RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 5 – Draguation Speeches: recap & power ranking!

June 11, 2022 by krisis

Welcome to my recap of the fifth episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 – Draguation Speeches, a challenge that mashes up comedy with inspiration and a touch of personal branding.

This is a fascinating challenge because there is nothing quintessentially “drag” about it, yet it is perfectly representative of the direction of the show in 2022.

Drag Race constantly finds new peaks of cultural influence, and with that higher profile all of its contestants have a higher profile than ever before.

Drag Race winners used to compete to score a club tour sponsored by Absolut Vodka.

Now, winning queens are getting the opportunity to appear on stage at the Emmy awards, walk the runway for Fenty and other fashion brands, and attend the Met Gala. Peppermint, the only Season 9 finalist to not yet have her own crown, just hosted the GLAAD Awards!

Of this cast of winners, five host ongoing podcasts (Jinkx hosts two!), Raja has hosted Fashion Photo RuView for almost a decade, Viv has anchored several Netflix YouTube shows, Monét had her own talk show, Jinkx has written and produced multiple one- and two-woman shows, and Shea has appeared in multiple features in Vogue – among many other appearances and accolades.

That’s the genius of this challenge. Draguation Speeches are not about a skill critical to the foundations of your drag, but the skill of translating your drag into different contexts. A drag queen should be giving a commencement speech! A show that started as an (even-more) queer spin on Project Runway is now a public-facing finishing school that turns former bar queens and Instagram influencers into in-demand LGBTQAI+ spokespeople.

If no Drag Race queen has been invited to receive an honorary degree and deliver a commencement address, it’s only a matter of time.

(Actually, Sasha Velour delivered a commencement address to The Center for Cartoon Studies’ class of 2020!)

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Drag Race challenge without the added requirement of making Ru laugh! Which queens manage to be both inspiring and hilarious? As it turns out, Ru and I are split on the decision. Read on to find out about our disagreement. Plus, at the end of the recap I’ll update my Episode 4 power rankings to show where the queens stand after another week of Legendary Legend badges. (Want to skip right to the power rankings? Go for it!)

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 5 – Draguation Speeches: recap & power ranking!

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 4 – Fairytale Justice: recap & power ranking!

June 4, 2022 by krisis

Welcome to my recap of the fourth episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 – Fairytale Justice, an improv acting challenge!

I have done improv in college classes and as a warm-up for rehearsals, but I’ve never officially performed improv for an audience. That still gives me a lot more exposure to improv than average TV viewer. I’d guess that the vast majority of people’s experience with improv comedy comes from watching Whose Line Is It Anyway? and having heard of the rule of “Yes, and…”

Broadly, the idea of “yes and” means that you accept what others in your scene have said as reality and then you add to it.

That might be the primary rule of improv, but it’s not a rule in the sense that people who haven’t done improv often expect it to be. It doesn’t mean that you must always say “yes, and..,”, that your character can never disagree with another character, or that the story can never contradict itself. It also doesn’t mean that everything in improv has to be done without a plan or with no preparation.

“Yes and” is simply a guideline for productive collaboration. It’s a means of always moving forward instead of pausing to correct or edit, even if that means you move forward into conflict. Any good conversation you’ve ever had involved an amount of “yes and.” So have most of your successful group projects. Even working from an agenda in a meeting requires an amount of “yes and”!

As it turns out, life is largely a game of improv.

RuPaul emphasizes improvisation on Drag Race because improv is foundational to not only his idea of comedy, but his entire career. Ru loves the idea of “volleying” – being able to trade an escalating series barbs live with another player. That quick wit has been a huge part of what has made him an enduring icon in entertainment. He picked that up from a wide array of silly 60s, 70s, and 80s influences like Laugh-In, The Sonny & Cher Show, comedians on gameshows like Match Game, and late night hosts like Johnny Carson and Joan Rivers.

Not all Drag Race contestants fully grasp this idea of “yes and,” let alone how to use it to play for laughs. That has resulted in many uneven improv moments over more than two dozen seasons of the show’s many franchises. Yet, in this episode, we saw two of the best ever examples of “yes and” in Drag Race history!

Do you know which two queens I mean? Keep reading to find out in my full recap of “Fairytale Justice.” Plus, at the end of the recap I’ll update my Episode 3 power rankings to show where the queens stand after another week of Legendary Legend badges. (Want to skip right to the power rankings? Go for it!)

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 4 – Fairytale Justice: recap & power ranking!

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 3 – The Realness of Fortune Ball: recap & power ranking!

May 28, 2022 by krisis

Welcome to my recap of the third episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 – The Realness of Fortune Ball!

In this episode of this special All Winners season, each our eight crowned queens have to construct a garment from scratch corresponding to a fabulous and colorful vacation destination – the sorts of trips offered as prizes on classic game shows like Wheel of Fortune.

Making a garment from scratch might be the one standard Drag Race challenge I’ve still never tried myself!

When I first started commenting on and recapping Drag Race back in 2014 I was doing it as a complete layperson. I knew plenty about singing, songwriting, acting, and public speaking – which covered a slew of typical Drag Race challenges.

When it came to the actual drag on the runway, I knew very little about make-up or fashion that I hadn’t learned from the judges. I was going off of what was pleasing to me without being able to articulate exactly why.

This is a frequent topic of discussion in Drag Race fandom, and amongst the queens themselves. Who is qualified to critique the work of these incredible artists, who are make-up artists, costume designers, and stylists all rolled up into one. The Drag Race judging panel sometimes struggles to have the right references to understand where queens are coming from, so who are we to try?!

I’m of two minds about that.

On one hand, you don’t have to be an expert in something to talk about if it resonates with you. That’s a way people gatekeep themselves from appreciating fine art, classical music, runway fashion, or any other form of high art.

On the other hand, I think Drag Race fans have consumed so much of the Drag Race industrial complex of endless franchise seasons, recap shows, podcasts, and fashion reviews that they think they’re an expert just because they’ve heard so much from the experts. There’s a Dunning-Kruger effect there, where even though fans don’t fully understand something about drag they assume they have have as much know-how as the queens themselves.

I’ve always been sensitive to that second bit, especially because I’m qualified to seriously critique a lot of elements of Drag Race OTHER THAN the drag itself.

That’s why I’ve spent the past few years trying to actually learn about drag other than by watching the show. I’ve read up on drag history and pageants. I’ve watched countless make-up tutorials. I’ve been keeping up with fashion blogs and runway shows. And, I’ve actually done my own drag make-up – which will never see the light of day on the internet! (At least, not until I’m much better at blending.)

I don’t think all of that is required to recap Drag Race. Nor do I think following runway collections and knowing how to contour doesn’t mean I’m anywhere in the same solar system of talent compared to these All Winners!

What I do think is that if you’re going to spend to time to go past consuming art to engage with it critically, you owe it to both yourself and to the artist to better understand their art form. (And, also, engaging critical doesn’t mean hating or belittling these artists! Turning in uneven work on one episode of a TV show has no bearing on how great a drag artist you are.)

Does that mean I understand how these queens built their dresses from scratch for this week’s design challenge? Hell no! Design challenges involve the peak of a drag queen’s power to create something from nothing, and I’ll cover every step of that process in detail here! Plus, at the end of the recap I’ll update my Episode 2 power rankings to show where the queens stand after another week of Legendary Legend badges. (Want to skip right to the power rankings? Go for it!)

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 3 – The Realness of Fortune Ball: recap & power ranking!

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 2 – Snatch Game: recap & power ranking!

May 24, 2022 by krisis

I’m back to discuss the second episode of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7’s back-to-back streaming premiere of its All Winners season.

If two Drag Race episodes in one day each packed with eight iconic champions wasn’t big enough to begin with, I have two more words for you: Snatch Game.

“Snatch Game” is an off-colour pun on the old TV game show Match Game, where contestants filled-in-the-blank in a phrase in an often-vain attempt to match what a panel of celebrities would fill in on their own cards.

Drag Race introduced it as a celebrity impersonation challenge in Season 2 and it immediately became a regular feature of every season of every franchise (except for All Stars Season 1, but we don’t talk about that).

One of the reasons Snatch Game has become such an iconic, enduring challenge on Drag Race is because it makes the show more accessible to a wider audience. Even if you don’t care about drag, this is a pre-packaged game show skit with easy-to-grasp rules, like a parodic round of Jeopardy on SNL – with the added thrill of each cast member improv-ing their own answers.

In recent years, some All Stars season have used the format of other TV game shows under the “Snatch Game” title, mimicking The Dating Game and Family Feud. Season 7 is back to the standard format… with a twist: every queen has to impersonate two celebrities on two different panels of the show!

I am old enough to have grown up watching all of these cheesy, campy old celebrity-driven game shows in syndication on daytime TV. In fact, they were one of the best things about staying home from school! Now, these camp curiosities have been relegated to special cable channels and YouTube clips. It makes me wonder how the challenge lands for younger audience members (and queens) who never experienced these things firsthand. To them, “Snatch Game” is primarily a Drag Race reference!

There’s no fear of that with this cast. They’ve all been through this gauntlet before. They’re all queens who have shown an ability to reference a massive amount of pop culture across their runs and reigns. And, half of them – Jinkx, Trinity, Shea, & The Vivienne – are previous Snatch Game winners!

If there was ever an episode a casual fan could enjoy, this is the one! I’ll cover every step of the episode in detail, including every celebrity impersonation and the slick “Pleather Principal” runway! Plus, at the end of the recap I’ll update my Episode 1 power rankings to show where the queens stand after another week of Legendary Legend badges. (Want to skip right to the power rankings? Go for it!)

Readers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win! [Read more…] about RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 2 – Snatch Game: recap & power ranking!

RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 1 – Legends: recap, songwriting analysis, and power ranking!

May 21, 2022 by krisis

Welcome to my first recap of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 7 – All Winners!

Wow, that’s a mouthful!

I’ve been recapping and commenting on Drag Race both here and on Reddit since Season 6 in 2014. It’s amazing how much the conversation around Drag Race (and drag, in general) has changed in that relatively short period of time.

When I first started talking about drag online there was an emphasis on “female illusion.” Drag queens who presented a more believable (or, “unclockable”) presentation of exaggerated femininity tended to be more revered. That included their hair and make-up as well as their body.

A term that was often used at that time was “fishy” or “fish,” in the context of “she is the fishiest queen in the cast” or “she is serving pure fish.”

(That term has rightfully been called out for its misogynist roots. Yes, even gay men dressed as women can be misogynists. You can find me using the term in older posts, but it’s not something I would say today.)

(Similarly, “unclockable” tends to be associated with trans people “passing” as their gender and isn’t a term we need to use for drag artists – nor should folks outside of the trans community be using it to talk about trans folk.)

Linked to that emphasis on femininity, Drag Race had a perverse stance of devaluing or even barring woman contestants, whether they were cis or trans. The perspective that RuPaul espoused at the time was that having breasts or a more-traditionally feminine face or figure provided too much of an advantage compared to male-bodied contestants who ostensibly had to work to create that illusion.

That’s not the conversation we’ve having around Drag Race anymore.

The change has come from boundary-shattering Drag Race contestants; from other shows like Dragula and We’re Here; and from the Drag Race fandom itself. We have now seen trans women compete and win across multiple Drag Race franchises, as well as the first cis woman compete on Drag Race UK. Dozens of queens have come out as trans, non-binary, and/or gender-fluid, some on camera during the run of their seasons. And, the fandom and the judges are no longer demanding breasts and padding as a baseline requirement for “good drag.”

That doesn’t mean Drag Race is now a perfect platform. It still relies on the performance of womanhood, which has inherent problems. While to some queens that equates to a celebration of womanhood, for others it remains an exaggeration or caricature. Drag Race still has trouble appreciating drag artists who aren’t presenting glamorous feminine drag. It still has a homogenizing effect on drag around the world, to which it has now added an element of colonization with its vast set of international franchises. And, RuPaul and Michelle Visage still come from a set of pop culture and style references primarily rooted in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s – before many of today’s drag artists were born!

Despite all of those detractions, the juggernaut of Drag Race is still elevating the work of dozens of queer artists around the world every year. I watch because I revere them and their talents. I love that the show has transformed into a celebration of their artistry rather than a catty, drama-filled reality show.

Of course, drag artists still come with some catty, drama-filled moments. That’s part of the proud herstory of drag! The show just isn’t as obsessed with manufacturing them anymore.

If Drag Race has increasingly become more celebration than competition, All Stars is it’s biggest annual bash. That makes this first-ever All Stars “All Winners” series a “Platinum Jubilee” of drag (or a “Quarter Quell,” depending on your perspective).

This new season features a decade’s worth of winners: eight artists who were originally crowned from 2011 through 2020.

That’s not every winner, nor is it every fan favorite winner, and some folks are grouchy about the heavy-hitting queens who abstained or were passed over. Yet, it’s a stellar cast of artists at the height of their craft, and it becomes evident very early in this episode why only eight of them are competing.

(The missing winners are Chad Michaels, Bianca del Rio, Violet Chachki, Bob the Drag Queen, Alaska Thunderfuck, Sasha Velour, Trixie Mattel, and Aquaria. Note that James FKA Tyra no longer performs in drag and Sharon Needles has been accused of some racist and predatory behavior that will probably keep her away from the brand for some time. Meanwhile, Lawrence Chaney, Kita Mean, Kylie Sonique, Symone, & Krystal Versacé were all either newly-crowned or not-yet-crowned when this was shot. Plus, reportedly, queens Ru did not personally crown are not yet eligible for this franchise, which knocks out English-speaking international winners like Angele Anang, Priyanka, Envy Peru.)

With all of that out of the way, it’s time to recap Drag Race All Stars Season 7, Episode 1 – “Legends”!

Whether you are a Drag Race veteran or you’ve never seen the show, I’ll cover every step of the episode in detail. In this premiere, the queens have to write a verse for a brand new Ru song, and I dare you to find another recapper who is a songwriter who has written more than 400 songs!

Plus, at the end of the recap I’ll update my pre-Season power rankings to reflect Episode 1! (Want to skip the recap and head right to the rankings? Go for it!)

Racers, start your engines! And, may the best drag queen… win!