Lana Ja’Rae wasn’t just the youngest queen to compete on her season of RuPaul’s Drag Race — she’s the youngest queen to ever compete on Drag Race, period.
Being born in 2002, the now 23-year-old drag queen helped bring a new generation of drag to the show, one that grew up with Drag Race on TV and access to drag literally at its fingertips thanks to social media.
“I’m so honored and happy to be carrying the torch of the young, online girls. I feel like our generation has so much to bring to the art form of drag,” Lana says. “I feel like we’re just here to have a good time and just really happy to be in the room, and through that, our drag is just so positive and so light. I feel like the new drag is just happiness. It all feels happy. It feels correct.”
“It feels so inspiring to see people so young, so sure about themselves, and so determined to succeed,” she continues. “I feel like we’re so hungry. I think we’re hungry to showcase who we are and our voices, and I think it’s very beautiful. Like, I’m such a fan of new drag, and I feel like people need to give us more respect. Because we may be young, but like, we’re f*cking talented as f*ck.”
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Lana first discovered drag as a child by watching Todrick Hall’s YouTube videos, where she saw RuPaul for the first time (not knowing yet, of course, who RuPaul was). In high school, she was introduced to Drag Race, and she was immediately obsessed.
“I always told myself I would do drag in another life. Like, I never thought I’d be able to do drag,” Lana admits. Despite her love for the art form, actually becoming a queen was beyond intimidating — until the reality check that was 2020, pandemic and political turmoil included, gave Lana the wake-up call she needed.
“A lot of things weren’t promised. A lot of confusion was happening,” she recalls. “And drag was something I knew for a fact that I loved, and I was like, ‘Well, if I cannot live tomorrow, I’m gonna make sure I can live in today and do something that I enjoy doing.’”
She was too young then to perform in nightclubs, so like many Gen Z drag artists, Lana’s drag career began on social media. Beyond posting her makeup looks and custom designs, she also competed in an Instagram-based drag competition called Drag Rodeo. Every era of Lana’s drag is documented on her profile, and despite the inherent cringe of seeing her past self, she’s grateful that her journey is immortalized on the internet.
“It is so cringy to think back. Like, why was I posting that online, and why was I competing and looking like that online? But I think there’s also something so beautiful in it,” Lana reflects. “You can literally see my journey as a drag artist grow, because I’ve been posting since the moment I started drag, and I think there’s something so beautiful to just having fun and loving drag, and that being your driving passion, and the good things come after. So it’s very cringy, but I don’t regret it. I would do it all over again.”
“If I cannot live tomorrow, I’m gonna make sure I can live in today and do something that I enjoy doing.”
– Lana Ja’Rae
This year, Lana found herself in a drag competition with just a slightly higher profile: Season 17 of RuPaul’s Drag Race. She won the season’s first mini challenge, then established herself as a lip sync assassin with three wins before she was sent home in sixth place.
“Going into Drag Race, I was like, ‘Oh my god, I’m that girl, you can’t tell me anything,’” Lana says. “I knew I wasn’t the best at everything, but I feel like Drag Race also showed me that I’m better at a lot of things that I didn’t think I was. And so it’s kind of forced me to step back, do some thinking about my drag in general and how to elevate it, and to always tell myself there’s always ways to get better. Even when you think you’re the best, you can always strive to be better than you were yesterday.”
Lana also came away from Drag Race with something almost as valuable as the crown: her very own meme, now firmly lodged in the greater gay lexicon. Seemingly every episode, Lana pointed out that something about her runway presentation was “very new” for her: she’d “never worn nails this long” until her Nailed It! look; she wore a gown for the parasol-themed Shady Ladies runway, which was “something very different” for her; and all three of her Tickled Pink, Sea Creature Couture, and Quilted For Your Pleasure runways featured “a very unique silhouette for Lana,” as she said in her confessionals.
@ej_oddly Ion truat hwr for many reasons😅. #rupaulsdragrace #rupauldragrace #dragqueen #runway #dragqueensoftiktok #dragrace #dragqueens #rpdr ♬ original sound – Trixie Mattel👑
Lana, for her part, loves the meme. “I didn’t even know I said it that much on the show. So when it happened, I was like, ‘Oh my God, wait, this is funny as f*ck,’” she says. “Now, everyone that comes up to me is like, ‘Is this something new for you?’ And I’m like, ‘Wait, what?’ Like, that’s so weird that I’m being referenced in a conversation with myself. I never thought that would happen.”
Given Lana’s apparent inexperience with nearly every article of clothing, some fans were left wondering what in the world she had worn before. The answer, Lana says, is right there in her name: just about nothing.
“Going onto Drag Race, I literally didn’t wear clothes,” she explains. “Like, I don’t think people realize my name is like a testament of what I wear: lingerie. Like, bra and panties, down.”
So, for a platform as massive as Drag Race, she aimed to switch things up, creating a runway package that, yes, was very new for her. “I feel like I tried my best to make it very unique and diverse. And side by side, I feel like it’s a pretty unique runway package.”
Since being on the show, Lana has continued performing in her home base of Brooklyn and embraced traveling across America and around the world, citing travel as one of the most exciting parts of her Drag Race journey, especially as it gives her the opportunity to meet the fans that supported her throughout the season. “I want to make sure I can see everybody and hug them and thank them for just showing me love, because it’s something I never thought I would be able to experience,” she says.
“I don’t think people realize my name is like a testament of what I wear: lingerie. Like, bra and panties, down.”
– Lana Ja’Rae
Beyond the traditional trajectory of Drag Race alumni, Lana says she hopes to make her way as a model, pointing out that drag artists have yet to truly stake their claim in the fashion industry.
“I really want to break into the fashion world,” she says. “Like, I love drag, I love performing, I love the base level of drag, but I really want to extend it and break doors down that haven’t been broken down before. Because I know there’s some drag queens in the fashion world, but there’s not one, like, a Black drag queen that really has stepped their foot down and really made their mark in it. And I want to do it. I’m like, why not? Might as well. Better now than never.”
That ambition goes for both her drag persona and her out-of-drag self; Lana doesn’t make much of a distinction between the two.
“I feel like drag is a further extension of who I am as a person, so I don’t consider them two different persons,” she says. “I keep Lana and Braylon very in the same line of things. So if they want me to model out of drag, I’ll model out of drag. If I’m modeling in drag, I’m modeling in drag. Or both! Who knows? I’ll do it all.” ♦
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