Brandi and Asia circa Feb. 20, 2011 Burlesque Number
What Asia O’Hara’s Drag Race casting means to me and our Dallas drag community
Brandi Amara Skyy | Contributing Columnist
brandi@dallasvoice.com
It was the rumor that set all of the Dallas drag scene ablaze.
Asia O’Hara went missing for three months from social media, the Rose Room and her Thursday Rising Star Show, and we all knew that could only mean one thing — she was cast on RuPaul’s Drag Race.
We didn’t know for sure, but we all hoped the rumor was true. And when the hearsay became official news, we in Dallas blew up all our social media sharing our excitement and congratulations. I was fucking ecstatic because Asia … well, Asia is family.
I’ve back-up danced for her in numerous pageants and performed alongside her show after show for years at Gaybingo Dallas in the Rose Room. I’ve judged her in pageants, and she judged me in the one that mattered the most — my herstorical win as the first ever Miss Diva USofA (now Miss USofA Diva) in 2014.
I was even her model when she applied at the makeup department of Tom Ford, and she laughed when her interviewer asked me what my favorite makeup was and I answered “Ben Nye.”
But what most people don’t know about Asia is that she has always been about the art of drag and pushing the envelope of what drag is and can be. And she’s always pushed herself to be and do something more.
Something different. Something worthy of the cheers. Something worth remembering.
And as a then up-and-coming drag artist, seeing her work and strive for something more than what had traditionally been done, those are the things that influenced my drag the most. Seeing and experiencing first-hand how she took an idea from inside her head to the stage, or from a tiny corner of her apartment to a full blown atelier — those are the things that have made me a better drag artist (Well that and the time she showed me how to apply a fierce set of bottom lashes).
They say it takes a village to raise a queen, and Asia was a strong root in my village, which is why after many years of not bothering to watch the show
I am tuning back in. She is the only reason I am tuning back in, because as a friend, apprentice, and long-time admirer of her drag, I’m excited to see what Asia brings to the show.
But more importantly, I want to support someone who has always supported me, her LGBTQ family and her drag community. Because along with herself, Asia has always pushed everyone around her to be something more — to be and deliver the unexpected.
To be the kind of drag stars they all dream of being.
And as a long-time community leader, she has challenged all of Dallas to expect more from drag, their drag venues, the people they choose to represent them, and perhaps most importantly, from themselves.
Because “settling,” “comfort” and “can’t” were never words in her vocabulary, and throughout her decades-long career, Asia has proven that if we want to be the best damn drag artists we can be, those words shouldn’t be in our vocabulary either.
That’s why I’m excited for the world to see and experience the side of Asia who is just as fierce as a person, an artist, a leader behind-the-scenes as she is on stage.
Since the official announcement was made, I’ve heard numerous people describe Asia’s appearance on the show as “the birth of a star.” When I hear this, I can’t help but think to myself that these people must not really know her, because if they did they’d know this truth as they do their own bones — Asia has always been a star.
The only thing that’s different is that now the rest of the world will finally get to see what we in Big D have always known — Asia O’Hara is an All-American Goddess and a symbol of excellence whose integrity and love of the art of drag pretty much guarantees that she’s going to slay RuPaul’s stage — and any of the other bitches that get in her way.
Brandi Amara Skyy is a writer, drag artists, and host of The Drag Show Podcast. Listen to Episode 01: You Are Born Naked and the Rest is Drag … RIGHT?!?