Dublin Drag Dynasty

Bonnie Ann Clyde, a Dublin-born diva, made history this year by becoming the first queen from the Republic of Ireland to compete on RuPaul’s Drag Race UK. Conor O’Doherty caught up with Bonnie to recount her journey to, through and beyond the show.

Photos by Retoucher Ryan.

Born James Keogh in Dublin, Bonnie is now based in Manchester and has lived and worked in Gran Canaria and San Francisco. The name, Bonnie Ann Clyde, is a loving ode to the queen’s late cats, Bonnie and Clyde. Bonnie may be no stranger to TV, but her recent run on RuPaul’s Drag Race UK turned out to be an experience unlike any other.

When asked about her time on the show, Bonnie described it as a dream come true.

“It’s been a lot, very overwhelming, and there’s been lots of different elements to it, but overall, it’s been a very positive experience,” she said. “I’m very happy with how it’s gone, it’s just great so far.”

One element of production that took a little getting used to was the eternally running cameras.

“You can kind of speak whenever you want and everything gets picked up. When you first arrive, that’s a little bit overwhelming,” she said. “You’re like, ‘Oh my God. There are so many cameras, there are so many different angles, and you’re mic’d all the time.' So you’re always on. That makes it a little bit more difficult.”

During her run on the show, Bonnie won an impressive two RuPeter Badges (the prize received for winning a challenge, and an ever-present marker of a contestant’s success on the show). One such win was for the Snatch Game, a comedy challenge renowned for its difficulty. Bonnie’s blinder of a play on the show came to a shocking end when, on episode eight, the makeover challenge, she was sadly eliminated.

Many fans of the show were dismayed by this, as Bonnie was the first-ever Snatch Game winner in Drag Race UK herstory to not reach the finale. Another unforgivable blow to the Irish people from the UK, and one we won’t soon forget, no doubt.

We asked Bonnie where her undeniable sense of humour and trademark wit came from, and if it was always a focal point of her drag.

“I think I’ve always been a bit of an attention seeker,” she said. “The easiest way, I think, to get attention if you’re not a 10 out of 10 attractive person, is to essentially just be funny. So I think I’ve always really strived to kind of just be the funniest person in the room, even if I’m not, which is not easy when you’re in a room full of drag queens who are naturally gifted comedians as well. I’ve always just been the one cracking jokes, and I’m a big fan of dad jokes and witty puns.”

She added: “If I see an opportunity to make a pun about something, I will, and it sends people somehow. Some people like it. It’s worked so far!”

In terms of flying the flag for the Republic, Bonnie admitted that there was “a lot of pressure”, but ultimately, it was a “nice badge of honour”.

“It also gives you a little bit of an advantage, because you’ve got a unique selling point that’s not just your drag character,” she said. “You’ve got where you’re from. I think I really just wanted to represent my drag, but also then, as much as possible, talk about Irish drag and get it on a global stage because I think it might be an opportunity for more of us to get on the show in the future, which I think would be good for the nation.”

While Bonnie may be the first to represent the Republic on the Drag Race platform, there is certainly no shortage of drag history and excellence across the entire island.

“Ireland has such a wide range of drag,” she said. “If we’re talking about just getting a select few girls, if we’re not doing an entire Irish season, then I think girls like Polly Glamorous, Mizza, and Robyn Diamonds would be great to compete on Drag Race. I think Ireland just has such a great eclectic range of drag queens who do a lot of different things, but I think the thing that we all kind of carry is we are all very, very good at what we do, because it’s such a small scene and it’s quite competitive. You have to be good to do well. We all look great, we all have a real distinctive sense of style. So, I think whoever they got on would do a great job of representing.”

While Bonnie knocked it out of the park for the south, she is not the only Irish queen on the season, sharing the honour with Belfast-based Elle Vosque, who went on to place second with two wins of her own.

“When I first saw that Elle was there, I was like ‘Okay, great. Now I can’t just rely on the Irish thing’”, Bonnie said. “In the end, it worked out being really nice because it just meant that I had someone in the room that I could connect with on a different level. All the girls on the cast are fab and we all get on really well, but there is a sense of camaraderie and a sense of familiarity with another Irish person. I knew just based on the fact that we’re both from Ireland and we want to represent the country, that there was always gonna be at least one person in the room who would want me to do well and would have my back and would support me.”

Bonnie and Elle took this camaraderie on the road during the airing of season seven with the Tuck of the Irish tour, treating fans across Ireland to several shows.

“We first went to Belfast, then we did Dublin, then we did Cork. We had such a good time. It was so nice to be back in Dublin,” Bonnie said. “I’ve come back for a couple gigs here and there, but nothing like that. So it was just great to see everyone, and I guess do a little homecoming, a bit of a celebration for that, and to meet everybody, and everyone was just so happy to have Irish Drag Race girls there, which is nice!”

Bonnie’s two wins on the show should come as no surprise, considering she has cut her teeth in several scenes, each with their own culture and work style to be adapted to.

“Every single scene that I’ve worked in over the years has been very different,” she said. “In Dublin, the gigs are happening occasionally. Unless you’re one of the main girls, you’re not going to be working all the time. It’s not something you can really do. Dublin was really fun and I had a great time there and it was my start in drag. It gave me that sense of fun with drag.”

After her Dublin beginnings, Bonnie found work in Gran Canaria, which strengthened her work ethic.

“It became a case of ‘Okay, well I’m doing this five nights a week, and I have to adapt and make sure that I am putting in the work,’” she said. “It was still fun. It was great, but I really wanted to give that level of polish to it and do that all the time. So, Gran Canaria was good in that sense.” Later, in Manchester, she hustled further.

“It’s going back from being secure in a job five nights a week, to then you are hustling to make sure that you’re earning enough money to get by, because I wanted to keep drag as my full-time job. So, it’s all very different,” she said. “I’ve had great experiences across all the different places, but I’m happy right now in the UK. I think it’s given me the biggest opportunity out of all of them so far. So I’m very grateful for that.”

This season is only the start, though. When asked about the future, Bonnie said she is keen to continue creating her own opportunities.

“Drag Race gives you the opportunities to go and do other things because you get your name out there quite quickly,” she said. “But you have to kind of then make your own opportunities. So I would love to do a lot more film and TV stuff. I won the acting challenge, so if there’s anyone who’s [working on] TV shows, I mean, come on, you can cast me! I would love to do that. And then, who knows, maybe a one-woman show, maybe my very own TV show. We could do Bonnie Ann Clyde’s Drag Race, and I can judge people from my pedestal. We’ll see how it goes!”

If there’s one thing we know for certain, Bonnie is an absolute star and a credit to drag entertainers both in Ireland and the world over, and we wish her the best of luck in her future adventures.