father, who
honestly, I didn't like. He was an alcoholic and a very macho man who did not understand me. Then I went to middle
school, and everyone started picking on me and calling me names. You know, they all thought I was gay. At that
point, I wouldn't go to school, and I was sent off to a group home, which was actually the best thing for me.
So for the next three to four years, I lived under, I guess you could say, structure, which at that time in my
life, I needed. Then, when I was let out, I went back to live with my father, and I went to high school, where, of
course, the bullying continued. I had not seen my mother. My mother had disappeared. So she came back into my life
around the age of 18, and she was sick with cancer. So I let a lot of the past issues go, and she was accepting of
my journey and me, but the real focus was taking care of her. And as she got sicker and sicker, I was there.
Unfortunately, she died. And at that point, I decided that time is short, and I decided to start living as
Cassandra, so I moved to Florida because I felt Iowa was not a conducive place to do that.
Monika: Your father had a much more complicated reaction to your femininity and transition. Looking back now,
how do you understand his reaction, and did your relationship with him ever change in a way that surprised you?
Cassandra: Yes, my father, he's a classic Midwestern man. He was definitely not supportive during the early part
of my transition. I don't even think to this day my father understands me. I think one thing about Midwestern
people is that it's like, I'm his family. I think first and foremost, that is what's important to him, knowing
that he didn't abandon me. But do I think he understands me? No, I don't think most parents truly understand their
kids. It's a different generation, a different time.
My father is 82 years old, and I know he loves me as his child. I don't really have any expectations anymore. I
think part of becoming an adult is understanding that your happiness lies within. It's not about other people. So,
you know, I call him every other day, check up on him, and then when I go back to Iowa, we spend time together.
But it's not what I would call a maternal, soft, caring relationship. I mean, that basically died when my mother
died. And I think, you know, I've spent the majority of my adult years searching for that again. And then finally,
here I am in my 50s, realizing that that comes from within. So I'm actually in a really great place now, which is
I just rely on myself and my own happiness, and I do the things that make me happy.
END OF PART 1
All photos: courtesy of Cassandra Cass.
© 2026 - Monika Kowalska
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