It’s a truism that, with Donald Trump as President, the American political scene has morphed into a sickeningly high-stakes reality-TV show. The ravings of Fox News hosts can send U.S. troops to the border. Prisoners pin their hopes for clemency on the benevolence of Kim Kardashian. But it goes both ways. The drag performer RuPaul Charles has long described drag as a political act, and since Trump’s election he’s become more serious about it. “I understand what it is we must do,” he told The Atlantic. “We’re going to mobilize young people who have never been mobilized, through our love of music, our love of love, our love of bright colors.” On the twelfth season of “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” which premièred Friday, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a guest judge. In promotional reels, contestants pledge allegiance to “The United Queens of RuMerica,” and RuPaul says, “The time has come for America’s first drag-queen President!”
Joe E. Jeffreys, a drag historian at N.Y.U., told me that academics are having a field day with “the representation of America” in the show. But that’s to be expected. With its “fun-house-mirror magnification” of social codes, as Jeffreys put it, “Drag Race” is a bonanza for scholars. It’s been the subject of multiple academic anthologies. Jeffreys teaches a semester-long class called “RuPaul’s Drag Race and Its Impact.” Students study the history of American drag, going back to vaudeville, and spend weeks examining how “Drag Race” handles topics such as gender, race, class, body image, fashion, and ethnicity. They unpack slang terms like “hog body” (an unfeminine physique) and “hunty” (a term of endearment). The course lasts fifteen weeks, but, Jeffreys said, “We’re really just scratching the surface.”
Last Tuesday was the high point of the semester: all thirteen contestants on Season 12 of “Drag Race” stopped by the class for a meet-and-greet. Jeffreys hadn’t told the class in advance, so that word of the visit wouldn’t leak to the show’s fan community (which includes many of the students). Despite having been children when “Drag Race” premièred, in 2009, Jeffreys said, “Many of them have gone back to Seasons 1 and 2. They have a deep connection to this material. A real encyclopedic knowledge.”
Around 9:30 A.M., the students filed into a black-box theatre. They were all stylishly dressed, with interesting hair. Jack Ford, a stage-management and psychology major, began a start-of-class ritual: a reading from RuPaul’s 2018 book, “GuRu.” He chose a passage that began with “The color red always gets me excited.” He said it made him think of the show he was stage-managing. “We’ve been having serious debates on whether to use color in our paperwork.”
Jeffreys interrupted with an announcement. “Class? We have some special guests. Please welcome the cast of ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ Season 12!” The students shrieked as thirteen drag queens in full makeup and glittering regalia came bounding into the room. They spent several minutes dispensing air kisses and hugs. After a while, they took seats on the stage. Jeffreys asked them to introduce themselves: “Tell us about your drag style.” Jaida Essence Hall, from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, was dressed in a teal Chinese silk dress suit, with teal hair in a sixties flip. “I do love glamour,” she said of her style. “It’s very polished and put together. A bit Jackie.” Crystal Methyd, from Springfield, Missouri, wore an orange wig, multicolored silk pants, and a cropped vest adorned with pompoms and plastic toys. “I love colors and comfortable clothes,” she said. “And My Little Ponies.” (She had the toys glued to her high-heeled boots.) Widow Von’Du, from Kansas City, Missouri, wore a black bodysuit and an enormous Afro, which she said was inspired by Black History Month. She said, “My style is very Black Power, ratchet queen,” as several students in the audience whooped. Jackie Cox, from Canada, wore an electric-blue sequinned dress suit, hoop earrings, and an ultra-high ponytail. She said, “My drag style is your cool aunt.”
There was a Q. & A. session, during which they talked about getting into costume. “Is there a point in your transformation when you become drag?” Jeffreys asked.
“The lash!” Brita Filter said. “I could have boy hair, and still be, like, ‘I’m a cute lesbian right now.’ ”
Jackie Cox said, “Brita, you are a cute lesbian.”
Heidi N Closet talked about growing up poor and being raised by her grandmother, along with her four siblings. “I want to convey the message that it doesn’t matter where you come from, that you can do whatever you want as long as you put the time into it,” she said. Widow Von’Du talked about the moment, fourteen years ago, when she stumbled onto her first gay-pride parade. “I was doing a martial-arts exposition downtown, and we were leaving and I was, like, Why are there all these naked dudes dancing on boxes? It started to rain. And this one drag queen was standing on top of this float, and these dudes were pushing her, and she was just living her dream. Soaking wet. And I was, like, whatever this is, I want to be part of it.”
When the class was over, the students were giddy. Katherine Gallo, a drama major, talked about what the show had meant to her growing up as “a queer kid on Long Island.” Her town is “a fun half and half,” she said. “It’s very accepting of being gay, but not of being super overt. I didn’t know there could be fluidity with gender until I watched ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race.’ That was so exciting to me.” Michael Roberts, who is from San Antonio, said that watching “Drag Race” was the first time he saw “the narrative for queerness coming from actual queer people.”
Ford, who grew up in Durham, North Carolina, said he’d started watching the show during Season 7. He was one of the only openly gay people in his high school. “I was alone. All my friends were girls. I felt like I was reborn when I found out that there were thousands of people like me. And here they were expressing themselves to the max, unapologetically and without any worry about convention.” Growing up in the Trump era is “forcing kids to mature much faster,” he said. “ ‘Drag Race’ exposes me to issues in the queer community that I need to be aware of. When I vote in my first Presidential election, I feel like I’ll be voting for the queens who are on the show, and that I’ll be giving them an added voice. It’s very special. It is a responsibility.”
