INTERVIEW PARTY GURL SHE DIDN’T WIN THE RACE (OOPS, SPOILER!) BUT SHE SHOWED THE WORLD SHE WAS VERSATILE, KNEW HOW TO SING, LOVED TO PARTY AND HAD A PERSONALITY TO MATCH. ADORE DELANO WILL BE PERFORMING IN AMSTERDAM THIS MONTH, SO WE SPOKE TO THE FORMER DRAG RACE-FINALIST ABOUT HER EXPERIENCES BEFORE, DURING AND AFTER THE SHOW. 16
Interview / Adore Delano What did you think were the major differences between Drag Race and your time on American Idol, other than being in drag? They’re two completely different experiences. I mean, let’s just talk about how FOX runs American Idol. That’s all I’ve really got to say. It’s run by Republicans, and it’s just very conservative. I was really controlled in terms of what to say, what to sing and what to do. When I was on Drag Race, it was all me. I got to show my personality, it was an actual reality show where the audience got to know who I was as a person, as opposed to being this little molded character. How much of a mentor is RuPaul to the contestants after the cameras stop running? Do you call her up to ask for advice? Not really, but I think we all knew that when we signed up for the show. She gave us an awesome opportunity. I ran into her when I was filming something for World of Wonder recently, and she gave me advice and was very sweet and loving. She’s a matriarch; she’s somebody that we all look up to. She’s like a goddess. It’s very rare that she actually has, like, lunches with the queens. I know she’s close with Raven, Raja and Manila. She goes out to lunch with them a lot, but I’ve yet to see that happen with the newer queens. What would you say was the best advice that was given to you by the judges? What Ru would tell me is ‘some people get it, some people don’t – that’s as simple as it gets’. Everything in life is magic. He told me to stop being addicted to the high that I get from the adrenaline rush of freaking out. I was too focused on negativity, being very insecure about everything. Ru told me to knock it off, that everything isn’t that serious. He really explained it in a way that no one’s ever explained it to me before. So he helped my insecurity issues a lot. How did you feel about the whole she-mail controversy that happened when this season was airing? I didn’t understand why it took six years for the community to get offended. I was basically transgendered in high school, I lived my life as a girl and I thought that was the route I was going to take. I would not have gotten offended, I would have kiki’d along with it. You know, it’s all about the context of the show, and they celebrate the trans community. It’s a very fun and tonguein-cheek type of show. I just never looked at it as something negative, I just thought it was a funny play on words. But I can see both sides of it. Sometimes girls who have been on the show complain they were edited to show them being nastier than they really are. Do you feel you were accurately portrayed? Absolutely! I was very happy with the way it turned out. Bianca and I were actually talking about it the other day. We were saying that the reason they didn’t show us talking shit about anybody is because we weren’t! We didn’t give the producers that. We were focused on winning, and that’s just what it was about. How did you feel about the way they taped the finale, with several possible outcomes being taped and you not knowing who the winner was until it actually aired on TV? It was pretty crazy! I’m never wrong about a winner and I knew Bianca was going to win as soon as we started rehearsing for the finale. But they filmed four endings actually, they also filmed a tie between me and Bianca. I was like ‘holy shit, this gonna happen!’ But I was so convinced Bianca was going to win, everybody was. I had already made peace with it. Do you have any idea why they don’t just do a live finale? I don’t know! I think it’s because Ru does so many takes and stuff like that. She improvises a lot. Out of all the songs on your album Till Death Do Us Party, which one would you say is most special to you? ‘I Adore You’ is one of the most personal songs on the album. I wrote most of that song. I co-wrote the whole album, but that’s the one song I did not want them to touch at all, really. I really love how it turned out. I wrote the melody to it as well. It’s special to me. Prior to shooting the video, the song was about commitment issues and how I would hurt guys, not getting that second chance when you’ve already shat on a relationship. But then the video was about cheating, and made me the victim. We’ve got gay prides coming up in Amsterdam and Antwerp. What does pride mean to you? I’m proud of being an avid pizza eater! Pride is so many different things. It’s liberating, it’s peace, it’s coming together, it’s celebrating fucking humanity, man! Not just the LGBT community, it’s everybody coming together and just accepting each other for who they are as human beings. I just love it. 17
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