RuPaul calls for Sharon Needles to compete on 'Drag Race'
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Aaron Coady, aka drag queen Sharon Needles, from the Sharon Needles Facebook page. -
Aaron Coady as queen of darkness Sharon Needles.
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Queen of darkness Sharon Needles didn't realize she had the capacity to be shocked anymore.
That is, until "RuPaul's Drag Race" called to say she'd been chosen to compete on Season 4 of Logo's crossover hit reality show: "I'm still boggled that Sharon Needles was good enough for the show."
While sitting in a Crazy Mocha in Bloomfield recently, it's a little disorienting to talk to Aaron Coady, who is talking about Sharon Needles, who are one and the same, but not really.
Becoming Sharon Needles is rather like donning a suit of armor, although Mr. Coady as himself is hardly shy and retiring.
"Once you are in full Sharon Needles mode, you don't feel fear, you don't feel physical pain, and you also don't feel your own moral filter any longer," said Mr. Coady.
"I can't speak for all queens, but Sharon Needles is definitely a different entity from me as Aaron Coady.
"There's something about a wig and a dress that allows you to stir the pot."
There is indeed. "Drag Race," hosted with elegant fabulousness by RuPaul Charles, is a somewhat mainstream glimpse into a drag world of feather boas, full-face makeup, and the secret to using multiple layers of body shapers.
"I think the show embodies what drag is. We look at our careers as something very serious. It takes every bit of blood, sweat and tears to create our characters, but at the end of the day, you're a grown man in a dress, and that's funny.
"We are not transsexuals, not transgender. Luckily, you can make a career out of it."
All queens, Mr. Coady added "come from a place of pain, and it's very obvious on film. ... I think the show highlights the fun of drag, but it definitely shows the struggles as well, the internal and the outside struggles."
What Sharon Needles brings to the table is obvious from the first few minutes of the season premiere, which airs at 9 p.m. Monday. The winner will headline the network's drag tour and receive $100,000 plus cosmetics and other pretty prizes.
Each week, they are tasked with creating a certain themed look, where the best will "Shante! Stay!" and losers "Sashay, away."
In the first episode, the 13 queens meet cute, if somewhat bitchy, as they are introduced. Most are glam, including Chad Michaels, who does a mean Cher. When Sharon Needles walks in, accompanied to "Addams Family" theme music and wearing whitish, Marilyn Manson contact lenses peering from huge black panda-bear eyes, she's probably the gothiest creation the show has ever seen.
"What a wack job," says one of the queens. Later, another tells her, "I feel like I need to pray the rosary when I talk to you."
"Beautiful, spooky and stupid," is how Sharon Needles describes herself to the camera.
Episode 1's challenge is tailor-made for her. It's "The RuPocalypse!" and there will be blood (and zombies). Sharon Needles almost has a fainting spell when she discovers the guest judge is Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, one of her greatest inspirations.
"I've just always been attracted to the dark side," Mr. Coady said.
That includes a love of Halloween, horror movies and television shows, some of which are so bad, they are great ("American Horror Story" and Logo's own "The A List: Dallas."). Just plain bad is also acceptable, and it's no surprise Sharon Needles and some of the other Pittsburgh girls have put on "Toddlers & Tiaras" parodies at the Blue Moon bar in Lawrenceville.
"We do 'Trannies & Tiaras'; all the skinny queens are the toddlers and the fat ones are the moms," he said.
Sharon Needles is not afraid to embrace the ugly side, and shock is currency in her world. Her live shows are outrageous, offensive (she once burned a Bible while singing "Angel of the Morning") but also wildly entertaining.
Offended? Of course you are offended; you'd have to be Sharon Needles NOT to be offended. "I like work that pushes the barrier of bad taste," Mr. Coady said.
"Even walking the streets of Pittsburgh at age 30 and being called 'faggot' every day, well, Sharon Needles is like the punishment. I am the sponge for all that ... and Sharon Needles just wrings it back out on the stage.
"She definitely uses the stage as her punching bag."
It's also in Mr. Coady's nature to do the wrong thing, just to see what happens: "The devil is always on my shoulder, saying 'go the other way!' I'm the sort of person who wants to wear a wedding dress to a wedding."
January has been a busy month. Besides performances in Florida and California, he will have attended a "RuPaul's Drag Race" press junket in New York as well as its Los Angeles premiere.
Sharon Needles planned to go to the LA event "as a dug-up Marilyn Monroe," complete with funeral shroud gown: "It might be my last time on a red carpet, and I don't want to waste it."
In "Drag Race" parlance, Sharon Needles would be a "Heather." In full drag, she looks and sounds more like a biological woman than most of her competition. Although heaven knows it's tough to play the ingenue when you're over 6 feet tall, and wear a women's size 12 shoe.
Growing up in Newton, Iowa ("Home of Maytag washers and dryers!"), he got his first pair of high heels at age 4. His mother, supportive of her middle child's penchant for dress-up, would take him to thrift stores, and the house was always full of costumes.
"I was wearing full-face makeup to school since I was 14 years old," he said. No surprise, he was bullied. At 16, he left school for the streets of Des Moines.
He visited Pittsburgh at a friend's suggestion, expecting to hate it.
"I thought I'd be here a couple of weeks, and I absolutely fell in love with Pittsburgh. I think it's America's biggest secret."
Appearing on "RuPaul's Drag Race" will give him great exposure, but he said he's conflicted.
"I have always wanted to be a self-created queen of the underground culture, an example of lowbrow punk drama. But at the same time [here switching to a high, sing-song voice] I want some money! I want the cameras on my face."
Going mainstream, becoming marketable, is that selling out or just being more of a grown-up? A girl's got to have a plan.
"I have a true fascination with fame, and I want to keep it marketable," he said. "I don't necessarily want to be lip syncing to pop songs in smoky nightclubs for the rest of my life."
First Published January 29, 2012 12:00 am
