‘RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars’ season 9 episode 9 recap: ‘Rosemarie’s Baby Shower: The Rusical’
“RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars” continued its 9th season on Friday, July 5 with the ninth episode featuring returning queens from seasons past. Making their way back into the Werk Room for the second time are Angeria Paris VanMichaels (season 14), Gottmik (season 13), Jorgeous (season 14), Nina West (season 11), and Plastique Tiara (season 11). Three queens are returning for the third time: Roxxxy Andrews (season 5 and All Stars 2), Shannel (season 1 and All Stars 1), and Vanessa Vanjie Mateo (seasons 10 and 11).
In addition to their chance at the coveted crown, this season the queens are competing to have a $200,000 contribution, provided by The Palette Fund, to a charity of their choice. Series judges RuPaul Charles and Michelle Visage will be joined on the dais by friends and series regulars Carson Kressley, Ts Madison, and Ross Mathews as well as a rotating cast of guest judges to help determine episodic winners and their choice for “next drag superstar.”
In episode 8, the queens took songs from RuPaul’s discography and used them as inspiration in a design challenge to create “runway eleganza” to wear down the catwalk. The judges panel decided that Roxxxy’s take on “Lady Cowboy” and Plastique’s on “Star Baby” were tops of the week. After the lip sync, Roxxxy was named the overall winner of the week and in the last use of the Ruby Snippers of the season, blocked Angeria once again from receiving another badge.
In the race to be one of the three queens with the most badges by the end of the season, Plastique and Roxxxy both have four, Angeria has three, Jorgeous, Nina, Vanjie and Gottmik all have two, and Shannel has none.
Now, check out our recap of episode 9, titled “Rosemarie’s Baby Shower: The Rusical,” featuring guest judge Kristine W below:
Back in the Werk Room, Roxxxy explained her decision to snip Angeria for the second time in order to even the score between them and as a way of putting a cap on the whole twist to cut queens out of the chance to win a badge. Shannel asked Plastique who she would have snipped, but she didn’t answer and simply said that “the one person I wouldn’t have snipped is Angeria.” Without the Ruby Snippers in play anymore, the queens wondered if another twist was around the corner for the final stretch of the competition.
The next morning, Ru brought news that for this week’s maxi challenge they’d be starring in a musical spoof of psychological thriller films. Over the course of the challenge they’d choose their parts, record their singing parts, and then work through stage choreography. Once again, the winners of this week’s challenge would earn two Beautiful Benefactress Badges, one for themselves and one to give away to another queen. Ru also said that “mathematically” it is possible for any of them to still make it to the final three, including Shannel.
As the queens prepared for the rusical, it came out that Jorgeous was a girl that fell to the bottom during her original season’s rusical and so she was keenly focused on redemption in this challenge. To redeem herself, Jorgeous wanted to score the role that would best fit her. Luckily, no one challenged her in the claim of a dancing AI doll. Gottmik and Shannel had no competition for their first picks either. Both Nina and Angeria had the same #1, one of the biggest singing roles of the show. Angeria was concerned that Nina is a queen who would do well with any part, but the decision was made by a draw from a hat and Nina won out. After losing her first choice, Angeria agreed to pair up with Shannel in sister roles. The remaining three parts all fell easily without contention into the hands of Vanjie, Plastique and Roxxxy.
For the recording sessions, the queens worked with David Steinberg as the composer and Michelle as their vocal coach. Despite never competing in a rusical and not having a singing voice, Shannel impressed everyone in the room and then with all of her own experience in musical theater, Nina intimidated the other queens as a possible shoe-in for another win. After getting the role she wanted, Jorgeous got in her head while trying to get her lines out in the mic and worried about her ability to merge her own “Jorgeousness” with a robotic voice and movement.
Next they met Miguel Zarate on stage to learn their choreography with a warning from him that there are aspects of what he’ll ask of them that are “heavy” with movement. Vanjie felt comfortable with her session, but after a confident showing in the recording session, Nina lost her way trying to keep up with the fast-paced moves. Gottmik, Jorgeous and Roxxxy all had to focus on characterization in a group number that required each of them to stand out and show the inspiration of the real film characters they’re based on. In a different group number, Angeria and Shannel started to worry about whether they’d have the strength to pull out a win in this challenge. Angeria let on that if she wins, her plan would be to offer her giveaway badge to the other winner in the hopes that they’d in turn bestow theirs on her.
Watching the rusical performance live from the judges dais with Ru this week was Michelle, Ts and Kristine. After the show, all of the queens were proud of what they accomplished and each felt like they delivered in a way that made them competitive for a possible win. Shannel was especially proud because it was so far out of her comfort zone and her first rusical. In conversation about who the winners would give a badge to, it seemed like Roxxxy and Plastique would be off the table to be given one. Jorgeous said that she would give hers to Shannel and then Angeria floated her idea that the two winners can just give them to each other.
Later that day, the queens walked the catwalk in the “Bring Back My Pearls” category. Then based on their performances and runway presentations, the judges handed out their critiques. Ru thought that Plastique was “perfect for that role” of Rosemarie and Kristine said she “looked like a true goddess” on the runway. Ts and Kristine agreed that Angeria embodied her character and Michelle called her pearl garment beautiful. Ru was “mesmerized” by Shannel’s performance because she never dropped character and Michelle praised her for being out of her comfort zone both in the rusical and on the runway. They thought Gottmik was cast in the right role and Ts appreciated that she went a different direction than the others with the black pearls. Michelle said that Roxxxy was “spectacular” as the clown character and Kristine thought she gave two completely different looks that made her unrecognizable. Kristine also thought that Jorgeous “commanded the stage” and Michelle added that she was “perfection from the beginning to the end.” Michelle said that Nina embodied her role and Kristine noticed the “charisma” that she has on stage. Ru knew that Vanjie would be a “showstopper” so she wasn’t surprised by the star power she brought to the end of the show.
After further deliberation among themselves, the judges made the decision that the top two performers of the week were Jorgeous and Shannel. With their wins, they faced off in a lip sync to Kristine’s song “Love Come Home” to determine the overall winner of the week. In their performance, Shannel focused on giving a perfect lip sync of the lyrics and truly embodying the spirit of pop star in the way she moved around the stage with confidence. As expected, Jorgeous matched every beat of the song to one of her signature dance moves , delivering a choreo-focused rendition of the song. This time, Ru decided that it would be a tie and they were dual winners of a $5,000 cash tip for their charities.
Instead of the Ruby Snippers, each of the queens had an extra badge to give away to any of the other queens. Knowing that this could impact which queen does or does not make it to the finale, Jorgeous decided to “keep her word” and gifted her badge to Shannel. In return, Shannel surprised Jorgeous with the gift of her extra badge. Because they each received two badges this week, Shannel now caught up to some of the others with two badges and Jorgeous skyrocketed to the top of the leaderboard with four of her own.
NEXT TIME: The Lip Sync Lalaparuza returns for a battle royale among some heavy hitters.
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