RuPaul's Drag Race season 15 cast promises Game of Thrones -level twists, spicy drama, and 'no chocolate bars'
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
You know a season of RuPaul's Drag Race is going to be good when it even shook 20-year drag veteran Sasha Colby to the core.
"I love every season, and I enjoy watching. For some seasons, it's the fashion or the drama. This one is pure chaos," the Miss Continental winner (and drag mother to season 14's Kerri Colby) tells EW of the upcoming season in our exclusive video interviews with the queens (below). "I was there, and I was like, this is gonna be good."
If the twists aren't twisting, Drag Race isn't doing it right. And the queens of season 15 — featuring the largest cast (16) and cash prize ($200,000) in the show's 13-year her-story — promise next-level gaggery that even seasoned fans won't see coming.
"It's the Game of Thrones of Drag Race seasons. In the way of, like, your faves might [go] before you expect it," describes Robin Fierce, while Seattle's Irene Dubois recalls seeing "some of the greatest drag I've ever seen in my entire life" on the season 15 set.
Vijat Mohindra The cast of 'RuPaul's Drag Race' season 15
For a series that's 15 regular seasons deep (plus six All Stars editions, one all-winners season, and countless international spin-offs) into its life cycle, it's become an increasingly titanic task to consistently pull off feats of goopery. Last year, the series introduced its chaotically entertaining chocolate bar twist to the format (but there's "no chocolate bar situation," confirms Houston's Mistress Isabelle Brooks), and the 2023 edition is stepping things up in fresh fashion.
One way to do it is to move the show to its new home on MTV (fresh energy!), up the number of queens competing, and cast some of the most famous drag entertainers working today. In addition to Colby, viral twin TikTok superstars Sugar and Spice are the first pair of biological siblings to compete on the show at the same time, while Los Angeles' Salina EsTitties has an existing IMDb credit list that includes Days of Our Lives, Legends of the Hidden Temple (in full drag), and AJ and the Queen alongside RuPaul.
Yes, the ladies are accomplished, but that doesn't mean they're not garnished with a little extra-extra for the Untucked cameras.
"Last season was Best Friend's Race. [There's] a little more seasoning this season. A little bit more spice," teases Miami pageant diva Malaysia Babydoll Foxx.
Perhaps Mistress sums it up best.
"Last year, they were worried about COVID and getting everyone tested, but I think they need to start looking for the vaccine for drag delusion, because there was an outbreak on set," the Houston queen — whom the cast teased as a likely contender for the season 15 Untucked crown — says. "A lot of the girls were very delusional, and I was trying my hardest not to catch it. That was one of the biggest twists of the season."
See how it all plays out when RuPaul's Drag Race season 15 debuts its two-part premiere (featuring Ariana Grande as a guest judge) Friday, Jan. 6 on MTV. Watch EW's exclusive first sit-down interviews with all 16 queens on the cast below.
Amethyst
There's plenty of Amethyst to go around. Really, according to science, an estimated 100 million Instagram accounts bear the same name as the purple semi-precious stone. And, yet: "I'm the only Amethyst with one name," the Connecticut queen — Drag Race's sole Amethyst to date — assures. "I'm just one name, like Adele. Or Madonna. Or Jesus."
She knows that answer is stupid. In fact, she aspires to be dumb in the smartest (and most charming) ways. "You're probably going to laugh a lot at an Amethyst show. I'm so stupid. That's my brand: Stupidity. And [making you question], 'What is happening right now?'"
It's a question that doesn't feel entirely out of place for the fresh-faced beauty to ask herself as she prepares for the biggest undertaking in her budding career. Just three years into her life as a drag performer, Amethyst was first born in quarantine, at the top of the coronavirus pandemic. Whereas other queens worked their way up through the club circuit, Amethyst performed her first round of digital gigs for social media.
Without constraints and a full-on scene to fit into (Connecticut has only "three main bars that embody" the state's essence, she says), Amethyst still paved a unique path for herself online, often fronting popular clips on TikTok. And now that COVID restrictions have lessened, that road continues to widen as she comes into her own as a live performer.
"I do a lot of these crazy mixes," she explains, also noting that you'll see her penchant for offbeat comedy on the show, as she knowingly leaned into the kind of facial gymnastics that often make a contestant meme queens of the season. "I've mashed up a Dua Lipa song with the old Education Connection theme song. It's as stupid as I can be."
One of her favorite (and, admittedly, best) numbers is the "Banana Burlesque," during which she sexily peels herself out of a large fruit. Funnily enough, she says season 14 queen Maddy Morphosis — the first straight cis man to compete on Drag Race — inspired the bit. "When I saw Maddy do it, I started doing my research, and I was like, this is amazing. I performed that for my first ever pageant that I competed in, and won," she says. "You have to be stupid to be a sexy fruit."
Though she has a clear knack for describing herself and her artistry in an endearingly simple way, Amethyst maintains that she "isn't the greatest with words." So, she lets her music speak for her, both at shows and in her output as a recording artist.
