Kylie Minogue and Taika Waititi are amongst the first guest judges set to appear in the forthcoming season of RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under, consider us gagged etcetera etcetera.
The season, which was filmed in New Zealand earlier this year, is set to premiere on Stan on Saturday, May 1st. As EW report, icons Kylie and her sister Dannii Minogue will tackle the role of guest judges, alongside the devilishly charming Hunt For The Wilderpeople director Taika Waititi.
“I’m so excited to finally be a part of RuPaul’s Drag Race for the first series [of] Down Under,” Kylie said in a statement. “It’s such an iconic show and I can’t wait to watch the contestants perform their hearts out to win the title of Down Under’s first Drag Superstar!”
Dannii ads, “I got to have a cheeky ‘Untucked’ chat with the girls…They had come straight from the runway challenge so it was exciting and tense all at the same time, not knowing who was going to have to lip-sync for their life.”
If What We Do In The Shadows proved anything, it’s that Taika Waititi is more than capable of camping things up. This world is wretched and cruel but the knowledge that we’ll get to witness Waititi bumble his way through the Drag Race lexicon has incited the giddiest feelings.
The contestants for the inaugural antipodean season of RuPaul were unveiled at Mardi Gras. It didn’t take long for controversy to rear its devious head. Two contestants on the series have already been called out for past instances of racism and cultural appropriation.
Anthony Price, who performs as Scarlett Adams, released a lengthy apology reckoning with old photos of him donning black face and harmful Asian stereotypes.
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“There is no way to sugar-coat it, when I was a teenager roughly eight years ago I performed in black face/cultural appropriation,” Adams said in a statement. “I was young and ignorant. I am no longer this person.”
Whilst Richard Chadwick, aka Karen From Finance, copped heat after an image of a large golliwog doll tattoo on their leg did the social media rounds.
Karen took to Instagram to apologise for the tattoo, admitting that they have had it covered, “I’ve committed to an ongoing journey of accountability, activism and education, and to uncover and unlearn any and all racial bias – conscious or unconscious – that may or may not be embedded within me.”
