A Cardiff woman is breaking drag history as she becomes the first cis female drag performer on RuPaul’s Drag Race UK.
Victoria Scone is set to appear on the highly-anticipated third series of RuPaul’s Drag Race UK.
In the BBC’s ‘Meet the Queens: Series 3’ taster, the 27-year-old describes herself as "camp, Cardiff, cabaret, disco diva, and with a lot of spunk…"
Read more: 'There's a power in otherness' Meet the drag artists who are breaking down barriers
The series starts in September, where performers from all over the UK compete in singing, dancing and comedy challenges.
Victoria - whose real name is Emily - told BBC Three that drag has always been part of her life.
She said: “The first time I was ever involved with drag was going to pantomines from a very young age.
“I should’ve probably been saying, ‘Oh I want to be like Cinderella’ or ‘I want to be like Jasmine,’ but instead I was like, ‘I want to be the drag queen!”
“I genuinely think I was born to be a drag queen - but I didn’t really know if, as a woman, that was a possibility for me.”
Victoria, who lives in Cardiff, describes her drag style as “very, very camp” and takes inspiration from traditional British drag performers such as Danny La Rue, Ceri Dupree, Miss Jason and Son Of A Tutu.
When choosing her name, Victoria wanted “something very British.”
She said: “I wanted something edible, being a curvaceous woman as I am. It’s also a pun as in ‘Where's Victoria? Victoria’s gone!’
“Very much old-school drag. I just love it. I love the fact that you can get up there, you can hold an audience for an hour or two hours or more. And it’s your bloody night. You are the star of that show.
“I don’t make people feel hostile when they walk in a venue. It’s like we are one big happy family in one big happy queer space.”
Victoria also shared with the BBC how being a woman in drag hasn’t always been easy.
Drag has traditionally been seen as men dressing as women, but in recent years there has been a rise in female, non-binary and trans artists.
When entering her first drag competition, Victoria was told, ‘This isn’t the competition for you.’ - but she didn’t give up.
She told the BBC: “A few days later, I applied to another venue and then another venue and then another venue.
“I was completely hooked. No matter what was thrown at me - I was going to be a drag queen.
“My existence is technically political every time I step on stage, you know, as a woman in drag.”
Victoria is keen to boost diversity in the drag world through her appearance on RuPaul’s Drag Race UK.
She hopes this will encourage the show to include more female performers, and for other lineups to be ‘more enriched and varied.’
The professionally-trained actor, singer and dancer said to the BBC: “To gate-keep who performs drag seems so backwards to me.
“As queer people, we are oppressed and mariginalised, so why would we continue to do that within our own community?”
Victoria worked as a sales and events coordinator before doing drag full time.
In the future, she hopes to speak more about the issues she faces as a queer woman in the industry and encourage fans that “drag is for everyone.”
She said: “There are just not enough queer women in the public eye, in my opinion, so I’m here to be a ‘celesbian’ - a celebrity lesbian!”
RuPaul’s Drag Race UK consists of twelve drag queens competing for the title of The UK’s Next Drag Race Superstar and starts streaming on BBC iPlayer in September.
Are you excited for the show? Let us know in the comments.
