Alisa 
You can eliminate it from RuPaul’s Drag Race or destroy it twice with Trixie Mattel – but it will not stop the success of a heroine. Trixie Mattel is part of a sport as a lively YouTube series unfolds at Viceland, proving that dragging is more than just a niche’s curiosity. This is everyone’s entertainment.
Trixie Mattel’s hair is a satin-lined platinum candy mountain. Her sharp cheek contours split her face in half, gradually becoming the edge of the lips, into the dim twin peaks. The original eyebrows arched upwards, almost reaching her hairline, threatening to hit the clouds. Her breasts are like two mountains. Trixie’s clothes are pink, sometimes pink, but never black or even navy. Her eyes were not blue, because she said blue eyes would not “follow all sorts of looks.” (Take the Aryan Nation as an example) Her body is an extremely curved hourglass that measures the elapsed polishing time. Her nails are mountains, I’m kidding! They are delicate claws. Trixie’s style is Barbie, but with a very unrealistic beauty standards. Her fabric foam. There’s a Coors Light logo on her gray baseball cap – and so on, it’s a gentleman’s baseball cap. Now Trixie Mattel is a gentleman.
Brian Firkus-Trixie Mattel met me during his working hours in a French restaurant in the border of Brooklyn too French to clarify the life back in 2017 as a daily celebrity queen. Despite the stifling political climate, the resistance we had to live in a jazz era and the sudden success of Firkus were the product of prosperity: for two years he had co-chaired from the gay bar in the Midwest, dragging a nationwide Sex TV shows, it’s tonight at Viceland’s third episode. To make the leap forward, it’s like you’ve done whatever you’ve done, and two years later it co-hosts a national television show that broadcast its third episode later tonight.
As an entertainer at the Trixie & Katya Show, Trixie Mattel is a dazzling neon sign that sells ads on hot dogs in hell, but Firkus is a quiet, quick thinker. The first thing he did was sit down and politely put forward a series of technical questions about the digital recorder microphone properties that I brought – I could not answer the question, but it turned out he was. He provided an overview of the various shapes of the standard microphone pickup pattern in a sound that would not wake the newborn. When I asked him how he knew the mechanics of personal audio devices very much, he seemed shy or simply fooled by what he considered the obvious answer. He winked wide open. “Just from sound and life,” he said after a while. Then he added: “When I started traveling, I learned a lot about the microphones because I had to learn how to microphones.”
Firkus and his collaborator Brian McCook met Ruqia’s seventh race of RuPaul’s Drag Race in their other capacities (he was Trixie Mattel; McCook as Katya Zamolodchikova). Both are fans’ favorite – Katie, her sense of humor and the cut glass skeleton; Trixie has her crazy cartoon look and dry, wet wit. (“Trixie looks like-” McCook starts to tell me over the phone with excitement and then stops. “- I do not even know; I’ve lost contact with the reality, so I do not even know she’s in a world of dragging She’s crazy for the looks of ordinary people! “) Katya lost the competition. Trixie was even more unsuccessful as she was frantically delighted by the incomprehensible boundaries of RuPaul’s Drag Race and was eliminated twice. But do not cry for the movie’s public defeat: In the defeat, Trixie and Katya designed a golden future for themselves and created a series of entertainment for the American public. Step One: Shoot them talking to each other and put the video on YouTube. The Next Step: No need, because the results they achieved in the first step are so stunning, dazzling, slurred speechless and unimproved. Who will predict Wayne’s spiritual successor to the world to be chaired by two stunning Bryants in the negative space?
“I’m not dressed as a woman, I’m dressed as a comic woman comic.
“This is the way we both do some patching work,” says Firkus, which is almost the most interesting thing I’ve ever seen in my life, that is UNHhhh, he and YouTube on the series he and McCook start Trixie and Katya follow They eliminate the drag race. Since spring 2016, the two have broadcast 66 UNHhhh digital episodes. The business was so successful that Viceland stepped in to turn the series into a real TV show.
UNHhhh can be consumed like a packet of crisps: each installment focuses on a single topic (“weeping,” “traveling,” “space”) and most of the time is less than 10 minutes. The plot has never dragged on, because there is no plot. The settings are always the same: Trixie and Katya are sitting in front of the green screen facing the camera, arguing, telling stories, alley distortions, and sometimes beginning to form a description of the illusionary sequence behind and around them until Trixie and Katya are dreaming The participants are completely included among them. Its pace is not only light but sudden. Disastrous. Katya and Trixie evoked the espresso spirit of two crazy news anchors, spending all their talk time on a personal chat and never reading traffic reports. Talk shows are less than thought shows and ideas are quickly loosened.
