Dragging Questions

[kybearfuzz]

Having watched many seasons of "RuPaul's Drag Race" now, I have picked up a bit of the lingo they throw about. Mostly through the constant overuse by the queens. I have noticed a few odds and ends that seems to be overused.

• You too can talk like a drag queen strutting the runway, just fill in this blank: I'm serving ___________ realness!" I think I read on FB a comment by ericdabear) where he pointed this out too. It's cute the first few times you hear it, but every single one of them fills in the blank almost every time they romp down the runway.
  
  
• When did it become the norm for drag queens to pull their wigs off during a high energy performance? I've been to only a few drag shows in my life and I've never seen it. At least one queen who is "Lip syncing for their lives" seem to throw the wig every week. This week one of the queens did it (no spoilers for those who haven't seen it) and Santino Rice shook his head "no" after it happened. I guess I don't understand doing that because it shatters the illusion that it's a woman. You ain't serving fishy realness doing that.
  
  
• Has anyone else noticed that often the queen who seems to be getting a lot of screen time during an episode is often the one who goes home? I haven't seen it so much this season, but in past seasons the queen who was involved in the most drama or discussions in a specific episode was the one sent packing.

And now back to non-drag related life :)

Comments

[thespisgeoff.livejournal.com]

Taking the wig off at the end of a performance used to be a drag staple - back in the days of "female impersonators." See Victor/Victoria for a good example of this; the idea is that you're shocking the audience by revealing that you're actually *not* woman.

Its history on Drag Race comes from when a contestant in...Season Two, I think, had a Wig Malfunction during her LSFYL and instead of worrying about it, just ripped that wig off her head and kept going. She was saved that week. Queens who saw that and thought the wig-rip was helpful have incorporated it into their own performances, with girls like Milan taking it even further and fully stripping during their frantic lipsyncs. The editing of this week's LSFYL appears to point to the death of the wig-rip, though, which is gratifying.

[kybearfuzz.livejournal.com]

Ah, I do remember that scene in "Victor/Victoria" but didn't make the connection.

I do remember Shannel having her Medusa headpiece fall off during her LSFYL moment and I think it saved her @$$. Milan was something of a mess. I enjoyed her dancing, but every LSFYL performance had the wig coming off and the more she stripped, the more it was obvious it was a man. It became her downfall.

And I do hope the wig-rip is over. I think even Phi Phi did it a couple of episode back and I thought "you really need to keep the wig, because you look like a dude without it."