Trixie's Behind-The-Scenes Facts About RuPaul's Drag Race!

hi it's Trixie and today I thought we would talk really quickly about some things about the popular television show RuPaul's Drag Race that you might not know so if you want to hear some neverbe heard tea AKA stuff other people might know but it might be new to you stick [Music] around so if you don't know me I competed on several seasons of RuPaul's Drag Race I did a Christmas special I've guessed it on many seasons I love being a drag race Queen I loved doing drag race and it's one of the proudest things I've ever done but I had never done television picture it 24 years old never been on television never even seen a video camera really and it all hit me so fast and I had to learn on my feet what exactly a TV set is what is TV I mean the only thing I knew about making drag race was what I knew about watching drag race which is so much not like making drag race and I was watching the new season of RuPaul's Drag Race season 16 because I'm hosting the pit stop and it was bringing back so many memories of like oh I forgot about about that oh I like it really watching drag race makes me remember doing drag race and I've been kind of thinking of like I wonder if people know XYZ like there's so many weird things about filming a competition reality show and competing in drag that you would never know and because we're in drag there's an extra layer of things that like make it so complicated so I made a nice little list here of things that I am going to tell you about some of this is drag race specific some of it's drag specific some of it is just reality show in general that you know I'd never done TV at the time I didn't know any of this stuff was you know how the sauce is made I didn't know first up did you know on television when you have to pee this is like more General you say I have to 101 I'm taking her to 101 she's going 101 oh he's 10 oneing 101 means go pee it's a more elegant way of saying go pee and on a TV set when I was 24 years old my instinct was to go will someone take me to pee and they'd be like you mean 101 I'd be like right 101 I have no idea where that came from if you guys want to look it up or some of you in the audience like like watching this know what that means 101 it means go pee another thing you might not know drag race is filmed in 2 days per episode it takes two whole days to make an episode of drag race so like if it's the first start of the Season Monday Tuesday an episode then next episode's like Wednesday Thursday then the next episode will be Friday Monday so it takes two whole days to film an episode of drag race and sometimes that's a blessing and sometimes it's not like let's say it's a Friday and you bomb The Challenge and runways not till Monday that means you have Saturday and Sunday to sit in a hotel room and think about whether not you're being eliminated sometimes the 2-day thing is really like oh can we just get it over with but anyway it all takes 2 days to make an episode often the first day is like walking into the work room doing a mini challenge finding out what the challenge is picking groups rehearsals whatever and then second day is where you see like the runway or the group presentation or the the roast or whatever like you know that's usually how it's broken up I just thought it was interesting okay this one ising crazy so you know when RuPaul's like it's time to lipsing for your life good luck don't pick it up they do something called a level check because the whole Sound Stage has speakers and they have to test the audio so they'll go all right we're going to test the sound and all the lip syncs are rigged up with click so it goes like click click click click song and after they do a sound level check and everybody goes like this then RuPaul off camera but on camera looks at you both and goes all right this time it's for real and it's so chilling because like you know they they're being respectful making sure that the audio is right so you can do your thing but that moment where you hear the track so you know what it's going to sound like is so scary it's almost worse than if they just hit play hearing it fake played and then played again o i was talk going toi about it and she was like it gives me the chills to think about and I was like I know another crazy thing did you guys know that often there are you know there's so many girls cast on the show per season and there's alternates and I won't call out who there are very iconic drag queens who are amazing performers who have snatched trophies who maybe were alternates and we don't know that or some of us do know that and we've heard it through the grap Vine or whatever I don't think there's anything wrong with being an alternate but I think it's crazy that like somebody might not be available or might drop out last minute or whatever and there's always a few alternates and you never know who knows what if that Queen you love was an alternate the season before what if she had been you know like it's really crazy to think of some people were on almost like some people might be on a wait list or something it's really interesting to think about all right this is fierce so when you're not doing drag race you live in hotel rooms right they have you stolen from society and the way on both my Seasons you would communicate with the production is you would be in your hotel room you're not allowed to open the