By Maggie Cassidy

National Coming Out Day ended with a star-studded bang Wednesday night as drag queens imitating superstars like Whitney Houston, Britney Spears, Christina Aguilera and Madonna wowed the crowd at afterHOURS.

Northeastern University’s Bisexual, Lesbian, and Gay Association (NUBiLAGA) sponsored the show to raise awareness for their “Coming Out Week.” The night featured lots of laughs, lap dances and unsuspected audience interaction between onlookers and the five fearless queens, who are well-known professionals in the Boston area.

NUBiLAGA co-chair Peter Karpathakis said the goal of the show was to increase awareness of the struggles that many people go through when coming out.

“With the drag show specifically, it was something that we wanted to really have some sort of big party celebration for the very end of the actual Coming Out Day,” he said. “The drag show has been one of the events that NUBiLAGA puts on that no matter what, we get a good turnout.”

More than 270 people showed up to see the five queens, Nicole Pride, Mistress Katya, Becca d’Bus, Fena Barbitall and Frieda Fries, as they covered a variety of beat-heavy songs ranging from pop favorites like ” … Baby One More Time” to more obscure tracks like a Russian cover of “I Will Survive.”

Karpathakis said one of the main reasons the organization holds the event is to spread awareness and cultural understanding about the gay community.

“Events like this just promote knowledge,” he said. “I feel like the biggest reason why a lot of terrible things can happen is because people just don’t know better. It’s not that people are evil or they do evil things