You’re the reigning champion of “RuPaul’s Drag Race All-Stars.” Where did your drag alter ego, Trixie Mattel, come from? As a kid, I wasn’t allowed to have girl toys, but I would take my cousin’s My Little Pony and smell it. That weird synthetic, fruity-sweet smell — that’s how I wanted to look. I wanted to look like this fabricated toy. I wanted to look like you could pull a string on my back, and I would say, like, six catchphrases.

Who were your drag inspirations? Were there any human beings? Barbie is at the top of the list. I mean, she’s as real as anybody to me. In society we are what we’re dressed as. If you’re backstage, wearing all black with a headset on, you’re a stage manager. If somebody knocks on your car window, you wouldn’t open it — but if he’s dressed as a policeman, you would. And with Barbie, it’s the same toy from the same mold from the same factory, but if she has a lab coat on, she’s a vet. If she has an astronaut suit on, she’s an astronaut. Drag is a parody of all that. Everyone knows we’re not what we’re dressing as.

You’ve also released two well-received country-music albums. Did you start playing music before you were doing drag? I lived deep in the country in northern Wisconsin. I didn’t have any neighbors or anything, so in the summers, I played guitar for hours and hours every day until I was about 18. I never thought about combining it with drag, ’cause to me, well, drag queens don’t play guitar. Now I’m like — you idiot, that’s an opportunity.

You also do stand-up as part of your act. Is it hard to get people to come with you from the sort of jokey part of your act to an earnest love song about heartbreak? I thought it would be, but it isn’t. I think it’s because comedy is such a great lubricant. It makes an audience feel for you. And in my comedy, most of the time, I’m the butt of the joke. Comedy gets the audience to come down that road with me.