Nina West hits the road for âA Drag Queen Christmasâ
Whether sheâ€TMs sparkling on the "RuPaulâ€TMs Drag Race All Stars" runway or hitting stages as Edna Turnblad in "Hairspray," Nina West brings her own distinct brand of kindness, talent and sparkle. As the drag performer heads to the Philadelphia area for Murray & Peter Present "A Drag Queen Christmas" (the tour stops at The Keswick Theatre in Glenside, PA on Nov. 18), we sat down to chat about the magic of "A Drag Queen Christmas," her dream Broadway role, and why the holiday season will never be anything but magic to her.
These Christmas tours offer something for everyone whether you celebrate Christmas or not. Itâ€TMs also a taste of home because you get to celebrate the holidays with so many people who love you. Whatâ€TMs great about this specific tour [is] this is the fourth time that Iâ€TMve done it. What Murray and Peter do is that they have a regular cast of people that they book and then they sprinkle in some new people from the more recent seasons to balance it out. This tour is really balanced because I feel like I'm coming home. Iâ€TMve worked with Jimbo before. Iâ€TMve worked with Crystal Methyd, Shea Couleé and Brooke [Lynn Hytes] before so when youâ€TMre on the road during this time of year, it is magical.
For a lot of people, this is their family thing. They go to "A Drag Queen Christmas"! They do this and they do the symphony, or the Pops concert or the Gay Menâ€TMs Chorus concert that's doing holiday songs. For a lot of people, this is their big special thing and it does mean a lot more than just going out on tour. We get to go and celebrate a whole season full of magic, hope and joy and bring a little bit of that drag magic along with it as well.
You mentioned to me that one of the ways you and Shannel clicked during "All Stars 9" so well is that you both absolutely love Christmas. What is it about Christmas that is so wonderfully magical to you? Shannel and I both love it and I canâ€TMt speak for her, but I would surmise that we both love it because it is so gay! It is so gaudy, larger than life and so opulent! From a church service to the small decorations, everything is just done up. I think for me, I fell in love with the decorum, the pomp and circumstance and the tradition and the majesty of it all. I think that's why I love the holidays so much.
I have a tiny A-frame farm house so that is a lot for one person! I collect Christmas ornaments and I think that I get lost in all of the magic of it. What the season means, the idea that there is this hope that we can all gather around at this time of year, regardless of what you believe or what you celebrate. It's the time of year that I think calls on us to be a little bit better and hopefully spread some joy.
We will see some quintessential Nina West holiday tracks on "A Drag Queen Christmas" tour, but we also hope to see some tracks from your latest album "The Very Queen" as well. I have been working on this EP off and on since the pandemic. "The Princess Song" was written during the pandemic. A version of "You Are The Dream" was written during the pandemic, but then we really changed and shifted to really encapsulate it in the "All Stars" experience. It was "When You Wish Upon A Star"-themed, which I really leaned into. "The Very Queen" is a celebration of every queen who has ever walked into the Werk Room. It was just wanting to really benchmark the five years of my life since I was on Season 11 to now, remind people of who I am and bring out another level of camp and fabulousness that exists in my drag.
The line, "Hereâ€TMs to the misfit kid watching this alone" on "Itâ€TMs Giving (Drag is For Everyone)" audibly chokes people up, including me just now. I don't think Iâ€TMve heard a more relatable line for so many in a song. For me ["RuPaulâ€TMs Drag Race"] was a mother kind of show. It was the Oscars or the Tonys â€" or the Academy Awards when Howard Ashmanâ€TMs partner posthumously accepted an Academy Award when he won for "Beauty and the Beast." That sticks out in my mind as a queer awakening and that was so long ago. Now ,these kids have "RuPaulâ€TMs Drag Race" and theyâ€TMre consuming it all over the world in small towns whether or not family members or parents know it. Itâ€TMs an access point to seeing themselves and I think that speaking directly to the person at home and telling them theyâ€TMre going to be OK is really important. Itâ€TMs also why I chose The Trevor Project and I wanted to reflect that in my final performance on the show.
Itâ€TMs always about leaving the generation behind us just a tiny bit better than we actually had it, donâ€TMt you think? Yeah! And you know what we have to do. We have to remind these kids who are consuming the show â€" who are LGBTQ and existing and engaging in a world of social media that is not necessarily always kind and pleasant â€" that they will have a task thrust onto them as well; to do this very same thing for the next generation. So we have to lead with kindness. We have to lead with love. We have to gesture in with this sense of how do we leave it better than we found it?
If you could do any show, what do you think it would be? Well you know, the 25th Anniversary of "Hairspray" is coming up and my hope is that they consider a Broadway revival of it. I am going to put my vote in now to revive Edna. I would love for them to consider [me for] Miss Hannigan in "Annie." I would love to be Miss Hannigan. I would love to go into "Hamilton" as King George. I would love to play the dentist in "Little Shop of Horrors," a big character part!
Nina West will perform in "A Drag Queen Christmas" 10th Anniversary Tour at 8 p.m. on Nov. 18 at Keswick Theatre, 291 N Keswick Ave., Glenside, PA. For more information or to purchase tickets, visit keswicktheatre.com .