door you would have little piece of paper you would slip onto the door that you put like can I have some Advil my TV is not working we're really rehearsing and' be like can you get me bath salts for for you know muscle pains or whatever really interesting to communicate cuz then when I watch like women's like prison documentaries that's how they communicate is those papers like being thrown around I think they call them kites yeah so like on drag race you're competing and you're like can I have a smoke break you wrate it on a note slide it under a door and some PA reads it and it's like all right this hor needs a smoke break love that this is another good one a little behind the scenes tea often on a set like that let's say there's a guest judge that they don't want us to know about they don't want let's say a group of dry Queens coming back from the bathroom to accidentally bump into Meredith Bax or Bernie or whatever celebity is coming so the PA wall walking drag queens before they turn a corner enter a building they'll yell Queen's walking Queens walking and that means like if you're I don't know a guest judge or someone you're not supposed to see or there's a prop we're not supposed to see you should be hid in I always think that was really interesting and in my mind when you yell Queen Queen's walking there's like some secret people scattering like roaches but I'm sure no one something else you might know about drag race if you watch in the work room many of the drag queens are always in like coats or blankets it's cold in there you guys they keep drag race I'm not kidding maybe 65° that whole set is ice cold which is incredible because as drag queens we are hot at all times if you listen to the bald and beautiful you know that kot and I pretty much talk about air conditioning only at this point I fantasize about the air conditioning on drag race it's amazing I'm so cold I feel so happy and dry and respected the fact that that production makes sure before you hit the runway it is an ice box in there that's love speaking of ice another behindth scenes reality term it's called hard ice hard ice is no talking so if they're transporting us from the hotel let's say to the work room they don't want us to turn to each other in the van and go how did you do in the challenge they want us to have those conversations on camera so Queens would be on hard ice they'd walk in and be like all right it's a working lunch but you all are on hard ice which means like you guys can use your sewing machine or whatever through lunch but you can't talk about story don't talk about competitions don't talk about each other do not talk and they would literally have Pas in there making sure we don't talk to each other which makes sense like drag queens can't be trusted they'll run their mouths they'll tell stories behind the scenes so you spend a lot of time on drag race not speaking like unless the cameras are rolling you're kind of just silently sewing or silently oring lines or like and it's very normal it's not drag R specific on all competition shows or reality shows there's times where they ask you to like some as are setting resetting cameras sometimes they're just buffering basically it's a very normal reality thing it's like just ice you know sometimes it's time for the talent to talk and as it's time for you to shut up this is crazy so drag race can film for a month 6 weeks 8 weeks like it can go a long time you don't have computers or phones you get there and I think both times they metal detected my body to make sure I had no way to contact my friends cuz you can't trust gay people you don't think drag queens if they had phones would be calling home and be like girl I won the challenge you can't trust homosexuals so you really are cut off when you get out of drag race and they give you your phone back it's so weird after like 2 months without a phone you turn it on or 4,000 text messages like show up and you're like I honestly both times I did drag race it made me miss not having a phone just people vibing granted by vibing we're all in wigs crying but like it's so nice to like be off social media really it was it's anyway no phones and no computers on drag race you're kind of like a little crackhead like you see a PA use their phone to like you know check the time and you're like you're like trying to see if there's a news alert or something cuz we're so cut off from the news even like we have no idea what's going on ooh food at drag race this is really interesting we get breakfast in the morning we get lunch we get dinner and if you have dietary restrictions like I've always been a vegetarian they were always so accommodating I mean I always felt like my food and drink was top priority and it helped me really just focus on the competition so shout out to everybody who feeds the drag queens cuz the food on drag race it really felt like if you were like I don't eat gluten and I don't eat meat and I don't like I don't drink water like they will find you what sustains you and that that always felt very supportive another one this is crazy obviously the workroom it's a stage right it's a set it moves if you been to dragcon you've seen it at dragcon the work room stage if you don't know it and obviously everybody should know this but I'm dumb I didn't realize it's fake brick it's just fabric walls and in some areas of the work room if the air conditioning is on you can see the