#JusticeForTrixie The Interview: Trixie Mattel Discusses Her Elimination

Trixie Mattel was one of the most anticipated queens of RuPaul’s Drag Race season 7 prior to the season airing, so to see her sashay away less than 1/3 of the way through the season has been difficult for many people. Following her elimination, the hashtag #JusticeForTrixie began to trend on Twitter in protest, with the likes of Alaska Thunderfuck, Jackie Beat and other drag legends tweeting about her elimination.

While we can’t say how this season is going to turn out, we can say that Trixie is definitely not happy about her elimination either. In this new, post-elimination podcast interview transcript, Trixie shares her thought on her elimination and how she feels things should have gone down.

Don’t forget to also listen to the full podcast episode above to hear the full hour-long conversation and get even more tee! (Downloads are available)

#JusticeForTrixie: The Interview

Tim: To get right into things, everybody on the internet has been going out there and hashtagging #JusticeForTrixie after your elimination. How are you feeling about this?

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Trixie: It wasn’t expected. At the end of the day, in the moment, I thought “Wow! I loved my challenge, I loved our parody videos. I loved my green runway look and it was all the way at the bottom. I don’t understand why. Ok?” Well, I love Pearl and I’m like 3000% sure I can win a lip-sync and I lip-syned and I thought, “Oh yeah, thank god, we both get to stay!” and they said, “Trixie get the hell out of here,” or whatever. I was so confused.

When I got home, my boyfriend asked me if I choked or what happened. I said, “I don’t know, I don’t know why I was in the bottom, and I don’t know how I lost the lip-sync. I don’t know.” I love Pearl and I know her skill set and I thought, “I felt confident that I could out lip-sync her if I have to.”

How did you feel about past Drag Race royalty tweeting out the hashtag as well?

I thought once I watched the episode that I would understand what happened and would feel more justified about it, but then I watched the episode and I watched it again and again. Basically after what I saw in the episode, I feel super good and super supported that past Drag Race alumni and musical comedy legends like Jackie Beat and Wendy Ho, Lady Bunny coming out and tweeting that they didn’t understand the eliminations either.

It’s amazing. I spoke with Tempest DuJour in episode one of this podcast and she got a similar reaction when she was eliminated.

Yeah. I think in her case, as a fan watching the episode, and while I was there, I didn’t understand why she was lip-syncing to begin with. The challenge was to make clothes, and she made clothes that were better than a lot of peoples. I love Jasmine Masters, she’s the best most amazing person, but the challenge was to make clothes and she didn’t make clothes, but she was safe. I didn’t understand.

Yeah, Jasmine Masters is another interesting discussion we could have about what happened with her on social media following her elimination. How do you feel about that?

The real tee is that I love Drag Race, but unfortunately, unless you know Jasmine Masters or you see her at a performance, you wouldn’t know, based on the show, that she’s actually really nice. She’s ACTUALLY hysterically funny. She’s somebody who could tell you what she had for breakfast and you’d be crying laughing. It was really challenging seeing people turn on her.

In Untucked, they kind of make it look very – I think you can tell that ‘Untucked’ and Drag Race are two separate shows. In the show, they make Ginger Minj look like everyone’s favorite, and then in Untucked they make her look like some sort of instigator. They make it appear that she has a sense of, a hint of, “I don’t want to be shady, but…” or, “I’m not trying to hurt your feelings, but…”, which is never a balanced way to come for someone.

Untucked has changed so much this season! Going into it and knowing what you had seen in previous seasons, were you a little disappointed with how Untucked changed?

I love it now! I was never a huge fan of Untucked before personally because I love Drag Race for the drag. I don’t love it for the drama. I like it.

I walked into Untucked the first day, and they didn’t give us a warning about the changes, so I thought, “Oh, the Interior Illusions lounge looks really different on TV!” I was fine. I liked it more. They call it Untucked, which suggests it’s a little more real, and I think that it’s a little more real.

What you lip-synced in the end you had to lip-sync against Pearl. What was worse: actually sashaying away or battling against Pearl in a lip-synch?

Sashaying away, 100%! Haha! Only because I love Pearl, I do. I really do. 100%. Then again, we all have different skills in drag. I’m very much known for my lip-syncing, my performances, but Pearl’s very known for her visuals. On Drag Race, the lip-sync for your life is supposed to be a moment where your past mistakes or awards aren’t important. This is what’s important to get through, this is what determines your fate.

