When Yvie Oddly took home the crown on season 11 of RuPaul’s Drag Race, the Denver-based drag star crowned herself with the title “Queen of the Queerdos” — thee portmanteaux she offered to her fans, who delight in existing as the odd ones out.
It’s easy to see why Yvie made such a formidable connection with a younger, more rebellious audience — her performances during her original season oozed with an original, obstreperous spirit that quickly came to define her drag persona. On one runway, she could serve up pure glamor, dripping in crystals, confidence and a third eye — while on the next, she could be a giant pink jellyfish.
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So, when Oddly got a chance to return and take home yet another crown for the all-winners season of All Stars 7, the queen naturally decided to bring her off-beat style back in full force, delivering high-octane performances during the season’s maxi challenges, and serving even weirder and more creative looks on the runway. Below, Billboard catches up with Oddly about her performance on the show, how she approaches making her runway looks, and why the internet is so obsessed with her dad.
We’re getting close to the end of the season, how are you feeling with All Stars 7 wrapping up?
It’s bittersweet, you know? It’s like the end of a show at the theater — one part of you is like, “I’m sick of this song, I don’t ever need to see this again,” and then a major part of you is like, “Wait no, I don’t want this to end, these are my real friends now.”
I gotta tell you, it’s been very fun following your Twitter with the show airing, you’ve been beautifully unhinged in your little recaps.
Yeah, I’ve gotten a little spicier over there, haven’t I?
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I also wanted to offer some congrats, before we talk about this season, on your drag daughter Willow Pill winning season 14!
Oh my god, thank you so much, I deserve lots of congratulations for that! [Laughs.]
But it does make the two of you only the second mother-daughter pair to both win their U.S. seasons — what was that like for you to watch?
It’s really, really validating, honestly. It’s so cool to watch somebody who you’ve gone so hard for, who you believe is magical, talented, amazing, beautiful, charisma, uniqueness, whatever the rest of that acronym is … and it’s even more amazing to get to see the world appreciate that. Willow is just a good-ass person, and she deserves some nice things. Not as many nice things as she’s gotten, but she for sure deserves some.
Part of what made this season so fun to watch is watching you and all of the other girls clearly just having fun in a way that the threat of eliminations otherwise might neutralize — did you notice that shift in the vibe on set?
Oh, definitely! It allowed you to take risks within yourself that I think, psychologically, it’s hard for you to take when you’re worried about whether or not you’re going to get chopped the next week, and all of your dreams are gonna get flushed down the toilet. I mean, what a sad thought — our fabulous drag not getting featured every episode?
OK, speaking of fabulous drag, your runways have been so incredibly iconic this season, and this glow-in-the-dark mushroom, mycelia fantasy is maybe my favorite thing I’ve ever seen you in. Did you have a favorite runway to put together this season?
God, that’s so hard for me to choose, they’re all my favorite runways. I like whenever I get a prompt to sit and think — maybe this is an obnoxious thing for me to do, or super edgelord-y — but I sit and think about, “What is everyone else going to do, and what can I do that’s going to stand out in its own way next to that?” It’s either that, or I look at what I really like around me at the time. A lot of my runways this season were really inspired by stuff that I was just very into when I got the call to be on the show.
Got it. So if that’s the case, then this runway is inspired by doing lots of ‘shrooms?
[Laughs.] I mean, I wasn’t not doing them!
Let’s get into the challenge — doing a full-on roast is probably the hardest comedy challenge you can get on Drag Race, and you hadn’t done a roast before this episode. What, to you, makes this such a tough challenge to nail?
I mean, compared to other comedy challenges, there is simply no crutch in this — at least not in the way that it works on Drag Race. In the Snatch Game, you have RuPaul and all of these other characters and your own impersonation to play off of; in the acting challenges, you have your teammates and scene partners and lines. For this, and stand-up in general, it’s just the most raw form of it — it’s you and the audience. Take that and put it on Drag Race, and the audience is literally just the four or five judges and the people you’re competing against. Let me tell you, you immediately notice how big and empty that space is. Comedians and roasters are people who play off of people feeding their egos, just like drag queens — a drag queen isn’t going to turn a lip-sync nearly as hard if nobody is handing her a dollar bill or “yass”-ing at her.
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When you were on set, did you find yourself forming any unexpected bonds with your fellow winners?
To be real, I was bonding with all of them. Especially with us all being winners, these b–ches are out there working the world, they’re writing shows, filming content, and we’re all just generally some of the busiest, booked, basic b–ches. So, every day when I would walk in, I would have to remind myself that this isn’t something that I’m ever going to get the opportunity to do again — I was surrounded by pure excellence.
Now, I don’t feel that I need to tell you that since the season 11 finale, your fans cannot seem to get enough of your very hot dad — how has he dealt with all of this newfound, thirsty attention from the fanbase over the last three years?
No, you do not need to tell me, I am reminded every day. Believe it or not, he has always been this attractive, regardless of whether or not he was on national television. My whole life, I’ve already dealt with his fans thirsting over him. He’s fine with it, honestly — he’s just kind of a shy person.
Fair, although you are now selling shirts with his face on it, so he can’t be that shy.
That was him meeting me in the middle. It was like, “Listen, Dad, people are talking about you, and if you really love me, you’ll help me make some money.” [Laughs.] Sales from his t-shirts are gonna go towards his retirement fund, so it’s all good.
Looking back across the seasons, do you have an all-time favorite Drag Race moment?
Ooh … all I can say is that one time, I got to see the bottom of RuPaul’s outfit in ways I never expected. I’ll let the fans nitpick that — I was all head over heels, and that is all I can say about that.
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Before I let you go, what have you been listening to lately?
Well, because I’m gay I’ve been listening to “Break My Soul” by Beyoncé a lot. That’s definitely on loop. I’ve also, straight up, had Motomami by Rosalía on repeat all year. That album is so good, there’s so many moods and sounds that are just so pleasing and that I would have never thought to put together — that’s my go-to at the moment. That album, to me, sounds like the beauty of chaos in the world, and I don’t even speak Spanish!
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Tagged: Culture, entertainment blog, music blog, Pride, RuPaul's Drag Race