"I want to be a pop star, which is kind of what I've always wanted to do," she says, adding that she produces and writes her own tunes. Now, thanks to her impending relationship with Drag Race stardom, "it can fall into my hands, easier" than ever before. And with (blonde) ambitions like that, Amethyst is looking to add one more name to her mantle: Winner, baby.
Anetra
Don't ever question Anetra's commitment to drag, because she's ready to suffer for it. In fact, she already has — many times over — like when she nearly suffocated while doing death drops as Mileena from Mortal Kombat.
"The teeth were acrylic nails that I chopped up, and I used scar gel and makeup to make it look like they were coming out of my face," the Nevada-based queen says of her three-hour facial reconstruction of the character's mangled fangs. "I superglued it to my face and the whole time in the number, I had a reaction to the superglue fumes…. I literally got off stage and opened the back door, and I was just like, blah."
Yeah, she threw up. "But, it was worth the look," she admits. So, *very Oprah voice,* is Anetra sick, or is she sickening? When she's feeling both, she has the competitive Las Vegas drag scene to thank for cultivating the kind of gritty determination required to push through the pain to become a star among a city of legends.
A further testament to her work, Anetra — a dancer who taught herself how to groove thanks to the Dance Dance Revolution video game — scored a recurring spot among the cast of Piranha, one of Las Vegas' foremost drag clubs, alongside industry staples like Hot Chocolate and Drag Race season 3 alum Yara Sofia. And she did it only six months into her career.
"I went there, turned the party, popped some thangs, busted a few joints, and they hired me on the spot," Anetra recalls, adding that her background in TaeKwonDo aided her on-stage abilities, as did support and encouragement from her foremothers in Drag Race excellence, such as her longtime pal and collaborator, season 5 queen Coco Montrese.
It's clear, though, that Anetra draws most of her motivation when she — briefly — exits the fantasy to take stock of her self-made achievements that brought her from the DDR leaderboard, to Piranha, to a national Taco Bell drag brunch tour.
"I think I went [to Drag Race] more prepared than I thought. I was going in a little bit nervous because I'm like, oh my God, I'm about to be standing next to $5,000 garments, and I make everything myself," she remembers. "You have to believe in yourself and accept the challenge and rise to it or not."So, like an up-and-coming queen holding in her vomit: She's inviting you to gag on all of her leveled-up talent on Drag Race, too.
Aura Mayari
Five minutes into our interview, Aura Mayari is already chatting up every straight guy in the room. Maybe it's because, as a former member of the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity, she feels solidarity among bros. Or, well, maybe not.
"Do you love it?" she asks with a mischievous laugh, flipping her hair and directing her attention to the camera crew filming our conversation. "So, what do you like about me?"
It's clear that the Nashville-based dancer knows she's the full package. "Just so you know, I'm the horniest queen of the season," she proclaims. "I am the trade of the season. I'm also the face of the season. I'm also the most talented queen of the season. I'm the funniest queen of the season. I'm just going to claim it all: I'm the queen of all trades."
Confidence is something she wears proudly, but it didn't come easy. She was born in the Philippines, and moved to Chicago in 2003, after her father found work to support the family in their new home. When she arrived, Aura recalls bouts with casual racism among her peers that could've diminished her spirit, but resisting it all instead shaped her into a "strong f---ing woman" who, to this day, refuses to back down. "The American Dream? Here I am," she says. "Being pretty."
From there, her story gets even sweeter: She says her fraternity accepted her sexuality unflinchingly, which fostered a sense of community that also lent itself to her search for a queer family of performers among Chicago's collective drag sorority.
After graduating, Aura, a skilled, self-taught hip-hop dancer who sought an outlet to perform, says researching the role of Angel for a production of Rent forced her to get over feeling "terrified" of drag queens.
"Their persona, their aura, that big personality, it intimidated me, but after watching a lot of shows, I fell in love with the art," she recalls, adding that, after immersing herself in queer nightlife to prepare for the role, she got into drag for the first time at a friend's birthday party, booked a recurring brunch gig with Drag Race season 11 and All Stars 6 icon Silky Nutmeg Ganache shortly thereafter, and had her own show seven months later.
It seems that Aura still questions the life she lives — in the pinch me kind of way that filming an Emmy-winning TV show might inspire, but also when it came to sniffing out bulls— personalities in Untucked.
"Because of all the cameras around you, all the girls performing in front of the cameras, it's like, is this real?" she remembers, clinging to the advice Silky gave her about leaning fully into her authentic self before joining the show. And if she does, we're all in for one of the realest fantasies Drag Race has ever seen.
Irene Dubois
Bleep blorp, does she come in peace, or did Irene "The Alien" Dubois hit the literal and figurative slay button when she descended from the cosmos above?
"I guess that depends on your perspective," Irene explains. "If you're a capitalist, then I'm an evil alien, but if you're a communist, then I'm a great alien."
Regardless, it's apparent she comes to this planet bearing gifts: Her fantastical drag creations, which are definitively rooted in earthly pop culture. With inspiration from her grandma and Star Wars, Irene's artistry feels both cozy and chaotically out-of-this-world at the same time.
