Drag Race UK Star Banksie Reveals There Was Explosive Backstage Drama

RuPaul’s Drag Race UK contestant Banksie has exclusively revealed to IGV that some unseen and explosive moments happened in the Werk Room.

The queens were pushed to their limits this week as they took to the challenge of performing in an all-singing, all-dancing Rusical called ‘Pant-Oh She Better Don’t’.

Despite serving up multiple conceptual looks on the runway, the Rusical was sadly the challenge that led to RuPaul sending Manchester’s very own Banksie home after a lip sync battle with DeDeLicious.

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So let’s take a look at what Banksie had to say about leaving Drag Race UK, from her lip sync battle with DeDeLicious to her Werk Room drama with Cara Melle and Vicki Vivacious:

How do you feel after last night’s elimination?

I feel so good. I thought I’d feel sad and a bit dead. But no, the amount of people saying I’ve been robbed and saying that I didn’t deserve to go, it’s just nice to know that people are going to miss me.

I got a bit emotional last night and was just like, I’ve always been the only person on Team Banksie. Now it seems like the whole world is, and that’s the one thing I’m taking away from this experience, is how lovely everyone’s been.

Fans online are well and truly devastated over you leaving the competition and your name has been trending all day. How has it been adjusting to the reception from the fans?

I’m shocked because I’ve been on interviews all day, so I’ve not even had a chance to go on Twitter.

The fan response has been amazing. The people who have messaged me and just being able to have those conversations with people.

I tried my very hardest to be as genuine as possible through this series and I’m so glad the producers made that a priority for my storyline. They were like, ‘Here is a non-binary neurodivergent weirdo who’s just flipping about the place and skipping and having a nice time and playing with their fingernails’ and that’s exactly how I am in real life.

Do you believe RuPaul and Michelle should’ve placed you in the bottom?

I feel like the bottom three would have been between me, DeDeLicious, and Vicki Vivacious.

Dede obviously, for the critique that she got, myself because I was a little bit nervous and I think Vicki cut out all of her harmonies and the majority of the choreo from rehearsal.

I didn’t do that. I just kind of went, Well, I’ve got to learn it because they’re not going to get rid of my choreography. I wouldn’t ask them to get rid of choreography because that would have made me really uncomfortable.

I got a critique on the runway that didn’t make the edit, where they said ‘It’s not Mirror Mirror enough. It doesn’t look like a mirror’ and I have the same issue when I think of Vicky’s outfit, where I think it was because it was blue and purple, I didn’t think it was Mirror Mirror enough.

When you walked into the Werk Room for the first time, what was going through your head when you walked around that corner?

I think it was really overwhelming. I mean, there was a producer who puts you on and goes ‘Go, this is your moment’ but before I went on they turned to me and said ‘Your life’s about to change forever’ and I was like ‘OK, this is it’.

When you walked into the Werk Room for the first time who did you look at as your biggest competition?

Well, the only girl I’d ever seen perform properly in real life was Ginger Johnson. I knew she could sing. I knew that she’d done panto after panto and stage show after stage show.

Ginger knew what drag was all about and knew her body, knew her face, knew her looks and her hair was always gorgeous.

I walked in, I was like, oh, Ginger’s great. I really like you. I think you’re really cool and she was really nice to me.

Also when Cara walked in, you just saw a winner and when she said ‘Bow down to your goddess’. I was like you are literally the most beautiful person in the world and I shouldn’t say that I’ve got a girlfriend, so I should be saying that. But she just was overwhelmingly powerful.

Last week we saw things get pretty heated during Untucked after Cara Melle and Vicki Vivacious threw you under the bus on the mainstage. How did it feel in that moment and was it a lot more heated than we actually got to see?

What I found funny about the edit was that Cara seemed to be getting more of a push from the editors and like she was saying the most about the whole thing, but actually, they really did share it.

They were both back and forth and that’s why I felt so overwhelmed. I think it was two VS one.

It was two people shouting at one person, and that’s when I could not handle it.

I know from experience that I need quiet spaces, I need to calm down, otherwise, I’ll just burst into tears. I just got up, I left and I had a moment and was able to concentrate and not be angry.

They did miss backstage gossip when we walked in, they didn’t catch it but Michael Marouli caught my eye when I was walking in and was like ‘Are you OK?’. I just turned to her and said ‘F***ing snakes’.

At the start of the competition, you mentioned your relationship with the one and only Cheddar Gorgeous – did she give you any tips and tricks when preparing for the competition?

We weren’t allowed to talk to anyone, sadly and the producer specifically told me don’t speak to Cheddar because you know what she’s like and I think it would have given me a bit of an unfair advantage.

I spoke to Cheddar around the time the show began airing and I asked her for her advice and said she to savour it. It happens really fast. You’ve spent ten times as long waiting for it to come out than you actually have filming the show.

So when it actually happens, be grateful, find the goodness, ignore the bad and just know that 1000 other people want the journey you’re having right now.

This week we saw you lip sync against DeDeLicious – how did you feel when you were standing across from DeDe knowing that you were about to have to lip sync for your life?

I didn’t underestimate DeDeLicious. I think that was the best thing I did because I could easily have gone, she’s a kicker, she’s a flipper, she’s one of those girls, who can’t do emotion.

I would have probably screwed myself over even more. But she knows what she’s doing. She’s an incredible performer, she’s an incredible lip-syncer.

I noticed when that song was the choice for that week, I was like, this is all going to be about knowing your words, emoting those words, noticing every breath that she takes and mimicking it.

I was like, I’m just going to stand there. She can move around and be funny. I’m just going to stand centre stage and emote directly at RuPaul.

What can we expect from Banksie next?

Get ready for the supremacy of Banksie… I’m taking over the world.

Drag Race is a door for me and I can’t wait for everything that’s been planned for us all to come out of the show.