Firkus said: “We are all very scared (on Drag Race).” On YouTube, we took the courage to joking some of the jokes that were really weird and weird.
“I’m sorry,” McCook said on our phone. “I have to go see a magician for lunch.”
Contribution to fanatical weirdness: None is pre-written.
Firkus added: “You feel really funny when you’re dragging.” You should not think you have a ball, but you feel like you have a ball, you feel like a ball-bearing woman, and improvisation is thrown Out of the advice and [behave like] the present truth and run it. ] Suspicious suspense, a human-filled room, knowing it’s not a woman, but all of us, including performers, at the same time pretending to be the fact now.
Despite the change of name, the Trixie & Katya Show has the intent and purpose of UNHhhh. For Viceland, the show has been extended for some time (22 minutes on TV), but the footage is still short-lived and is always hurried by urgent, soul-stirring music. Unhhhh’s behind-the-scenes staff kept Trixie & Katya intact as an important move by an invisible editorial team (simply called “Chris and Ron” on the show) as a sharp third character, adding Trixie and Katya Joking with the text on the screen highlights the awkward moment of sound effects.
Although many of the Queen Lara were praised for their illusion of turning them into beautiful women, they were a combination of Trixie and Katya’s bold visual aesthetics (Kaja’s jump between filmmakers and psychopaths in the ’90s) Coupled with their common ingenuity, they have fun on their feet and make them real stars. But on the one hand, a dedicated TV show is a work of artist’s dream, and McCook identifies a factor that makes the drag queen tricky spotlight: the entire self-procrastination is based on knowing that performers are not charming women they pretend to be. The “fraud” inherent in this process.
He said: “Dragging is dramatic imitation and irony.” The queen is not trying to be a star, we make fun of the stars, the queens are those who “point” to the stars, like the ABBA we’re looking at, Shy jumpsuit can go ABBA dance and “point”, but I can not be confused with ABBA, just like a Zen act.
As Trixie and Katya’s videos reflect (many have watched more than a million times), an unprecedented number of people – especially young people – are looking for, and more importantly, finding queens. Although a Queen’s YouTube video feels better than most to know how the Internet has helped to get the general public to get late-night homosexuality in history, Firkus concedes that even if he is surprised at the level of flourish in an elected country, President Donald Trump .
“Sometimes I let our background of political realities shape my perception of the possibilities.” Especially this year, I do not think there could be two queens performing this shit show could be one thing. ”
Unless you’re a professional queen or CIA staff member, you probably do not need to worry about something for your job: Carry a separate full-size suitcase for your wig travel; use Elmer’s vanishing purple Glue sticks to your eyebrows every day (because if you try to hide the hair on a foundation, they will look through like a zombie soldier). It’s important to hide your eyebrows so that you can draw better, more dramatic eyebrows. Makeup is almost as fast as eating. Like a Victorian lady into a corset, and then dance; place the triangular pad to rebuild your body shape without resorting to major surgery; wear eight pairs of tights while the huge discomfort (with a smooth filler The edges make it look less like stuffings); find someone to customize your cowboy boots as they do not wear the # 14 men’s pink cowboy boots; figure out how to balance your artificially enhanced frame with high heels.
“I fell off a stage and my shoes fell off,” Fix said, appreciating a pair of huge sour-heeled shoes. He and I are browsing a Williamsburg slippers store where everything looks cheap but unreasonably expensive – a pair of frail shorts for $ 150. “Dragging is dangerous and you are basically stepping on stilts, but the good news is that if you drag right, you’re so filled, you’re a dummy dummies.
Trixie usually performs three or four shows per week, either for a single stand-up or for a club appearance. This gives me a chance to ask Firkus a question that every man, woman, and child in America wants to know at some point in their lives: What does “club look” mean?
He said: “Last week I flew to Phoenix.” Once there, I went to the hotel, went in, went to the club, met everyone, changed my phone number, gave my music to the DJ, took the stage , Make my first number “- the number here means more than” I’m a horrible homophone, so I will make a two-and-a-half minute number and then I will say for 15 minutes, do stand up and then I will change, then I will be the second number, and then I will make a meetup, usually between 75 and 125, and then go back to the hotel to sleep. I will do it twice a week. ”
How about the rest of the work schedule?