"Although I'm an alien, I started doing drag in Texas, so a lot of my aesthetic is based in old pageant glamour. I'm like an alien with rhinestones and big hair," she says, adding that a lot of her aesthetic derives from movies and TV shows she used to watch as a when she was a kid who "did not have a lot of friends," but made up for it with a boundless imagination.
It's a sentiment she's held on to as an adult, whether it's across her solo work or the recurring Mothership show she co-hosts with Drag Race season 14 alum Bosco back home in Seattle. She calls her work a "sci-fi fantasy with a twist on classic beauty," such as a sexy female Gremlin with the biggest lips you've ever seen, or a slutty version of Dobby the House Elf from Harry Potter.
Irene is also known for her prosthetic enhancements, including facial pieces, ear attachments, and anything else she can glue to her face — and she brought it all to Drag Race (sorry, Michelle).
"Drag is a yassified version of reality, so if we hit the slay button on any character, they can become a drag queen…. I like to find the characters that maybe no drag queen has thought of turning into a slay, and seeing how far I can push the slay," says Irene. There's also a darker — okay, intensely philosophical and existential — edge to her craft that feels like an exercise in "trans-humanism" reflecting "how humans will evolve when we're changing our own genetic code" with technology.
"I'm really interested in the idea of creating the most beautiful thing I can, and then destroying it. I see drag queens as sandcastles in a hurricane. As soon as you're done, we immediately begin to deteriorate. So, why fight that? In my performances I like to embrace the deterioration, and show everybody that I'm just a clown," she states. "It's something we're all going to go through no matter what. Death is coming for us all. If we can embrace that, we can enjoy life and have a lot less anxiety about it."
Something tells us that, whatever it is that Irene beams down onto the Drag Race stage, death (in the house-down-slay-boots-mama-yes kind of way) is imminent for us all.
Jax
Jax is the picture of excellence, when she's behind the camera or doing a triple-backhand into a death drop under the spotlight.
From the moment you lay eyes on her, whether she's knucking and bucking on stage (she's a trained gymnast and former competitive cheerleader) or posing for her own self-portrait (she's also an experienced photographer), the New York City queen is in full, confident control of everything you see. It wasn't until she fully came into her own as a drag artist, though, that she learned to harness her power.
"A lot of where Jax comes from, and my art in general, is playing [with] satire of my upbringing," she says. Adopted by white parents when she was only a month old, her new family brought her from Puerto Rico to the "very Caucasian" suburbs of Darien, Conn., where she says her instinct was often to minimize herself instead of embracing her identity.
Now, it's common for her photographs to juxtapose colors, patterns, offbeat fashions (graphics, bold colors, and "anything that looks like your grandma's wallpaper" are go-to aesthetics), and even full-body paint that changes her skin color, all set against the backdrop of serene, placid locales, like a family home or a field of flowers — anything that makes a bold statement amid the ordinary.
"Drag is me finding a way to combat that, and really embrace my Blackness, which I didn't get into until I was able to move away from Connecticut and move to New York at the age of 18," she explains. "A lot of the time I was like, why can't they just be the good Black kid? Why can't they chill out? Why do they have to be so loud right now? Now, I'm like, no, be loud, say exactly what you want."
These days, what Jax wants is for all to see her standing in her power as she flexes might of mind and body. The throughline of duality runs consistent in Jax; when it comes to performance, she considers herself both the jock and the cheerleader. She finds it particularly amusing that straight men adore her, because experiencing a Jax show is like "watching a football game with glitter," she's said in the past. She even has the battle scars to prove it.
"I did three back handsprings into a booth at a bar and broke my pinkie finger. To a Kylie Minogue song," she remembers.
One thing she hasn't quite processed yet is her Drag Race experience. When asked if she could apply her vision to designing a self-portrait inspired by her time on the show, she hesitates. "Honestly, just a blank slate," she admits. "It's all a blur to me, baby."
Here's to filling it in alongside her as we soak up whatever Jax serves on season 15.
Loosey LaDuca
When Loosey LaDuca tells you that she went to college for musical theater, the natural reaction is, that's the BFA-weaponizer of the season!
"I am the boom-boom weapon," Loosey says (deflecting!) before clarifying: "I'm not going to be like Jan because I don't look good in purple, and I'm not going to be like Denali because I can't ice skate, so, no to everything."
What Loosey fails to realize (or, maybe she does, we still can't tell) is that she's actually wearing a shade of purple on her face as those words leave her mouth. "Baby, this is aubergine. Actually, that was just a joke: I look really good in purple. Every shade of purple," she corrects. So, she's lying, forgetful, or simply funny. We're going with the last one.
The Connecticut queen says she discovered a knack for making people laugh early in her 10-year drag career, mostly "because I can't do a split, so I have to do something," she admits. In addition to live vocals ("95 percent" of her shows contain them, she says), the other somethings Loosey gets into on stage involve celebrity impersonation (Stevie Nicks and Madonna are go-to favorites) as well as taking unconventional pop culture references and making them sexier.
One of her best numbers online is a sultry dance to Nicki Minaj's "Super Bass" while dressed as a panty-wearing Care Bear (complete with a furry headpiece), while she's also hit the stage as a glammed-up version of Scooby Doo's Mystery Machine. Yes, as in the van, not a member of the Scooby gang.
