So with that in mind I'll share that I think it's Fine, and it would be more Fine if the show was more inclusive of people further marginalized within the LGBTQ community, and even more Fine if the show didn't make such a big deal about her casting.īut Maddy's straightness (sorry, sorry) is a constant point of interest this season, as if the producers want us to think of her inclusion as something significant, instead of just something that happened.

It shouldn't particularly matter what I think about her (all the queens use 'her' for their drag personas on the show, so that is the pronoun I'm sticking with here), though from what I can glean about the demographics of this fan base (hello, it's me) I know that's not how it works. While some fans of the show have taken issue with Maddy's casting, many of them have shared their support - what that's supposed to say about the people who watch this show and their expectations for it, I'm not entirely sure. Which, I suppose is generally true, being that drag is a notably Black, queer art form, made more accessible (I'm not sure that's the right phrase there but you know what I mean?) to straight cis people, particularly women (hello, it's me) by the popularity of the show itself. Yes, aside from the season's Willy Wonka-esque spin (one eliminated queen will be saved from sashaying away by a golden ticket hiding in the wrapper of a RuPaul chocolate bar - I wish this was a joke), producers seem to think that Maddy's casting is this season's most surprising twist. Of course, the show has much further to go in its mission to better represent the intersectionality and experiences of people in the LGBTQ community - I'm not even touching on any of the critiques of racial representation and class dynamics on Drag Race.īut it appears that RuPaul and other producers felt comfortable enough in their mission to finally give the people a cast member who they'd been asking for all along: a straight, white, cisgender drag queen from Arkansas named Maddy Morphosis. That's all to say that Drag Race has come a long way from 2018. It cast its first trans male drag queen, Gottmik, last season, and cast trans queens Kerri Colby and Kornbread Jeté for season 14, which is currently airing on VH1. In the years since RuPaul's gross comments about the show's casting of Peppermint - the show's first openly trans drag queen - Drag Race has cast trans drag queens such as Gia Gunn, Jiggly Caliente, and Kylie Sonique Love on its spin-off show RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars. RuPaul's Drag Race (and RuPaul himself) has a checkered history when it comes to casting drag queens from across the gender identity spectrum, particularly trans drag queens.

Drag me to hell 2 online