I’ve seen Pearl lip-sync and I know how I lip-syinc and, no shade, wasn’t worried at all. I thought, “This sucks because I’m gonna have to watch Pearl go home because I’ll definitely send her home. That’s what was hard because I thought I was definitely going to win.

Sashaying away was hard. I was kind of shocked. I remember the producers were filming me holding my RuPaul statue and saying, “You don’t seem very shaken up.” And I was like, “I guess I just don’t understand why I’m going home.”

Well, it was really surprising to everybody. In an earlier article we did, based on a poll, you were voted the most anticipated queen of the season, prior to the season beginning. Were you surprised or were you expecting it, based on that poll, about the reaction you got on social media?

No, I get it, and here’s why. I mean, I’ve been getting a lot of support from people who don’t understand why I was eliminated, but they’re basing that because they watched the episode and they don’t see why I had to sashay. They’re not upset because I was anticipated to be a favorite. They’re not upset because of their preconceived notion of what would happen before the season, they’re upset because they watched the episode and based on this there’s not enough support to send this person home.

I feel like people watch Drag Race and feel like they’re watching the Olympics of drag, as it’s called. I feel like they’re rooting for athletes, in a way, based on skills. I think with episode four, people felt like they were watching an episode that was designed to eliminate someone from the beginning. If there’s a thing that’s like we’re gonna see who does the best and worst in this challenge and judge accordingly, the audience felt like they were being taken for a ride a little bit. They were like, “Wait a minute, why is this person in the bottom? Why is this person lip-syincing?”

And then, not only were they confused why I was lip-syncing, they were confused on why I didn’t win the lip-sync based on what they showed.

I’m obsessed with Pearl, absolutely obsessed with her, and it’s just a questions of skill set, you know? I mean, Pearl has so many skills that I don’t have. If it was a lip-sync battle based on putting together a fashion spread, she would kill me.

A Blondie song! Blondie’s my favorite band. I wasn’t even batting a lash, I was like, “This is a done deal, I’m gonna beat Pearl in this lip-sync.” I guess with editing I thought that they would be able to piece together an edit that was more convincing that she had won it. Even with the edit I did, it still looked like I beat her a lot, so I don’t really know.

If you could change your experience on the show and make anything different, would you?

Um… *sigh* I’m gonna have to say no. I think I have to say no because even in the episode I was eliminated, I’m gonna stand by our parody. I thought it was funny. And I loved my runway. And after watching me lip-sync, I’m like, I wish I could lip-sync like that all the time. That was a great lip-sync. It’s one of those things where I really did show my best self.

With the comedy thing, with them saying that maybe I wasn’t standing out – I don’t fully understand that. But then again, I always say I’m like the sock puppet of drag. Like, I like knock-knock jokes. I have a bad sense of humor in a way, so people don’t always think it’s funny.

It felt like the judges liked Pearl more above me just in general, so I guess that’s why I lost the lip-sync. But I’m like, why are you gonna have a lip-sync if even if you lip-sync better it doesn’t matter.

How did you feel getting eliminated on not just a comedy challenge but, having your singing background, getting eliminated on a singing challenge?

Weird. Quite humbling. However, I don’t claim to be a great singer, especially why I transitioned out of music. It’s just something I got real with myself and my skills, and I’m like I’m never gonna be a singer, I’m not that great at it. But then again, with Drag Race, it’s not about what your skills are. This is the challenge of the day – how can you outshine other people today.

Look at Katya. She doesn’t sing at all. She was a mess in our group. And according to Miss Fame, she’s the strongest singer in the competition or whatever, so if she was she could have won the challenge. But really it has nothing to do with your skill set, it’s what do these five judges think of you today? That’s literally Drag Race, you know?

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To hear my entire conversation with Trixie, to find out who she would have played in Snatch Game, where the inspiration for her makeup comes from, who she’s rooting for to win this season and so much more, listen to the full podcast now on SoundCloud.

Follow & Connect with Trixie Mattel:

• TrixieMattel.com
• On Facebook
• On Instagram
• On Twitter
• Tour Calendar

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