"Funny is always first. Funny makes money. I usually have big, big blonde hair on, I have the biggest boobs in the room, they're an H, thank you for asking," she quips, before elaborating on her inspirations. "I love an outrageous pop culture moment. I'm a little older than some of the other girls. I loved Anna Nicole, who was just always the most outrageous person in the room and doing more and more. Also, what's better than a socialite going to jail? Paris? Behind bars? Heaven."
As wild as Loosey's style is, she grounds herself (and does quite a bit of good for the community) with regular appearances with Drag Queen Story Hour shows for children throughout the year. It's vital now, more than ever, she feels, as LGBTQ folks face an uptick in political oppression and social violence as she prepares to take her place on Drag Race's national platform.
"I'm not a crier, but every time I do a Drag Queen Story Hour, I end up crying," she says (she does have a soul under those H-cups), adding that seeing kids appreciate the fantasy of her artistry, far removed from the overt sexualization conservative politicians ascribe to queer performers, seriously invigorates her. "I remember I was dressed as a mermaid once, and I was reading The Little Mermaid, obviously, and this little boy came up to me and he really wanted me to come home with him and swim in his pool. It was the cutest thing…. He sees it, he gets the point, he just sees a mythical creature coming to life, and that's incredible."
Time will tell if she'll cast the same spell on Drag Race audiences, too.
Luxx Noir London
Luxx Noir London knows she's good television. Or at least, she's going to be good television, because she listened to her intuition.
"I'm obsessed with reality TV," says the New Jersey-based queen, who grew up watching everything from America's Next Top Model to Drag Race. After living her life by its principles, she seems to have the tools not only to make a good contestant across her season 15 debut, but she could be in the running to become a producer, too: "I knew what things to say, do, or push in a way that would make for the overall betterment of the program," she says. "In my head I know what works. I know what I would want to watch."
Control is something Luxx has a firm grasp on, from her tightly curated Instagram feed down to her budding music career and her carefully constructed fashions. "I don't like to necessarily be inspired by one specific thing. I don't put myself in a category of a type of queen," the former musical theater student explains. "I do everything. I don't really do glamour, camp, or high fashion, I just do whatever I'm inspired by, which is pretty much everything."
Sometimes, she's inspired by cow print. Sometimes she's inspired by rainbow cow (stunning!). And sometimes she just feels like doing a sexy, blue-furred bear with a broken nose for the season 15 promo. Whatever it is, she's going to feel good in it, whether you like it or not.
Like many queer kids, Luxx was teased for being different, but her parents taught her to embrace her exuberance from a young age, and she speaks about it all with a wisdom far beyond her 23 years on Earth.
"They raised me to believe that I was the best person walking into any room," she says. You couldn't ask for a better mentality heading into a reality TV show. But Luxx also knows she's entering an arena that's about more than a competition. She's worked with many queens who've found success after Drag Race, from Mo Heart (who's Luxx's adoptive drag mama) to The Vixen, who cast her in one of the season 10 queen's Black Girl Magic shows.
"The piece of advice I've taken from [The Vixen's experience] is, for someone like me, who's a louder personality and an African-American person, it's going to be hard for me to navigate the system, because people are always going to see me as the angry one or the aggressor in the situation," she says. "I'm trying to actively show that, just because I'm confident in myself or that I'm portraying myself in a way that's true to myself, if you can't take it, that's not a fault on me. I shouldn't be the aggressor because you feel threatened. Unless I'm threatening you — then, you should feel threatened."
She says she carried that mentality — as well as the perspective her family gave her — into the Werk Room, and, in true Luxx form, she doesn't think she'd give herself "any notes" on her Drag Race run: "I don't know what I would've done differently, I don't know what I could've done differently, or what I even should've done differently. The experience that happened was meant to happen for me," she finishes. "Whatever that experience may be, that's what it was."
Malaysia Babydoll Foxx
She's built a family dynasty and a legacy of divine distinction in Miami, but the accomplished Malaysia Babydoll Foxx still loves to be underestimated.
"I always like to push my boundaries. I always do everything I'm told that I'm not supposed to do," she explains. "I like to prove to people that I can do it, and that it's possible." As such, the self-proclaimed "phattest and baddest" entertainer's journey to the top is living proof that she's stuck to her principles from the beginning.
Malaysia wasn't always the title-bearing titan of the pageant circuit that she is today. She started performing "as a guy," she recalls, before realizing that dressing up in a feminine fantasy was simply more fun — and satisfying. Today, she's the mother of the Foxx family, a collective of performers she created to make space for outcasts who, like her, felt ostracized by the community. Now, Malaysia makes her own rules, and with a powerful family behind her (including her own drag mother, season 4 Drag Race alum Lashauwn Beyond, who made some of her season 15 runways), she has the power and influence to write new ones, too.
"A lot of people look at the smaller girls like, 'I'd love to do that,' and I'm like, I'm gonna do it," she says of her approach to fashion, which combines equal parts camp-glamour opulence and intricately designed takes on pop culture figures like the Grinch, Cruella De Vil, and Beetlejuice. "I just like to be that billboard for the curvy girls, like, we can do anything that anybody can do."
