Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/MTV
A certain sect of competitors has long walked the hallowed halls of RuPaul’s Drag Race. And of course by “halls,” I do mean the warehouses of a studio backlot in Burbank, California. But nonetheless, these very special queens move amongst their competition, undetected and lying in wait. They look just like all of the other contestants in the workroom, but underneath their padding is a gift from the gods, an innate talent that sets them apart from everyone else at the end of the day. These are Drag Race sleeper cells, waiting to be activated the moment they hear RuPaul say, “Don’t fuck it up.”
They are the Lip Sync Assassins. We just met another one of them.
You know them, and you love them. The always and forever fabulous dancing diva Alyssa Edwards; the ultra strange and endlessly captivating Coco Montrese; the jump-splitting Laganja Estranja; the classically delicious Peppermint! These are all queens who made such a splash on their individual Drag Race seasons that their lip syncs sit amongst the most rewatched of all time, and who often are asked back to the show for All Stars seasons because of their unforgettable twists, turns, and pussy-slams on the main stage. Legend has it that the sheer force of Laganja Estranja’s ass hitting the ground caused the California quake that inspired San Andreas.