Dale Madison

Dale Guy Madison is an award-winning educator, LGBTQ activist, playwright, author, filmmaker, performance artist and doll collector. He knows how to show and sell, as one of the first African American hosts of QVC, and the first to produce the African Marketplace shopping hour on the popular shopping network.

For more than 15 years, Dale Madison has worked as a grassroots LGBT activist, using the arts to affect change in the areas of AIDS awareness, substance abuse, community health issues and homophobia. He is the author of “Dreamboy: My Life As a QVC Host,” a memoir – set against the tunes of the 1960s girl group, The Supremes – details his broken relationships, a whirlwind heterosexual marriage; life as an openly gay black actor in Hollywood; his work as a QVC host; and a period of darkness, which found him clinging to life in a mental institution. In addition, he penned “Sissy Sammy in the Land of WeHo 90069,” an adult fairytale about an effeminate boy from the hood, who is bullied, but eventually gets lost in an all-gay town.
Through his production company, DamnGoodMan Productions, he creates, curates and produces culturally-relevant entertainment that embraces positive, empowering messages for the LGBTQ community. As a performance artist, he’s also written and performed two one-man shows, “FREEda SLAVE: Mask of a Diva” and “My Life in 3 Easy Payments.” Both theatrical productions introduce audiences to Madison’s drag persona, FREEda SLAVE, which he created for his bit part in the hilarious 1995 comedy, “To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar ,” starring Wesley Snipes, Patrick Swayze and John Leguizamo.

Dale Madison is an award-winning educator, LGBTQ activist, playwright, author, doll collector, performance artist and artist-in-residence. He produced the African Marketplace shopping hour on the QVC network. He is a nationally recognized doll designer, traveling around the country, promoting African dolls. Dale has also taught doll workshops, exhibited and curated doll shows at the William Grant Still Arts Center.
The author of “Dreamboy: My Life as a QVC Host & Other Greatest hits,” his memoir was turned into a one-man show, “My Life in 3 Easy Payments,” offered an interactive experience through spoken word, songs, storytelling, and video footage of his television work.
He founded the production company, DamnGoodMan Productions, to create, curate and produce culturally-relevant entertainment that embraces positive, empowering messages for the LGBTQ community. Madison’s two short films, “DREAMBOY: My Life as a QVC Host & Other Hits,” based on his memoir, won the Best LGBT Film Award at the 2008 San Diego Black Film Festival (SDBFF) and “The Panty Man” was nominated as Best Short in the 2009 Pan African Film Festival (PAFF), respectively. As a filmmaker, Madison is making the festival circuit with his short film, “Life After QVC,” which made its world premiere at the 26th annual Independent Filmmakers Showcase (IFS) Film Festival. The 25-minute, vérité-styled docucomedy takes a comedic trip down memory lane, chronicling Madison’s rise as a popular pitchman on the new shopping network in the early 1990s to the unexpected turn of paying the bills as a drag queen named FREEda SLAVE.
Madison received a Maryland State Arts Council Individual Artist Award for his one-man show, “FREEda SLAVE: Mask of a Diva,” which addresses the masculine and feminine discrimination within the gay community. Bringing the show to Los Angeles, it won the critic’s “Pick of the Week” in Backstage West. In 2010, he debuted his second one-man show, “My Life in 3 Easy Payments, to a sold out crowd at the Highways Performance Arts Space in Santa Monica, Calif. After a limited engagement in Santa Monica and West Hollywood, Madison took his one-man show to the Big Apple for the United Solo Theatre Festival in New York City. The show speaks to the pop culture phenomenon of reality show and the quest for fame at any cost. Adapted from his memoir, “My Life in 3 Easy Payments,” it offers a humorous interactive story through spoken word, songs, storytelling and video footage of his life. Both theatrical productions introduce audiences to Madison’s drag persona, FREEda SLAVE, which he created for his bit part in the hilarious 1995 comedy, “To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar,” starring Wesley Snipes, Patrick Swayze and John Leguizamo.
Madison received his master’s degree in Education and Leadership from Antioch University. He was a recipient of an Audre Lorde Scholarship to support his educational offerings in the LGBTQ community