One of her crowning achievements was a light-up gown that literally plugged into the wall, which prohibited her from moving around the show floor as she lip-synced to a power ballad during her "step-down" presentation she fronted before passing the title on to her pageant successor. Then, as she remembers, things got "chaotic in the background," and a brawl broke out between patrons in the middle of her set.
"But, I'm standing there being very graceful and very beautiful," she maintains. Enough so that a steady stream of people still filed in line before her, patiently awaiting the change to tip their queen.
It takes a powerful leader to hold her subjects' attention while fists fly in the vicinity, but Malaysia's trajectory up to this point has been a battle in itself, one she's aiming to cap with another hard-fought crown at the end of Drag Race.
"When I walk into a room, I like people to think [I can't do something]," she says. "And then I like to be like, 'Surprise, it's me.' [On season 15,] I'd say that my presence was made known."
Marcia Marcia Marcia
If you say, "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia" three times into a mirror, Drag Race's latest theater nerd will appear and weaponize her BFA.
"When you have a background in ballet, you can pretty much do anything with your body. I can turn it out: A little gymnastics, a little dance, a little emotion from the theater," she teases.
Just by looking at her finely curated Instagram, it's obvious that most of what Marcia does is killer: Blending Positions-era Ariana Grande sexiness wrapped in vintage Givenchy and the throwback glamour of swinging-'60s Twiggy, her feed looks like something out of a classic fashion bible. Whereas other gals who discovered their drag aesthetic shut indoors, taking photos during quarantine, Marcia didn't let up on her theatrical presence that leaps off the page.
With stage credits that range from a Hello, Dolly! national tour to an off-Broadway production of Kinky Boots in New York City, Marcia says she found her passion for drag while hustling through the theater world. Working for other people was fun, but she started feeling the desire to wield "control over the costume part, and the set part," so she experimented with makeup and clothes while in lockdown during the pandemic. Now, her signature look incorporates small embellishments on her face: "I like to say that other girls stone, I bloom. I love a flower, I love a bow," she explains."
She balanced her skills well enough that she was even able to score a weekly live show in just seven months, even amid the competitive New York scene. Maybe it's the level of talent she possesses, or maybe it's the fact that she's an inherent alpha when it comes to stealing the spotlight. She is, after all, named after Marcia Brady, one of pop culture's foremost queen bees.
"She has such a great bite to her, and everything is [done] with a smile," Marcia observes of the eldest Brady daughter, admitting that, like the character, she wants to enter a room in a manner that "carries so much envy" for all those watching.
One such observer, she recalls, was Eve Plumb, the actress behind Jan on The Brady Bunch, who once attended a performance of Kinky Boots as the guest of Drag Race Miss Congeniality winner Nina West. Marcia felt Plumb was enamored with her style, and it makes sense: When you look as good as she does, we're all left feeling like Jan when Marcia Marcia Marcia enters the room.
Mistress Isabelle Brooks
As decreed by Mistress Isabelle Brooks: "A lot of the queens think that they reinvent the wheel. Everything's already been done, 10 times over." So, Drag Race is officially over. You can all go home now.
Okay, not quite, but the Houston diva who hails from the Davenport Dynasty marched into season 15 fully believing she was the baddest in the room — an attitude that has many of her sisters suggesting that Texas could take the Untucked crown this year.
"I got the call to be on the show, and they're supposed to make sure you're not crazy, but me? I am f---ing crazy. So, I call [my drag aunt and Drag Race alum, Kennedy Davenport] and I'm like, 'What do you think about me being on the show?' and she was like, 'Child, they do not know what they're doing, they're about to get it canceled, you're about to go out there and act a damn fool,'" Mistress says. "And what did I do? Act a fool."
It might sound like the chaotic musings of a devilish wild child, but, the seven-year drag veteran (difficult to believe, considering she) is remarkably grounded in reinventing the aforementioned wheel by, well, not reinventing it much at all.
"I consider myself to be a person that mends the bridges. I can be with the alternative, young, up-and-coming girls, or I can hang with the girls that were, like, Miss Texas 1962. I can mix and mingle with all the girls. Looking up to these entertainers, who wear feathers and beads in their show, that's normally stuff you'd have to see at a pageant or competition, but they do it at your local Hamburger Mary's on a Tuesday night," she says of the diverse Houston drag scene that raised her from the age of 16 into the title-holding pageant beauty (including Miss Gay Louisiana USofA at Large 2019) she is today.
"I wouldn't say that my drag is necessarily outside the box or something you've never seen; I just do traditional drag very well," she continues. "I think that my aspect of drag and my outlook on drag isn't dying out, but it's losing momentum over time, because the truth is: The people we look up to and our drag parents look up to are passing over, moving on, they're quitting drag, losing their life… it's up to us to continue the legacy, and that's what my drag is about."
That means you're getting big drag (she designs her garments herself), big makeup, big hair (seriously, she has a wig-making business and she's wearing four of them for this interview), a big personality, and — to top it all off — big confidence in herself as a self-proclaimed "heavyweight diva" representing for the big girls.
