![]() ![]() ![]() If I didn’t know this from the huge billboard behind RuPaul’s chair in this fancy London hotel suite, I’d know it from the number of times he says “truTV” or “on Mondays and Tuesdays” during our chat. And now, after a late-night, soon-abandoned slot on E4 years ago, it’s coming back to Britain truTV, in fact. It ruthlessly mocks the reality format while still managing to be one of the most sensitive shows on TV. It makes circuit stars of its girls and has originated multiple catchphrases, from “Gentlemen, start your engines, and may the best woman win!” to the kindly kiss-off “Sashay away”. (For the uninitiated, the term “shade” is a form of slapdown that comes from Latino and black gay culture.) “Our show” is RuPaul’s Drag Race, a cult reality series now seven seasons in, which pits drag queens against each other as they bid to become America’s next drag superstar. “I remember something about Michelle Obama and the press said she was throwing shade at someone! Which is a direct correlation to our show! Hahahaaaa,” he hoots. ![]() RuPaul’s laugh is so long and so loud that you hear it from two rooms away. Even as a kid, I would dress up in my sisters’ clothes, in cowboy outfits, in sailor outfits. He was there as the date of his bandmate’s sister, but, he tells me, he dressed like that even when he was at the same school. There’s an internet-famous prom picture of him in 1983, when he was 23 and dressed as if he’d just stepped off the set of the David Bowie movie Labyrinth. Before he was the world’s most famous drag queen, RuPaul Charles was a punk in a downtown Atlanta band called Wee Wee Pole. ![]()
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