Makayla Couture became the latest queen to exit Canada’s Drag Race: All Stars, but she exited the competition after being in one of Canada’s Drag Race‘s most iconic lip-syncs to date.
The Season 5 runner-up was eliminated after landing in the bottom two following an ad challenge, where she lip-synced against Aurora Matrix. She joins Jackie Cox, Pythia and Juice Boxx as the fourth queen sent home from the competition, as with the other queens once again withheld the Golden Beaver from her
In an exit interview with BLKCinema.com, she opened up about being targeted as a threat, her strategy inside the competition, the judges’ critiques and how her faith is shaping what comes next.
“I thought I was going to have a little bit more alliances [laughs],” she said. “I thought we were about to battle to the end, scheme and scam, but it did not work out that way.”
She says wanted to compete with the best, not eliminate them
Asked whether her strategy was to take out strong competitors early or go head-to-head with them, she said she preferred the latter, even though the other queens’ approach proved effective.
“My strategy, for me personally, I did want to make it to the end with the best,” she said. “I wanted to be able to get to the top four and be like, wow, this is the best of the cast, the cream of the crop, and feel like this is a fair competition. But at the end of the day, if you take them out early, you still beat the competition. So hats off to the girls and what they did, because they have been getting from Jackie to Pythia to Juice, then me. They are hitting us like crazy.”
She refused to twist her pleas to the other queens
Couture said she stayed honest during her case to the cast rather than shaping her words around what might keep her safe, even knowing her reputation as a threat worked against her.
“My mindset was so focused on having a good time while I was there so that I could watch something back that would feed my soul, that I didn’t twist any of my reasonings to stay, any of my pleas,” she said. “I wanted to be straight up and honest and be like, ‘Listen, this is what it is. I’ve helped all y’all out. I did my absolute best with what I got, and this is your moment. Do you want to help me or not?’ And the girls had already been saying around the room that they had seen me, Aurora, [and] Pythia as really big competition. So I knew it was always in the back of their head. If Makayla’s in the bottom, we got to boot her out, and they sure damn did.”
Couture said her spirituality and upbringing has shaped how she is processing the loss, as she seemed very content with her exit on-screen in last week’s episode.
“I’m a very spiritual person. I grew up in the church, so I grew up very Christian, very religious,” she said. “Now I’ve gotten to a point where I know that the universe has me. The universe got me. She is always protecting me, and she knows what path I need to go on. And if this isn’t my time, there is something bigger and better waiting for me. I just need to open that door. I don’t know what’s next. I don’t know what the next big thing is going to be, but I know that it’s going to be something that’s going to keep the people buzzing. You know you can’t have Makayla Couture without a little buzz.”
The cast leaned into authenticity, which led to dramatic ‘Untucked’ moments
Couture says that the cast actually didn’t know they were making good television during Untucked, but were just authentically being themselves.
“The whole competition is a pressure cooker, and it’s made to make these moments happen,” she said. “We were just being as raw and real as we could. Whenever I was not in the hot seat and I got to sit back and just watch what was happening, I love this show, I love reality TV, so I’m watching it like I’m at home. I really did feel like for a majority of the cast, the cameras were not there for a lot of us, and we really were trying to be our authentic selves the entire time through. That’s how it makes great TV, by us being our true self.”
Makayla Couture felt ‘robbed’ in the girl group challenge
Couture said she was blindsided landing in the bottom after the girl group challenge, admitting the judges’ feedback stung and she does agree with some fans that she was robbed.
“Yeah, you know what? Yeah. I was going to sugarcoat it, but no, yeah, I felt robbed in that moment,” she said. “Even when we were filming it, I was thinking maybe a potentially just a cute little safe and I’ll be happy with that, I’ll be good with that. But for bottom, girl, I swear to God, I could feel my head spinning around [laughs]. I felt like, ‘What the hell is happening?’ But you know what? Jimbo, Priyanka and Brooke Lynn [Hytes] have a specific taste, and it wasn’t my taste.”
She also responded to the judges’ critiques that she may have dimmed her own light to allow others to shine in group challenges.
“I know that, naturally, I just am extremely empathetic and want to help out with everyone. I’m very motherly, I guess you could say, where immediately when I know someone needs help with something, I’m like, ‘I’m there, I got you,’” she said. “So in both situations, both the girl group and now this political ad challenge, I really just tried to help out as much as I can. And maybe that was my hindrance. I probably should’ve just threw the pearls and watched the girls fall. But again, going back to that, I want to come back and have fun and be able to leave, no matter where I land in this situation, and know that a bitch had a good time. So that was the main thing for me, and the cookie crumbled how it crumbled.”
Featured image photo credit: Photo: World of Wonder
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