"You don't really see big girls doing kicks, flips, splits, acting a fool [often]," Mistress finishes. "Back home, they started calling me the heavyweight champ and the heavyweight diva, and it stuck with me. I always come out swinging. I don't have to win, but I'm always winning."
Princess Poppy
From New York to North Carolina, Princess Poppy's act has perched on thrones (and stages) around the country. It wasn't until she settled in San Francisco, though, that she found her rightful place among the city's other royal oddities. Like, for example, the queens who splash around on stage in plastic swimming pools while crooning about "gurgling balls" to their heart's desire.
"If someone wants to pee onstage while doing the Dora the Explorer theme song, you kind of just have to be open for that," Princess says of the California metropolis' drag scene, which also launched Drag Race queens Rock M. Sakura and Lady Camden into superstar orbit — the latter of whom helped her prepare to introduce the nation to her specific brand across season 15.
Camden gassed her up and facilitated connections with designers for her runway package, but one thing that didn't rub off on Princess? The Lady's sweet scent. Yes, you're going to get "femininity, beauty, harassment, raunchiness, and just a tiny bit of stink," Princess promises of what fans can expect at her shows. "Like, I'm performing a lot, so I have perspiration. I stink a little bit…. Visually, I'm gorgeous, I'm pretty, I'm a princess, and then my personality is like Don Rickles."
A drag queen claiming to be funny is hardly a novel affair, but Princess has a singular focus on comedy as a regular stand-up act and a pro on the mic while hosting her weekly drag brunch. And she does it all while looking gorgeous.
"I describe myself as a comedy queen who just so happens not to look like s---," she explains. But she's not afraid to get gritty while traversing an array of themes in her mixes. Her favorite is a mashup of Meryl Streep's "biggest hits," such as a Miranda Priestly monologue from The Devil Wears Prada to the "gay iconography" of Mamma Mia. Then, there's the serial killer stuff.
"I've always been fascinated by her," Princess explains of her Aileen Wuornos-themed magnum opus. "One day I sat down and I listened to 'Bohemian Rhapsody,' and if you listen to the lyrics, it tells her life story. So, I did her life story to the tune of 'Bohemian Rhapsody' and acted out everything."
So, if you're looking to get your life and confront the spectre of death, get thee to Princess Poppy's court: She's a queen who can do both.
Robin Fierce
Robin Fierce's drag stops for no one — not even her manager at Best Buy.
"I fully have sold TVs in drag. I'm dead serious," the Connecticut queen says, fondly recalling her former job as an electronics saleswoman, where customers watched her work a sales floor while their mouths hung "agape" as she hawked Toshibas in her "auntie bob" wig, full padding, and a fresh mug.
Sadly, Robin was, uh, fired from Best Buy, but not for lack of commitment — she was just committed to a different professional path. You see, she didn't show up to work in drag for fun; she usually had a gig lined up after her shift. "They did fire me, and now we're here," the Drag Race season 15 contestant says ahead of her national television debut. "They just stopped putting me on the schedule, and I never showed up again."
Now, she's booked and busy on rosters of a different kind, such as stages across the region. She hails from a little-represented drag scene in the northeastern state, which she says boasts "camp, spooky, ooky, glamour" and "high-energy queens" of all sorts, though she proudly stands in her power as a self-proclaimed diva whose influences include Mariah Carey, Beyoncé, and Diahann Carroll.
"I get my grandiose ladiness from [them]," Robin explains, citing the Dynasty star as a particular inspiration because she mixed her high-brow aura with comedic sass. "When I think diva, I don't think diva, like, 'Where's my champagne, darling?' It's not in the aggressive way, but diva like, 'Hi, I'm here, we're about to do a thing and get into it because the face is on, the body is on, the look is on,'" she elaborates. "I think you'll get the divadom in the best way."
If she has to defend her elegant pedestal, though? It's on, as a few tussling attendees found out the hard way when Robin was forced to break up a fight between them in the middle of her show (if you don't believe us, just watch the TikTok that captured it all.)
"Robin Fierce is not only a host and performer, she is a bouncer. Don't let the divadom fool you, okay?" Robin says. "I didn't want them to get kicked out of the bar. Like, y'all, if you're going to fight, go back outside, do whatever you have to do, come back and watch the show, I don't give a f---, come and be peaceful, watch the show, and give me dollars."
You'll get your money's worth: In addition to channeling the charisma of a pop diva as a seasoned dancer, Robin is a skilled singer, and incorporates live vocals into her acts — without her signature lip-sync "nucking and bucking" so she can preserve her pipes, which she assures us she'll flex under the spotlight until her final breath.
"One day, when I'm up there and about to retire in drag, I'mma just stand there," she says. "And y'all will take it in."I guess you could say she's in it for the long haul, ready to sell it for an adoring crowd — but she'll be on TV instead of selling them, this time.
Salina EsTitties
You could say Salina EsTitties' journey to stardom was, well, written in the stars. Or maybe in bodily fluids you'll encounter at her shows: "You're gonna laugh, you're gonna cry, you're going to lick someone's nipples, you're going to get some c-- in your eye, Anything could happen," Salina explains.
