When it comes to Queens from RPDR, we’ll always have our seasonal favourites – this year Katya is a early front-runner – but we’ll always come back to some of our favourites like Raja, JujuBee, Raven and Manila Luzon. A year or two ago we spoke to her about style, politics and Barbra.

What age did you get into drag?
I was always sneaking myself into my Mum’s dresses. She was very petite when she was younger and never threw anything away, so she had this giant walk-in closet full of clothes from the 1960s.

Did you always go by Manila Luzon?
Yes. When I first decided I wanted to do drag, I knew I needed to have a really great name. Manila Luzon was perfect because my mother is from Manila and Luzon is the island there. Plus Manila has the word ‘man’ in it and also has the same amount of syllables as Madonna.

Is she your biggest icon?
One of them, yeah. Madonna, Barbra Streisand and Kylie. I would love to go to a Barbra Streisand concert but I don’t have that money yet. I didn’t win RuPaul’s Drag Race. Trust me, tickets would probably be one of the first things I would buy if I had the coin.

Have you claimed all your prizes from the challenges you won on RuPaul’s Drag Race yet?
From the All-Stars season, I won the first challenge with Latrice. The prizes were these custom gowns from Sequin Queen. I was emailing them trying to claim my prize and waited several weeks with no answer. In the end I put them on blast on Facebook and they called me immediately. I was able to collect my prize after creating a little bit of a stir. A little controversy goes far. That’s how Kim Kardashian got her start, right?

What is Manila’s style?
I’m a huge fan of theatrics and costume but I like to mix it with fashion. I love Jeremy Scott because his stuff is always fun and tongue-in-cheek, very kitschy. Does he send me stuff? No I just buy it. Jeremy Scott, pleeeease send me something nice!
I love how Katy Perry dresses up as candy. I want my look to be iconic. I don’t want people to be like ‘Oh yeah, she wore that dress, it was….pink.’ No, I want them to say ‘Oh wow, she looked like a giant stick of bubblegum.’ I like seeing how I can take the design of this pretty Elie Saab dress and turn it into a banana.

When you talk to a drag queen you expect it to be camp, witty and some shade to be thrown, right?
Yeah, see that is the kind of drag I love. But I’m not trying to be the activist. Drag queens are a cartoon character, well, at least I’m a cartoon character. I love awful bitchy comments.

A lot of queens’ style gets better when they leave the show…
Yeah, before you start the show sometimes you’re doing gigs that pay $100, which has to pay your rent AND for a fabulous outfit. Then after the show you start to work more and you can afford to make your outfit a little better.
But take Sharon Needles for example, when she started her season her drag was really crunchy. But look at her now, she has bright white teeth instead of whatever colour they used to be. And yes, that was shade, by the way, honey, that was shade.

Do you spend more on clothes for yourself or Manila?
Well I don’t usually buy clothes off the rack. I went into Harrod’s the other day and was like ‘Ah! Ah! All these beautiful dresses I will never buy because I can just get Ivy Winters to make them for me a lot cheaper.’ When I was suggesting her to the casting people, I was a little reluctant because I was like, ‘Well I hope you don’t do too well because I still need you to make me clothes!’

What about acting?
I’m a realist, I’m half Asian. Not Oriental. There are only so many productions of The King and I or Miss Saigon a year. If I’m going to act its going to be with a wig on. Not necessarily as Manila but as a drag queen. I’ve auditioned for those things where they want you to be a drag queen only to come on set and they want you to be a transsexual hooker who gets bludgeoned to death in the bath. I’m like ‘I don’t really know, why don’t we leave that for Willam.’

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