Events

[COMEDY] Bianca Del Rio isn’t particularly interested in what you think of her. And that’s probably just as well. It allows her to dish out the vitriol that’s made her current show, Rolodex of Hate, such a success. It’s also what earned her a mighty flattering comparison to the late Joan Rivers in a 2014 New York Times profile.

Del Rio’s plenty abrasive, alright, but what sets the season six winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race apart is her deliciously dismissive delivery: you get a very real sense that she’s not completely kidding when she’s up on that stage, reading everyone the riot act. No doubt, her equal opportunity mud-slinging will be on full display when Rolodex of Hate pulls into 710 Main Theatre on Monday, November 16.

Born as Roy Haylock and raised in Louisiana, Del Rio, now 40, comes from a generation that got started without an online image to build or witty tweets to hassle over. Her age became more of an asset than a liability on Drag Race and, in the end, she believes it’s a large part of why she won. That, and her trademark over-the-top look, something she’s humorously described as “erotic clown.”

“In many ways, the set of Drag Race was the most comfortable place for me to be,” she said, calling from her new Los Angeles digs on a rare day off. It’s a place in which she’s barely been able to spend an accumulated two weeks since relocating there in June, thanks to a rigorous performance schedule.

“I had no cell phone, no computer, and nothing else to focus on except what was right in front of me. My work was cut out. Some of the younger ones probably had a harder time, since I think a lot of their daily routines revolved around social media. But prior to the show, it wasn’t that much a part of mine. I never felt for a second like I was missing anything.”

Apparently, she still doesn’t. She says nothing should be off limits in comedy, and she’s quick to assert that our world has become hypersensitive and entirely too PC, something reflected in her unabashedly harsh (and uproariously funny) performances.

 

A photo posted by Bianca Del Rio (@thebiancadelrio) on Sep 22, 2015 at 4:18pm PDT

“Most people seem threatened that I can take or leave social media, and maybe that’s because they have too much of themselves invested in it,” she said. “I mean, it’s great to have the access, but it ends up being  way too much information. You got up today? That’s news? Actually, it’d be more interesting news if you didn’t get up today. Then you hear from these people that find you offensive and want to give you a hard time about it—who fucking cares? Don’t like me? Don’t watch. I don’t like the Kardashians, so I don’t watch. I don’t like football—same thing. The bottom line is that not everyone is going to like you, and I couldn’t give shit. I find inner peace knowing they’re all going to die one day.”

One thing she refuses to harp on, however, is her success. At the end of the day, Bianca Del Rio knows she, “landed the golden ticket,” and you won’t catch her complaining about the rigors of her current schedule. The $100,000 she won from Drag Race (which she’s joked amounts to only $4 after taxes) sits in the bank gathering interest. She seems content to continue forging forward with the earnest work ethic that’s gotten her this far and claims not to have grandiose designs on life.

“I will not complain about how much work I’m getting,” she said. “I’m not looking for love at this time, but I’m not bitter or angry that I’m too busy for it, either. I mean, I miss my dogs when I’m away… they don’t talk back. But it’s a lucky life. What do I have to complain about, traveling from one location to another? I’m not flying the fucking plane, I’m just sitting on it.”

By 2015’s end, Rolodex of Hate will have seen 93 performances this year, and Del Rio is particularly proud because it’s the first show she’s really attempted to format, writing out parts from memory and—more or less—sticking to them. It’s brought her to a place where she feels more confident about how to develop her next show and how to loosely calculate the right amounts of structure and improv for her comedic style.

But she also says a recent trip to New York reminded her of her past career as a theater costume designer, something she misses and would eventually like to find time for again.

“Once you have a skill like costume design, it’s always there, it’s always a part of you,” she said. “I’m not trying to cure cancer, y’know—I’m just doing drag. And I’m not going to do it forever, either. But for right now I basically live on Delta Airlines and I’m fine with that. Eventually, what I’m really interested in doing is purchasing property in NYC so I can fully live there like a rich white woman.” So much for lack of grandeur. 

(fyi: this video contains language which may be nsfw.)