fabric like the bricks are just billowing and you're like okay fake walls fake walls in theater they call them Flats theatrical Flats but anyway I just always blows my mind that the work room it's four flat walls inside a giant Sound Stage it's like the Sims if you built like a pool that no one can get out of and die it's like a little by the way the wall walls are hot pink at the dentist they paint the walls pastel so that you calm down what do you think they want to happen to you when they paint the walls neon snake skin stress right okay this is really a general thing but in TV in general but also on dver R it's a lot of waiting it's a lot of downtime for example when a queen gets eliminated and you all do like the let the music play and you walk off the run the the runway you walk off the stage you're on hard ice you can't talk about who went home or what just happened and you have to wait a good usually 15 20 30 minutes for that Queen to do her in the work room like goodbye with the trophy and then pack up her stuff so like 30 minutes after elimination you're all just like sitting there quietly waiting drag race is a lot of waiting cuz TV is a lot of waiting this is cool so we all have these lip syncs right that we have to learn I know what you're thinking how do they know the words how do they know what's going to happen basically at the top of the Season you get a binder of like lyric sheets and you get an iPod old school iPod that can't connect to the internet with just those songs on it so you have an iPod where you just have the lip sync songs a dozen two dozen and in your downtime when you're sewing or whatever you'll notice girls have headphones in they're listening to lipsticks they're listening to the ones they have to learn they have the lyric sheets anytime you're eating or sitting in a car or whatever I would spend all the time with those headphones in with the lyric sheets and I mean I was never a great lip syncer so who cares if I knew the words but that's how you learn the lip syns and usually the day before they'll be like all right next week tomorrow next week's lip sync is Anaconda by Nicki Minaj you know they'll they'll give you the all the songs and then as The Show Goes On the competition goes on they'll let you know what's next I got to tell you this this is like maybe not a good fact but no run through like the first time you walk the runway on drag race it's the first time you've seen the runway so imagine your first time walking the runway and they go all right it's you go Trixie and you hear Rupal go next up tury Matel whatever you turn the corner and the lights are on and there's Rupal and the judges and the runway and you've never seen it before and it's so scary that you don't there's not even like a test run it's it's scary to be on the runway for the first time on live like on television it's really spooky in the same vein before you walk into the work room for the first time you know the first day on drag where everyone walks in like I'm so and so whatever while one Queen is in the room introducing herself talking they have the next one outside the work room like outside the fake work room the fake room you have your microphone on they have you in front of a mirror and you're with that person who's like you're going to be like have fun you're going to be great it's going to be incredible have fun it's amazing very positive environment and you can hear the girls in the room sometimes like chattering you can't quite make out the words cuz they're you know talking at a normal LEL and they're kind of far away but it's really scary to stand outside the work room and be like oh my God we're about to walk in you know what I mean it's you can hear them talking in there and you're like I'm about to go meet all these women it's spooky TV makes it look like you appear out of nowhere but like you can see the outside of the work room and you're like that's the work room you know it's it's crazy another crazy thing is maybe this is obvious one Sound Stage will be the work room and like you know storage and stuff and the other Sound Stage will be the runway and so usually if you're in the work room we'll all walk as a team to the next Sound Stage to do runway so there's that brief moment where we're all on our Runway looks but we're like walking across a parking lot in the middle of the day and it's always very weird it's like a bunch of drag queens in like high drag rice drag with like the California Sun outside and we're just like really weird and we're on ice we're not allowed to talk so we're just like quietly walking the other crazy thing is this is like a TV thing sight lines so like any competition reality show a lot of times when the judge or the host is like welcome to this baking competition welcome to this it looks like they're looking right at the competitors but for camera reasons a lot of time host or the person if you guys are the competitors the host or the Whoever has to look this way for lighting or for cameras and so in the moment it feels very weird cuz you're like why aren't they looking at me it's for camera reasons and now that I've done things like that I understand that but I remember at the time being like where's everyone looking why is everyone looking at me like I I didn't really get it but now I get it another fun fact sometimes you get extra time meaning like RI rachu or Kitty girl or like those big production