Megan Fox Before and After 2 !!!
“Supermodel”
was released in late 1992, and the ensuing fame seemed unprecedented.
Whereas drag performers like Divine had achieved cult stardom, RuPaul
was a self-styled “Supermodel of the World,” his heels firmly planted in
the mainstream. He appeared frequently on VH1, guested on “The Arsenio
Hall Show” and became the face of the Viva Glam line of MAC cosmetics.
(The company brought back the ads last fall.)
It
seems implausible in hindsight: Even before Ellen DeGeneres came out,
America embraced a black female impersonator with the subversive message
“We’re born naked, and the rest is drag.”
“I
go into everything thinking it’s going to be a huge hit,” Mr. Charles
said. “But usually the rest of the world isn’t up to speed.” He had left
his offices on Hollywood Boulevard, and was promenading down the
Hollywood Walk of Fame. As the stars for Eartha Kitt and Vincente
Minnelli passed underfoot, a man yelled from a moving car, “I love you,
Ru!”
“I love you too, baby,” he called back.
For
Mr. Charles, fame — like everything — is part of what he calls “the
hoax.” “There are only two types of people in the world,” he said.
“There are the people who understand that this is a matrix” — he knocked
on an iron gate, to prove its unreality — “and then there are the
people who buy it lock, stock and barrel.” To him, drag exposes
everything else as a charade. “Drag has always been under fire, because
people resent anyone who breaks the fourth wall,” he said.
It
was the hoax, he said, that led him to self-medicate with drugs and
alcohol, until he gave them up in 1999. As he entered his 40s, he felt
the cultural tide (and his career prospects) receding. “I could feel the
wind change,” he said of the antsy Sept. 11 era. “The same way that
very few animals were harmed in the tsunami. They knew in advance to
head up the hill.”
He
spent the next few years lying low, hosting barbecues in his West
Hollywood home and getting to know his nieces and nephews. (His longtime
partner, Georges LeBar, lives on a 50,000-acre ranch in Wyoming. They
see each other about every two months.) He describes his career slowdown
as a time of reflection. He had been fame-obsessed or famous all his
life. What was it all for?