The First Lady Of Clownery
Jinkx Monsoon Takes Silliness Very Seriously
The RuPaul’s Drag Race star, now on Broadway in Cole Escola’s Oh, Mary!, thinks every acting role is a drag role.
Long before Jinkx Monsoon was lighting up Broadway, she was a college student in the Pacific Northwest learning about commedia dell’arte — the classical art of being a clown. It’s easy to see that training paying off in everything she does: her top-notch drag artistry, which made her a two-time winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race; this summer’s swashbuckling Pirates! The Penzance Musical, which took her to the Tony Awards stage; and now playing an unhinged Mary Todd Lincoln in Oh, Mary!, the laugh-so-hard-it-hurts play from Cole Escola.
“I feel like every character I play is a drag role,” says Monsoon, 37. “It doesn’t matter the gender of the character or the costume I’m wearing. You’re stepping into a persona through presentation and performance — that’s drag.”
Monsoon’s recent stage projects combine some of her longtime interests, including period costumes and larger-than-life divas. But they’re also marked by a commitment to taking silliness very seriously. “The best comedy comes from authenticity and honesty, and the best clowns are clowns who are fully realized characters,” she says. “In Oh, Mary!, each character has something you can relate to. It might be funny and madcap and ridiculous, but the characters are written truthfully and beautifully — even when they’re telling the filthiest f*cking material.”
Monsoon wraps up her term as Oh, Mary’s first lady on Sept. 28. (30 Rock icon Jane Krakowski takes office in mid-October.) But Monsoon won’t be offstage for long: She’ll reunite with her creative partner and fellow Drag Race alum BenDeLaCreme for their seventh holiday show, hitting venues across the country in November and December. “Doing a show is the bright spot in my day, every day,” Monsoon says. “If I’m not home with my cats, then I want to be at the theater.”
On performing at the Tonys:
It was dream fulfillment to make it there and also be seeing friends like Cole Escola and [Death Becomes Her’s] Megan Hilty — she and I shared a dressing room in Provincetown one summer and have been pals ever since. She was a working actress in Seattle, just like I was before Drag Race. To make it to this point of affirmation and not feel like a complete outsider because members of this community had already welcomed me in and were there waiting to hug me — it was very, very special.
On Jane Krakowski taking over Mary:
My reaction was, “Duh! This makes brilliant, beautiful sense.” It breaks my brain a little bit when I think of the fact that I’m in the middle of a Tituss Burgess-Jane Krakowski sandwich. They’re both such gifted, singular performers. She came backstage at Pirates, and whenever I meet someone I admire as much as her, I say, “I have to gush and tell you everything I’ve always wanted to tell you, and then after that I’ll be normal.” She took it like a champ. There are some people you meet for the first time and you feel like you’re meeting an old friend.
On fan fiction as a benchmark of success:
That’s how DeLa and I knew we made it with our holiday show: when people started writing really uncomfortable stories about us.
On living part-time in New York:
New York is the anti-Pacific Northwest. I go by stretches of land with no trees or grass. It does weigh on me a little bit. But New York is all about finding the spot that works for you, and I feel like I’ve found my spot. It’s nuts that it’s Times Square, but I feel pretty powerful here. I’ve become a f*cking warrior, and it gets me into character for Mary. I put on my noise-canceling headphones, put on some angry classical music, go on a 20-minute walk through Times Square, and I’m ready for my show.
On her most memorable stage-door encounter:
I was doing the stage door for Pirates, and this group of teenage boys are all freaking out about something: “Say Bazinga, say Bazinga!” I’m like, “What the hell is going on over there?” And then I get to the end of the line and it’s Iain Armitage, who played Young Sheldon in Young Sheldon, a show I actually love because I really resonate with Annie Potts’ grandma character. I’ve had wigs made from that hairstyle. Anyway, here’s this kid that I saw on TV, and now he’s almost a grown-up just saying hi as a fan. Life is so weird.
Check out the rest of Bustle’s Entertainers Issue here, featuring interviews with Brittany Broski, Chloe Fineman, Domhnall Gleeson, Jenny Han, Janelle James, KATSEYE, Kesha, and Nicole Scherzinger.
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.