numbers sometimes you'll get an extra day of rehearsal sometimes and that's always crazy cuz it's a two-day shoot that becomes a three-day shoot and one of the days is like off camera sometimes there's so much to put in your little brain like I remember the Christmas holl slice bacular we had an extra day just for choreography off camera which was like we're standing on the the RuPaul dr's main stage with no stage lighting it's like oh this is really just a room you know also shout out to Santa's Little Helpers which is what I call all the production assistants on drag race they're the ones who take us to the bathroom feed us help us zip a dress sometimes help us like you know hand us a tissue when we're crying the production assistance on set especially in a competition show really make the world go around so shout out to all the Pas out there Life Changers this one I'm going to be vague about but we're in drag for long days and drag is very taxing on the body and sometimes people don't get to pee and sometimes pee happens that's all I'm going to say I've never peed myself on drag race but I know it's happened whether or not people have said it happened I think people have peed their pants and it hasn't showed on camera and so no one knew and the drag queen's like whoop so anyway that's interesting try to go to the bathroom Okay crazy when you go to drag race you sign an NDA so you can't tell anybody where you're going you can't tell anybody where you're you're going not anyone I told no one except like need to know basis I remember not even telling kimchi I remember telling kimchi like Kim I'm going to be gone for the next month or so my grandma died which you know in drag in drag World we're like girl and I remember Kim goes I've seen your drag your Grandma's not going to be dead very long thanks Kim it's one of my best friends oh this is interesting so you know on a season where if a queen gets eliminated but maybe there's a challenge at the end where everyone comes back sometimes if you get eliminated they'll keep you so like if you're eliminated in episode 4 but season in episode 8 there's a reunion where everyone comes back they'll keep everyone there so if you get eliminated early sometimes you just have to camp out in a hotel for like two weeks it's kind of nice cuz once you've cried and you're sad you're like oh well I guess I'll just wait around you know I remember on season 7 I got to go home for a week which I was very grateful for because I do know on other Seasons sometimes flying people home for 5 days just isn't practical so I remember being very grateful to go home and sleep my own bed for like a week speaking of time another crazy thing is a whole calendar year can go by you can film drag race let's say in a sum maybe it doesn't come out till next summer it's a whole year of not being able to tell anybody you did drag race not being able to tell anybody how you did where you were and by the time the program comes out you almost forget some of it you're like who goes home what happened so much time goes by that like you you almost when you watch it on TV it feels surreal like did that really happen it feels like so long ago oh another crazy thing in addition to shouting out the Pas on drag race the sound people you guys drag greens are wearing sequin feathers latex metal and they have wigs on and like people have to figure out how to put body microphones on us in a way that's discreet and we do not have normal outfits on I remember when I did the red latex Runway I had to wear the mic pack and the mic in my wig they had to cut a hole in my wig and feed the mic in the wig and I remember being blown away by just like the imagination of like how would you figure this out casting casting you guys goes for so long I remember getting phone calls off and on from casting for like a couple weeks and then when I was cast I literally had two weeks two weeks to pull my drag together for drag race two weeks two weeks I think on allst Stars I had maybe three weeks but on season s you guys I had two weeks crazy and finally my last little tidbit is the interviews you see we're always in the same outfit and we film them sometimes in the morning sometimes on weekends on my season of season 7 we would film them in the evenings like late at night and I remember on All Stars we'd film them first thing in the morning I'd be in the interview chair out of drag at like 8:00 a.m. talking and then we go film drag race like a day of drag race at like 11: I know that was a lot very quickly I have a gig to get to but I don't know I thought some of this behind the scenes stuff was cool drag race is an amazing experience and a show that has always treated me so well there's just TV magic stuff that I don't want to give away any fantasy and run it for anyone but stuff you don't think about like when do drag queens pee how do they get microphones on them so many weird little problem solving tricks little things like that are what make Drag Race So seamless and magical so thank you guys for joining me for another video I will see you very soon goodbye

Channel: Trixie Mattel

Views: 788,742

Keywords: Trixie Mattel, Trixie Mattel Youtube, Trixie and Katya, Trixie, Trixie Mattel makeup, Trixie mattel music, Trixie Cosmetics, Bald and the Beautiful, drag, queen, drag queen

Id: eurpLojLz7w

Length: 16min 56sec (1016 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 08 2024