The phrase "anything could happen," it appears, is the dreamer philosophy she's applied to most of her professional life. Like that time the cosmos tried to guide her down a new path after she struggled with homelessness and substance abuse.
"I was on a Greyhound bus coming back to Hollywood, and I was listening to a podcast with RuPaul and Oprah, and Ru said something like, 'I found my purpose, with what I was doing in my life,'" the Los Angeles performer says of the night she knew she was done "flipping burgers" for scraps she'd end up spending on drag, anyway. "I got sober when I was 21 years old, and in the moment I heard RuPaul say that, and I saw a shooting star go across the sky over Hollywood, and I was like, maybe there's a purpose for me to do drag."
There's no better way to test the will of the drag gods in the sky than on Drag Race season 15, which Salina joins after reaping the benefits of life as a working entertainer in southern California. She's come a long way since her days of playing football as a kid in school, trading shoulder pads for hip pads after earning her BFA, studying dance at a year-long program, and letting herself loose on the Los Angeles scene. It was there that she made her first lasting impression on the community, having won Drag Race alums Raven and Morgan McMichaels' Project Drag competition before booking national campaigns for Nintendo and Sephora.
She's just fine collecting checks for her mug in quick-hit ads ("RuPaul really loved my makeup this season," she teases), but she really cashed in on her skills as a comedic actress and personality with appearances on shows like Legends of the Hidden Temple (yes, she competed in full drag), Days of Our Lives: Beyond Salem, and RuPaul's AJ and the Queen Netflix series — the latter of which, she feels, also solidified her Drag Race destiny.
"She had a whole monologue, she's getting out of drag the whole time, it was a lot for her," Salina remembers of filming a scene with RuPaul for the short-lived series' first episode, which sees Mama Ru de-dragging backstage with a group of Drag Race queens. "I'm next to her, she's going over her lines, she forgot her lines, like, 'What the f--- is that line?' and I go, 'Oh, it's this,' and she goes, 'Thank you, girl.'"
Then, Salina says, Mama Ru paused, and gave her future Drag Race daughter the most purposeful gesture an aspiring queen can receive: A silent up-and-down with her eyes. Now, three years later, Salina is primed to make mama proud.
Sasha Colby
As season 14 finalist Bosco declared shortly after the season 15 cast reveal: "Sasha Colby being on Drag Race is like Beyoncé being on American Idol." From her mouth to the drag gods' ears, it appears that the sentiment carried through to the Werk Room, when the iconic performer — winner of the prestigious Miss Continental pageant, star of Sasha Velour's NightGowns Quibi series, and many, many, many more things — walked on set for the first time.
"It was kind of funny, because when I went to the worktable, everyone spread out, and we all said hi, and production was like, 'Can you cut? It looks like a Sasha Colby meet and greet here,'" the native Hawaiian, who was raised as a conservative Jehovah's Witness before liberating herself as a proud trans woman, recalls with a laugh. "It was nice to see all the other girls appreciate [me]. They've all got good taste."
They also (clearly) knew their her-story, as Sasha joined the competition as one of the most esteemed queens to ever hit the Werk Room. Even if she's not familiar to you you've literally seen her legacy play out on Drag Race before: Sasha's daughter, Kerri Colby competed on season 14 to usher in the "Trantastic Five," the largest-ever number of transgender contestants to appear on the show at one time.
"I was proud to see what she did to the other girls who were coming to terms with being trans. I saw her be me, like how I was to her," Sasha says, explaining that she also feels a kindred connection to the Hawaiian "māhū" (essentially, people of a third gender), in tandem with her own journey. "I was so proud that she got to understand what that meant to help someone find themselves. Now, she's stuck with a whole bunch of kids, just like me."
She might have the quantity of drag kids to qualify her Mother-with-a-capital-M status after 20 years in the game, but they were bred from a quality matriarch, whose 2012 Miss Continental performance (partially set to Juno Reactor's "Angels and Men" and Azealia Banks' "212") still makes the rounds online today, just like her more contemporary performances do when she hits stages around the world.
One of those numbers — a powerhouse display that stars only Sasha, pouring her heart out atop a lone chair while Yebba's "My Mind" blares — embodies everything you need to know about her form.
"It's that girl who did ballet, but she's got to pay the bills. Even strippers have heartache, people who are looked at as images of lust, they're still going through feeling not wanted by somebody or something, so I always like to take that idea of what I present, a goddess, a fierce woman on stage, and I like to crack that character and give it a little life," Sasha says, admitting that she immediately speculated that the season 15 girls might be afraid to lip-sync against her on the show if the opportunity arose. "That's the place where I'm the most myself and the safest, so, that's kind of what I was telling myself…. worst-case scenario, I'll be in the bottom, and, then that's what I do."
What Sasha does (very well) is only half of her story, though.
"I just hope that my showing on Drag Race allows everyone to see that drag is an art form and sees no gender," she explains. "It started with trans women and trans performers. We were all much more together as one, fighting the outside force [of oppression]. We're kind of turning on each other and trying to compartmentalize everything, when, really, drag is so much about art, it's about creation. I [could] be a girl and work at the bank, that's not the point, I just happen to really love drag and I love being a performer."
