The LA-based drag queen and performer is the host of RuPaul’s Drag Race, a reality TV competition in which men transform into their drag alter egos and complete challenges, including a runway ‘walk off’, in an effort to be crowned the ultimate queen.

MUSIC

Music is my life. La Flavour’s ‘Mandolay’ is a disco classic — I dare you to sit still while listening to it. Then there’s Brainstorm’s ‘Lovin’ is Really My Game’. Oh… My… God. I’m getting hot just thinking about it.

BOOK

George Orwell’s Animal Farm explains a lot about who and where we are right now, but I’d also recommend Marianne Williamson’s A Return to Love. Both those books epitomise the illusory nature of the world we live in. Drag is there to remind culture not to take itself too seriously. All of this is illusion.

CATCHPHRASE

Since I was a kid I’ve collected catchphrases. My mother got me on to it. Her favourite was: ‘I don’t lend, I don’t borrow and I don’t visit.’ I loved it, but my favourite would have to be: ‘You’re born naked and the rest is drag.’

FILMS

The Wizard of Oz is my favourite. It explains what life on this planet is about. Although Dorothy reaches Oz, she finds she had what she needed to go back to Kansas all along, but the Good Witch tells her that she had to learn it for herself. All of the answers to the meaning of life are there.

TRAVEL

I always bring an orange scarf, not just so I can wear it or tuck it into my pocket, but also so I can throw it over a lamp in the hotel room. Orange is my favourite colour and it gives a lovely warm ambience.

PEOPLE

Queen Elizabeth is so elegant. She’s reigned for so long and does it with such ease and grace. I love beauty, colour, music and freedom, and I think she does, too. And we both love those corgis. I think we’d get along.

FASHION

My favourite dress is a pink animal-print silk organza number, custom-made by the designer Zandi. Proportionally I look good in a dress, and animal print on someone who’s 6ft 4in, with big hair and heels, can blow a person’s socks off.

EXERCISE

At 4am I’m up, meditating; at 5am I’m in the gym on the treadmill; by 6.30am I’m hiking in the Franklin Canyon Park in Beverly Hills. There’s no one there, so I listen to Aretha Franklin and breathe in the clean air. I used to party until closing time and wake up in the afternoon. As you get older, you have to make sacrifices.

RuPaul's Drag Race: Season 4 queens - in pictures 14 show all RuPaul's Drag Race: Season 4 queens - in pictures 1/14 Season 4: The contestants 2/14 Phi Phi O'Hara 3/14 Sharon Needles 4/14 Milan 5/14 Madame LaQueer 6/14 Latrice Royale 7/14 Lashauwn Beyond 8/14 Kenya Michaels 9/14 Jiggly Caliente 10/14 Dida Ritz 11/14 Chad Michaels 12/14 Alisa Summers 13/14 Willam 14/14 The Princess 1/14 Season 4: The contestants 2/14 Phi Phi O'Hara 3/14 Sharon Needles 4/14 Milan 5/14 Madame LaQueer 6/14 Latrice Royale 7/14 Lashauwn Beyond 8/14 Kenya Michaels 9/14 Jiggly Caliente 10/14 Dida Ritz 11/14 Chad Michaels 12/14 Alisa Summers 13/14 Willam 14/14 The Princess

FOOD

My parents are from Louisiana, so I always go for hot sauce. I put Cholula or Frank’s sauce on scrambled eggs in the morning. If I’m trying to lose weight, I eat a lot of grilled chicken and the way to flavour that up is to have plenty of toppings. The English palate is very different from the American one — you guys like to throw a fried egg on everything.

EMOJI

Facebook has an unofficial emoji of me — it’s got my blond wig, brown skin and it’s doing a pose I do on the runway. I pull it out whenever I say: ‘Gentlemen, start your engines, and may the best woman win!’

RuPaul’s Drag Race is on truTV on Mondays and Tuesdays at 10pm. It is followed by the behind-the-scenes RuPaul’s Drag Race: Untucked