(Boston) Pride survives divas and downpours
by Ethan Jacobs/Bay Windows
Photo: Marilyn Humphries

Nearly 100,000 turn out for festivities

At this year’s Pride, all the rainbow flags, balloons and signs looked depressingly out of place; from the moment the Moving Violations riders revved up their engines at the start of the parade to late that afternoon when Pride festival headliner Shannon ended her set and waved goodbye to the crowd, this year’s Boston Pride festivities were deluged with rain from start to finish, with nary a natural rainbow in sight. Yet that didn’t stop an estimated crowd of 100,000 revelers from braving the rain to celebrate the 36th annual Pride Parade. The crowd was down from past years, and the festival show was cut short due to the weather, but the crowds still lined the streets to cheer on the parade, and there was a robust crowd watching the show and wandering the booths of the vendors and nonprofits on the Boston Common. The only major snafu came when festival emcee Hedda Lettuce, whose raunchy stand-up act clashed with the tone of the largely family-friendly event, tore into the Pride Committee from the stage after organizers asked her to tone down her act, inviting them to “eat [her]...continue at BayWindows?