“I’m going to hang almost everyday, whether I’m on stage, YouTube or TV, or the news media. I do not usually take a rest for three weeks. One day I take a day off. I use it to clean my trailer room. Usually I just Go home and open the trunk, fell to the ground, because it is difficult to keep up with it and leave.
Another thing about Brian’s work: It’s very time consuming. The process of becoming a Trixie Mattel takes about three hours, which means he takes three hours a day to get ready before he can get his job done. Mostly for make-up, Trixie wore much more than average or even above-average women, making makeup more than Kelly Jenner. The result is not only expensive (though, thankfully, tax-free) but physically painful.
“My eyes always feel uncomfortable wearing so many makeup and adhesives. I use black eyeliner at least once a month. I wear 14 to 16 eye lashes at once and seven pairs of lashes at my fingertips. All stick to your eyes, my fingertips will be [false] nail tingling.
Because Firkus is allergic to metal, he must wrap his clip earrings with medical tape. To get Trixie’s iconic volcanic eruption, he must nail a 10-pound wig over his head. Then there is a sagging breastplate.
In Trixie’s GQ photo shoot, I was allowed to try out her peach, double-D, slightly cool and thick breasts. They hang loosely from the thin, crisp, tan silicone bib that secures the back of the neck and are designed to sit on the skin. They are oval, oval, hovering between “natural” and “perfectly unnatural,” with two perfectly round, dark pink nipples standing with permanent help – I’m trapped in the flesh No bra erectability. Bibs weigh about eight pounds. I am a man with a pair of breasts hovering around the “natural” and “too perfect, natural” spot and find Trixie very nervous about my neck.
“This is a lot,” admits Firkus. “But it turned out to be an unpleasant white noise, I did not really feel my eyelashes, because all things hurts and hurts all of a sudden and, strangely enough, the pain makes you feel good Because you know how powerful the image is, your waist is 6’4 “and his palms are facing each other until they hover over an inch. “You know, you took the air out of your room as you walked into the room. In a good way. People like it. Your waist is beautiful. I like it and I feel pretty. If I sit down and feel I was not dressed as a woman, I dressed as a woman comic cartoons. In addition to resistance, I am completely witness protection program, just as I saw the murder, no one knows who I am, because I see It looks so different, and I look like Forrest, the shape of the body is different, the face is different, the height of the hair.
The height is probably something you might not guess because dragging is the master. When you see Trixie on television, your mind will reduce her to the size of an average woman.
“In real life, I’m going to pull out a cheap wholesale corsets, just six feet tall.” Among her men’s No. 14 pumps, Trixie can outperform most supermodels.
All of these efforts have brought a dilemma: we were taught from an early age, and it was impolite to look at people. So should we feel guilty about studying the queen’s appearance closely?
Firkus shook his head. “When I was in trouble, I did not always want to talk to others, but I enjoyed being watched and nobody put so much work where they seemed overlooked.
The 2017 American culture shines with the influence of homosexuality. Last spring, television viewers felt the drag on when RuPaul’s Drag Race converted LGBTQ niche Logo TV to mainstream VH1. However, more often, this bleeding is less obvious. Through the infiltration of social media, the terminology invented by colored people decades ago has now become so deeply rooted in the vocabulary that even Viacom, a multinational media group, feels it can be dumped in corporate Twitter, honey, and IELTS they. Women are turning to the Queen for tips on how to look like women: outline, a complex shading technique that creates an illusion of reshaping the face, dragging down the likes of makeup trends, and is enjoying peak popularity so early adopters Kim Kardashian West can sell four small squares of slightly different brown powder for more than $ 50.
However, even on television channels, more and more television channels, some continue to treat them as entertainers of the other audience. So here’s the most important thing about resistance: It’s fun and interesting. It is fun to watch people who like to have fun. It is relaxing. Damn it close to the sanctuary, in a spectacular way of vintage entertainment. Its appeal is wide. (How widespread? American Film Institute announces “Enthusiasm” – a comic movie starring Marilyn Monroe in 1959, opposite the two men dressed in women – this is the most interesting American movie ever) . By avoiding drag, visual effects, and hindering your ability to learn new slang in time – you miss a good time.
