It’s hard to be a female impersonator in today’s world. Today’s world is
teeming with aging-not-so-gracefully actresses who are their own best
impersonators: when Faye
Dunaway served as a judge on the reality contest “The Starlet” on the WB a
few years ago, she was a dead ringer for herself. Or RuPaul. Drag queens want to
look like divas, but it’s a drag when so many divas look like cross-dressers.
“RuPaul’s Drag Race,” which begins Monday on the Logo channel, is a new
reality competition that explores what it takes to be a drag star today.
And, strikingly, not one of the nine contestants relies on movie-star
impersonation; there are no Marilyn
Monroe or Liza
Minnelli look-alikes. When one competitor, Shannel, calls himself “the Barbra
Streisand of drag,” it turns out he is referring to personality, not
persona. “Because I’ve heard she’s a real bitch and anal-retentive about
everything,” Shannel says. “And that’s kind of, I guess you could say, how I
am.”
Each of the nine men has his own distinctive style and look as a woman,
ranging from madcap androgynous punk to prissy ’50s schoolmarm: they are sui
generis practitioners of a field founded on imitation.
RuPaul, who still wears the tiara, is the host and supreme adjudicator of the
competition. There is no shock to see this singer-performer in a cascading blond
wig and feathered, form-fitting ball gown. RuPaul became a cross-over star in
the early ’90s with his hit song, “Supermodel (You Better Work),” and has a wax
likeness enshrined in Madame Tussauds. It’s more startling to see RuPaul make a
subdued entrance as RuPaul Charles, a tall, elegant bald man in a tailored suit,
tie and eyeglasses.
Fittingly the drag contest borrows heavily from other television shows. In a
gown RuPaul is a hair-tossing, snappy tyrant in the manner of Tyra
Banks on “America’s Next Top Model.” He too has a signature dismissal line,
telling successful aspirants, “chantez, you stay,” and eliminating losers with
the words “sashay, away.”
In pinstripes he is more like Tim
Gunn on “Project Runway,” dispensing fatherly advice and costume tips. One
of the first challenges is a design competition “on a dime.” Contestants who are
accustomed to expensive rhinestone-and-tulle wardrobes (most of them perform for
a living) are instructed to patch together an outfit from hand-me-downs and
dollar-store purchases, accessories that RuPaul describes mischievously as “a
whole bunch of crap.”
Most reality contests, from “Project Runway” to “Flavor of Love,” pump up
backstage rivalries and campy hissing matches. “Drag Race,” however, is
strangely benign and friendly. Everybody postures and vamps for the camera, but
behind the scenes the competitors offer only pro forma cattiness. Melodrama is
for show. In dressing rooms and rehearsal halls the competitors seem to share a
stage-weary camaraderie, perhaps forged in the narrow, precarious niche their
art form occupies.
Logo is devoted to gay entertainment — the schedule is crammed with movies
and reruns like “Queer as Folk” and “Xena: Warrior Princess” — but the channel
also has a didactic streak. There is a newsmagazine and a large roster of
serious documentaries along the lines of “Rock the Boat,” a 1998 film about a
group of H.I.V.-positive men who undertake a grueling 2,200-mile sailing race.
Even “Drag Race” has a message (besides “You better work”). One contestant,
Victoria, is a middle-aged, plus-size performer from Raleigh, N.C., who looks a
little like Dame Edna and was most likely chosen more for diversity than looks
and as a reminder to complacent viewers about prejudices past. At one point
Victoria reminisces about his early days in the 1980s when he was mocked and
worse. “I’ve been shot at,” he says sunnily.
Mostly, of course, “RuPaul’s Drag Race” is a campy, good-humored ode to
cross-dressing, lip-synching and striking an attitude. In a photo-shoot
challenge each contestant is asked to lie sexily across the hood of a car in a
carwash alongside two scantily clad, musclebound male models while being hosed
down, drenched really. The exercise is less a test of pin-up posing than a
testament to the waterproof claims of MAC cosmetics, one of the show’s sponsors.
Guest judges include Michelle
Williams, a member of Destiny’s Child, and Bob
Mackie, the designer best known for “Dynasty” and Cher costumes. When a
contestant presents himself in a silver-festooned, crotch-skimming minisheath,
Mr. Mackie has sage advice: “I think you could have come lower in the
front.”
Drag shows are not for everyone, but anyone can enjoy an insider’s peek at
one of the more outré forms of transformative entertainment. “Tighten those
tuck-in pants,” RuPaul drawls. “It’s going to be a bumpy ride.”
RUPAUL’S DRAG RACE
Logo, Monday nights at 10, Eastern and Pacific times; 9,
Central time.
Directed by Ian Stevenson; Fenton Bailey, Randy Barbato, Tom Campbell and
RuPaul Charles, executive producers; Chris McKim, co-executive producer; Germano
Saracco, director of photography; James McGowan, production designer; Dave Mace
and Pamela Post, production executives for Logo. Produced by World of Wonder and
Logo.
WITH: RuPaul Charles (host, judge and mentor), Merle Ginsberg (judge) and
Santino Rice
(judge).