Watch TheWrap’s full Q&A with the “RuPaul’s Drag Race” family at this link.
The “RuPaul’s Drag Race” franchise is up for 11 Emmys, including Outstanding Unstructured Reality Program for “Untucked,” the documentary-like series that follows the competing Queens backstage as they decompress during a break. While “Drag Race” and all its offshoots are full of LGBTQ+ representation, the most recent season of “Untucked” was extra special as it saw Season 14 Queen Jasmine Kennedie come out while holding the hand of her sister Kerri Colby.
As TheWrap spoke with Jasmine, Kerri, and executive producers Mandy Salangsang and Tom Campbell during the Awards Season Screening of “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” they addressed having that powerful, personal and touching moment captured on TV.
“Up until that point into that season, I would say I was very comfortable with a camera around me. I will say I was very loose and didn’t really have any, you know, awareness of what was going on in the sense of like, ‘Oh! We’re filming a reality TV show.’ That kind of just went to the backburner,” Jasmine said. “And in that perfect amalgamation of what happened in that on ‘Untucked’ about [guest judge] Ts coming [into the werkroom], as well as Deja [Skye] sparking the conversation of transitioning, and people wondering if they were [transgender], and I think, you know, up until that point, I really had to fight kind of like, ‘the group,’ I guess you could say, idea of who I was.”
Jasmine said that as the conversation took place the Queens got a sense of who she really is.
“And that’s where I started feeling a little bit more comfortable about talking about it. And I think with Bosco starting off the conversation, [it] kind of gave me the initial push to be like, ‘I’m not the only one going through this.’ So I think it was the perfect spark to start what came out to be my coming out,” she continued. “And it was really emotional.”
“I think I was mainly focusing on the people around me and just telling them, basically, like, ‘This is how I’ve felt for a long time.’ I haven’t been very communicative about it because of my life and my upbringing, I just [didn’t] really want to bring it up,” Jasmine said. “It was kind of like a pressure cooker and I let the steam boil for a little bit too long, and it kind of just exploded. But what came out of that was, you know, finding myself and the ability to let myself grow. And it was a really emotional, uplifting moment in my life.”
Kerri, who Jasmine cited as inspiration, called the moment “powerful” and “emotional.”
“But besides being such a tear-jerking, emotional moment, it really was so raw and so real,” Kerri said. “And for me, I had talked to Jasmine a little bit before about identity when we were off camera. And that’s when I was like, OK, I said when I walked [onto] the show, I was like, ‘I feel feminine spirits.’ But you can feel whatever you want, you have to wait on that confirmation of somebody.
“And as we were talking and going through that, through the whole season, specifically with Jasmine, I had a very family-kindred spirit, very big sister, in a way motherly-daughterly relationship with Jasmine. I always saw so much of myself and her. And I just really appreciated watching her grow throughout the season,” she added.
Kerri said the moment was incredibly powerful.
“I say this every time, it really almost felt like going into a labor and bringing forth a new identity, a new spirit, a new soul. And literally watching somebody in front of you emerge and shed who they are, what their reality is and how they believe, know and are now affirming [how] they want to be treated. And it’s so rare that we get to see those moments happen in front of our faces,” Kerri said. “But even beyond that, to happen in front of the world’s face, it was just so, so emotional and moving.”