The latest episode of Canada’s Drag Race served up high-energy performances and a bittersweet exit as the competition heated up. Titled “From Drags to Riches: The Rusical”, the show featured the remaining six queens in a musical extravaganza inspired by the life of Brooke Lynn Hytes, with special guest judge, Real Housewives of New York City original cast member, Luann de Lesseps joining the panel alongside Traci Melchor, Brad Goreski, and Brooke Lynn, herself.
After the intense Lip Sync Extravaganza and the departure of two contestants last week, the queens dove into the Rusical challenge, choreographed by the talented Hollywood Jade. The episode opened with reflections on the previous eliminations, with Denim expressing sadness over the departure of Kitten Kaboodle and Aimee Yonce Shennel – hailed as the hearts of the season.
Amidst celebrations for making it to the top six, RuPaul’s message emphasised the significance of learning from losses. Brooke Lynn entered, introducing the week’s challenges, starting with a late-night TV host quick drag mini-challenge, won by Venus after an engaging segment on sex-related topics.
Moving to the main challenge, “Rusical Week” featured each queen portraying different eras of Brooke Lynn Hytes. Assigning roles led to some surprises, with Melinda Verga taking on “Baby Brooke”, and Aurora Matrix embracing the Sugar Bum Fairy persona, which specialises in Brooke Lynn’s ballet career – Aurora stated that she has no formal dance training so talk about taking a risk! Tensions rose as Nearah Nuff expressed reservations about her role since it sees her take on a highly choreographed dance routine and having only just won the Lip Sync Extravaganza she’ll have to make sure she doesn’t display the same performance – props to the shady edit during the judges critiques, we love Canada’s shady edits!
With choreographer Hollywood Jade guiding them, the queens rehearsed intensely. Aurora breezed through her ballet-inspired routine, while challenges arose for Melinda and Kiki Coe with choreography and props, respectively. Nerves ran high as the performance day approached.
On the main stage, the queens delivered their Rusical acts, showcasing their interpretations of Brooke Lynn’s life. The runway theme, “Always a Bridesmaid”, saw dazzling wedding-inspired looks from each contestant – this correlated perfectly with Brooke Lynn’s outfit as she was dressed to the nines in a gorgeous bride wedding gown.
In critiques, Melinda received praise for her energetic portrayal, while Aurora impressed the judges despite the challenge of ballet without formal training. Kiki faced minor hiccups in her performance including losing her hat but the show must go on! Nearah’s professionalism stood out, although a similarity in energy from the previous Lip Sync Extravaganza was noted. Venus was praised for her ability to not emote too much in her facial expressions and her runway outfit was loved by everyone. Denim did a fantastic job but the judges found that she lost the gospel edge to her performance, specifically towards the end.
After deliberation, Aurora clinched the week’s victory. Venus, Nearah, and Melinda were declared safe, leaving Kiki and Denim in the bottom two. The intense lip sync to Jully Black’s “Seven Day Fool” ended with Denim shantaying, leading Kiki to sashay away.
The upcoming episode promises the top five queens delivering transformative drag makeovers to surprise guests from home. We all love the makeover challenge but we can’t help but hope the critiques make more sense than RuPaul’s Drag Race UK’s series 5 makeover challenge – it seems family resemblance is important.
New episodes of Canada’s Drag Race Season 4 are dropped every Thursday night on Crave in Canada, BBC Three and iPlayer in the UK, and WOW Presents Plus in the US and the rest of the world.
You can follow all your favourite queens from this new season of Canada’s Drag Race across all social media by checking out our article here.