Lea DeLaria, Orange Is The New Black's Big Boo, will lead Manchester Pride Parade: 'The girls are hot'

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Andrew Feinberg

White House Correspondent

Lea DeLaria, also known as Orange Is The New Black’s Big Boo, will lead Manchester Pride Parade on 23 August.

The three-day long festival runs from Friday 22 August to Monday 25 August. DeLaria – who was known as the first openly gay comic before appearing in the US prison-based drama series – will serve as the event’s Grand Marshal, following in the illustrious footsteps of Ian McKellen who has previously led the parade.

“It’s an honour to be invited to marshal the Manchester Pride parade,” said DeLaria.

“I can’t wait to return to Manchester. The girls there are really hot!”

DeLaria has also acted in Will and Grace and Friends, as well as appearing in a film called Attack Of The Big Haired Lesbians.

And, if past parades are anything to go by, the comedic actress is well worth coming along for: in the 1992 New York Pride Rally, DeLaria said she got Reverend Fred Phelps, the homophobic pastor of Westboro Baptist Church, thrown out. He was, of course, standing at the sidelines protesting with his famously contentious placards.

“It reached a point where he literally tried to cross the police line to hit me,” DeLaria told The Huffington Post in June. “I was so horrible to him, and the police honestly looked like they just wanted an excuse to throw him out, so they were really excited that they got to throw him out.”

Other high-profile names to feature in the festival include Conchita Wurst and AllSaints.