Firkus remembers the first queen he had seen since childhood: Rupaul in Brady Bunch Movie.
He said: “I know she is beautiful, I know she is not a woman, I know I may not ask this question.
Although dressed as a nightmarish kid’s toy in New York City and Los Angeles, Philcus grew up on the Silver Cliff in Wisconsin with a population of 483. He is Ojibwe’s mother, but he describes himself as a “weakened Caucasus.”
“My accent is about the same,” he said in a conspicuous Wisconsin accent. “I came from a dead-end dirt road, like a log cabin, and I’ve never seen living in rural areas more than I. When I was about 12, there was no indoor pipe in the house.
Firkus’s first experience was produced at the University Produced by Rocky Horror Picture Show in Milwaukee. The name “Trixie” is a tribute to the person he describes and is a taunt to a stepdaddy who, when Firkus thinks Firkus’s behavior is “feminine”, Firkus casually calls him “Trixie.” After graduating from college, he turned to acting as a source of income, and soon after, he started Trixie Mattel’s character. (“The reason people want to be a server is the same: you can choose your shift, you can make money, it’s Milwaukee – my rent is $ 400, and I’ll rent my rent in a week.”) Barbie themed Firkus said the character, part of the business decision, is intended to pre-scare the audience’s nostalgia.
He explained: “Everyone has a relationship with the proportions of palettes and Barbie, and a large part of what they like is familiar to them.” It gives people a warm fuzzy, even if you do not play Doll, you too. I know this reference. I know what I am looking at. This is a way for my audience to be rooted in me. Just when they saw me, they were like Barbie!
“When I was young, I wanted a Barbie really bad, but my mom compromised, she gave me a Ken, boring.” He laughed and added, “Plus, if you’re scared I’ll be gay , Then let me be a muscular man’s doll, I can take clothes away from the clothes, this is not a real strategy.
Today, Philkos described his family as “not against homosexuality,” but added that he sees them as “more strongly proud” of his brother, “three Iraqi veterans and a lawyer.”
“For me, teasing jokes on TV, they’re like ‘alright.’ I think the money is better than anything.” (After the game, Firkus earns thousands per appearance Dollars, “plus the merchandise,” he added, in a methodical and candid manner with accountants.)
Dragging is understandable, because dragging is adorable. But I asked Firkus if it made the drag so cute?
“Stupid,” he said affectionately. “Dragging is very stupid, do not do it unless you’re going to do it to the highest level, you give up all the privileges when you drag it down, basically wearing a chicken suit, no matter what you do, The audience is like that, well, he did it for us and this one is for us. ”
He also pointed out that luxury clothing is a precedent for historical comedy.
“Joan Rivers and everyone, when they like people, they wear gowns and suits, and I think when you get onto the stage it’s a way of telling the audience that you respect them, and you automatically let the audience take root. For you, because from the second step onwards, the viewer wonders what you’re going to do next, and they want you to succeed, and dragging is a buffer, a way to win the audience in the first two seconds. Very comfortable, they have a lot of wheels so they can only laugh.
He added: “People do not know they always see the drag.” Melissa McCarthy plays Shaun Speyside, Dana Cove plays the church girl is dragging, Taylor Perry plays the horse Dinah is dragging, Dolly Parton is dragging her tits, corset, wig and make-up … “He’s gone.” For homosexuals, this is still just a gay idea It’s like saying that I should not listen to hip-hop because it’s black, it’s the same, you’re just beginning to listen to half-a-do When Eminem starts to do that, what’s hip hop music? You just mark a piece of art based on the source of the music, a form of art born in the gay world, but you do not need to like it, it does not make you homosexual. ”
“Trixie & Katya Show” is probably the first (weird) experience that our viewers will see, “Firkus simply added,” maybe even the last one.
But the truth is, Firkus is confident. When your daily routine involves walking into a room and pumping out all the air (“in a good way”), that confidence becomes your self-confidence; be sure to stand on the stage, using an industrial strength The Velcro strapped your eight-pound breast around your neck to sing your voice (Trixie is also a country singer, by the way). This kind of confidence comes from tens of millions of opinions on YouTube. The only thing he does not want is to keep people from dragging on because they think their appeal will be lost.
“I think,” he said. “People will be surprised how much they love it.”
