Carl Rizzi is 67 years old, with more gorgeous kids and grandkids than he can count. And he’s got nine more on the way this sunny Sunday afternoon.

Unlike most expectant parents, he waits for them in full makeup and a sequined gown at the newly reopened Ziegfeld’s, in the Buzzard Point section of Southwest Washington.

As president of the executive board of the Academy of Washington, the oldest drag organization in D.C., Rizzi – or Mame Dennis, as he’s known in character – has steered the group through generations of changes over his more than 40 years of involvement.

One of the most challenging changes came in 2006, when several blocks of what had been a historically gay part of D.C. found itself in the path of construction for Nationals Park.

The Academy’s home of nearly a decade, Club 55 on K Street in Southeast, was closed, along with the old Ziegfeld’s on Half Street. Rizzi had hoped that the Academy could relocate when Club 55 reopened. But getting approval on a strip club isn’t easy. And finding a temporary home was tough, too. Most clubs aren’t open on Sundays, when the drag balls go on. And many have hesitations about renting to a club full of drag queens. So the wait stretched on.

But it ended Sunday, when Ziegfeld’s reopened at a new location several blocks down Half Street. This is the Academy’s new home, and they welcomed fledgling members at the New Faces ball, their first show of the season.

“You think drag’s a dying form, that none of the kids would be interested,” Rizzi says. “But I’m amazed. They just keep coming.”