If the whole season 15 crown thing doesn't work out, consider that State of the Union address Sasha's bid for President of Drag instead.
Spice
Clearly, biology hit the yassify/slay/house-down-boots button when Sugar and Spice — the first-ever set of twins to compete on Drag Race — were born. And born to do drag, they definitely were — just not like everyone else who paved the way before them.
"Me and Sugar weren't on TV, but we're used to cameras, and I'm used to presenting myself on camera, so I guess there was a leg up in that aspect," Spice says of the pair's massive digital impact, which includes over 7 million followers on TikTok amassed after she rose through the ranks of Vine and YouTube as adolescents.
Both feel remarkably comfortable performing in their element, acutely aware of their positioning, wording, and, most importantly, their angles, the moment their respective interviews begin. That confidence likely results from the fact that they've lived — publicly — a life that many queer people experience behind closed doors, as the 23-year-olds' rise to prominence came after they made a viral video of themselves coming out as gay to their mother in 2018. They transitioned to performing "bedroom drag" as adults in their parents' suburban Long Island home around 2019 (a second "coming out," of sorts, though Spice notes that their "closet door was glass"), while their aesthetic — and spirits — remain firmly planted in the nostalgia of their youth.
Spice describes her style as a mix of sexy, throwback vibes that recall the essence of her formative years, like when she spent years dressing up the duo's dolls for online-only competitions (which they also slayed, mind you.)
"We've won multiple Bratz Next Top Models," Spice remembers, referencing their dominance of the popular YouTube trend that saw entrants recreating photo challenges from America's Next Top Model with inanimate subjects instead of living models. "We always went to the end. It was iconic. Even our drag and doll photography back in the day, we were very polished."
Essentially, Spice views her grown-up drag as an extension of her childhood creativity, and downplays critics who (often, as she admits) attempt to delegitimize her artistry because of its Instagram-chic sheen.
"We like to bring our TikToks to life, we like to give you the experience. I'm not this dancer that's going to ki, ki, ki and ka, ka, ka, but, I'm [still] a performer. I love to entertain," she says. "It would be so embarrassing if I walked out there trying to do lyrical ballet. It's like, no, let's give camp, let's give Katy Perry, let's give the whole bit."
If there's any doubt about her qualifications to do all of this on national TV, beyond the confines of her cell phone screen, just remember: "Babes, I was doing this back in middle school," she promises. "It was just on my dolls."
Sugar
When asked, "Who's idea was it to audition for Drag Race?" between herself or her identical twin, Spice, Sugar's response unpredictably twisted itself into a three-minute verbal epic, touching on moving from Long Island to Los Angeles, bike rides, suburban existentialism, coming out, Bratz dolls, career anxiety, fashion photography, Jojo's 2006 cinematic masterpiece Aquamarine, and spiritual mantra, all before she pauses to admit: "I forgot what was going on."
Did she answer the question? Not quite. Do we now know how her brain works? Kind of! You see, much like her vibe in general, Sugar's answer to even the simplest query is a perplexing, entertaining, and wholly endearing, electric spectacle — and exchanging a few words might even leave you feeling physically buzzed.
Needless to say, the in-person Sugar experience feels a bit like all of the chaos of the internet tucked under one blonde wig. It makes sense, as she and her sister (two of the youngest season 15 contestants at age 23) have racked up 7.4 million followers on TikTok thanks to their drag transformation videos featuring dancing and impeccably crafted Y2K style. Beyond giving their followers what they want, they've lived many of their most intimate experiences out on the internet, such as a video in which they both came out of the closet. Coming out a second time as drag queens in 2019, though, lit a fire neither of them wants to quell. Their challenge on Drag Race, it seems, will be to prove to their already established following that they're not only drag queens, but flesh-and-bone entertainers who can work a stage in person.
Still, Sugar has an issue with other bedroom queens of her generation, and hopes to break the stereotype as she separates her identity from her sister's on TV. "Everyone's so serious. Drag queens love to be serious. It's like, I'm bored. I just want to shake someone, yell, scream, fart. I don't know," she says.
"I think I tend to take myself not seriously. It's all fun and games. I think people see me on TikTok and they see the character," she continues. "I think it'll be interesting for people to see me without that. It's a thing I'm working on because even with drag it's like, this is an armor."
We might see that shell start to crack on season 15, as the siblings' foray into TV marks their first major career outing in drag while competing in a singular lane. But, something tells us Sugar isn't going to have any trouble finding her high-heeled footing on her own terms, as she's ready to overcome feeling like an "accessory" to Spice, as twins often do, she says.
"No matter who you are, no matter what you look like, everyone has to have that moment at least once where you look into the mirror and you're like, am I secretly a supermodel?" she exclaims, and it's entirely unclear whether she's joking or not (probably not). Either way, we're down to watch her figure out the answer to her own question on the Drag Race runway ahead.
Subscribe to EW's BINGE podcast for full recaps of RuPaul's Drag Race, including reactions with the cast, special guests, and more.
Related content:
