Beyond: Last News

As RPDR enters its 17th season with 29 Emmys under its belt, Uncloseted spoke with Alaska and Shea Couleé, as well as academics and superfans, to investigate how the show has affected US culture.

THIS ARTICLE FIRST APPEARED ON UNCLOSETED MEDIA A NEW INVESTIGATIVE LGBTQIA+ FOCUSSED NEWS PUBLICATION.

WORDS SPENCER MACNAUGHTON AND SAM DONNDELINGER

ADDITIONAL REPORTING SOPHIE HOLLAND

At five years old, Justin Andrew Honard remembers discovering the treasures of his grandmother’s closet in Erie, Pennsylvania. He doused himself in her perfume, wrapped himself in her delicate furs, and twirled in her fancy skirts.

But she says that sort of freedom of expression was short-lived. “I quickly realised I can’t be doing that because it’s not safe.”

“There was no representation [in Erie],” says Alaska, who is currently starring in Drag: The Musical. “Queer people were treated as other. You don’t have to be told explicitly that you are being othered and you need to be careful. I knew that. Getting called a f*ggot, well that was just part of walking through life.”

Alaska says she found her sense of belonging when she discovered drag in college. “It just made sense to me. I got to decide what kind of character I wanted to be and what kind of stories I wanted to tell.”

Three decades after playing with her grandmother’s clothes, Alaska catapulted to drag superstardom when she appeared on season five of RuPaul’s Drag Race and leveraged her initial popularity as a fan favourite to return and win season two of RuPaul’s Drag Race: All Stars.

Alaska is far from alone when it comes to finding superstardom on RPDR. After the Jan. 3 season 17 premiere, 224 queens will have appeared on the American reality competition show. The US version of Drag Race has won 29 Emmys, more than any other reality show ever. And the franchise has spawned 15 international installments featuring hundreds of additional queens from Canada, Thailand, Brazil, the UK, Belgium and beyond.

RPDR has not only moved

Shea Couleé