An interview with Etcetera Etcetera: “I can be a glamourous showgirl, and also be a giant cockroach.”

Ever since she stomped onto Sydney’s drag scene, the “Glamour Bug” Etcetera Etcetera has been titillating audiences with her hilarious and provocative performances, witty personality, and exuberant fashion sense. After breaking out in season one of RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under, Etcetera has been booked and busy, performing on national tours, walking runways internationally, and just generally being an icon.

Etcetera spoke to William Winter to discuss her upcoming solo show Big Screen, Small Queen (Everything I Didn’t Learn at Film School), why exactly they’re so inspired by cockroaches, and her time on Drag Race.

Why don’t you start by introducing yourself?

My name is Etcetera Etcetera, I use They/She pronouns, I’m currently living on Gadigal Land, and I am a drag artist, cultural provocateur, old school cross-dresser, and a good time party girl, just beamed from a dumpster somewhere in the form of a glamorous cockroach.

Can you tell us a little bit about your upcoming stage show Big Screen, Small Queen (Everything I Didn’t Learn at Film School)?

I always fantasised about directing films and working on film sets throughout my teenage years. Then I went to film school, and even after a couple of months there I just hated it. I felt like I was walled out by this impenetrable boys club of, it’s very trendy now to say it, but nepo-babies. I was a seventeen-year-old queer kid who moved to Sydney all on my own to start following my dream.

So I actually fell into doing drag because I hated film school so much, I was going out to clubs all the time, and very slowly I discovered that the things I loved about film, I also loved about drag: storytelling, costuming, creating a narrative, and I very slowly transferred everything I loved about film into drag. I drag and dropped, excuse the pun [laughs].

The show is basically an expositional version of my backstory told by me as the main character on a film set about my life. It’s very funny, it’s very silly, and I’ll be very beautiful, which I think is a drawcard. Whatever happened to glamour?

What drew you to film school originally?

I wanted to be a director. As a queer person growing up without people around me, I had to create my own world to get a sense of control over my life. I think that’s why I ended up falling into drag, because that’s what I do every day of my life. That sounds so tacky and kitschy and good-feely, but it’s actually true, and I think it’s very special to share that feeling with people. I’m doing this for me, because it inspires me to get up in the morning.

What films or film creatives have inspired your drag today?

The first film that I was obsessed with was Muriel’s Wedding. I thought it was almost my story; “I’m moving to Sydney and my life’s as good as dancing queen, woo-hoo, everything is great.” It’s very hyper-real, in that, it’s a caricature but emotionally impactful. I was obsessed with how two things can be true at once: you can live in a shit hole, and be the most fantastically glamorous, amazing person in the world. I can be a glamorous showgirl and also be a giant cockroach.

Can you tell us a little bit more about the cockroach?

Yeah! Well, we live in Sydney, we all are aware of the humble creature known as the cockroach. I was living in a share house, and I was microwaving some beautiful, cheesy, tinned spaghetti for dinner, which fit into my budget at the time, and there was a cockroach doing backstroke. It’s so ridiculous and summed up where my life was at that moment.

So I posted on Facebook marketplace asking does anyone have a cockroach costume, and this random girl turned up at my house, gave me this Halloween costume, she said “you don’t have to pay me for it, I just want to get rid of it.” I never saw her again, and I started doing this cockroach number. I poured tinned spaghetti all over myself, pretended to be the cockroach I found in my microwave, and I thought “I’ll do it once, it’ll be a one-time thing,” but I’ve never done anything in drag which people, at least here in the Inner West, have resonated with more.

It’s become a symbol of resilience, of queer people and the fact that they’re seen as gross vermin by a lot of conservatives and right-wing politicians, and I kind of reclaimed that. “Yeah you might see us as disgusting, but we’ll outlive all of you, and we’ll continue to proliferate and be in your houses and homes and communities and there’s nothing you can do about it cause we exist.”

You talk about breaking into the film industry as a “less-than-mainstream artist”. Where do you see yourself and your art style in reference to this idea of “the mainstream”?

As soon as you, as a queer artist, become commercially successful, you have to grapple with this very hairy question that is, “when am I not telling my story anymore?” Learning to take control of your narrative, to exist outside the mainstream, is just to be honest and authentic. You kind of have to say no to stuff. There’ve been times where I know I should take a job, but it doesn’t read as me, and then I see another queen do it and I think “it makes so much sense for you.”

Someone like, for example, a massive collaborator of mine, Art Simone, is a drag queen drag queen, she is foam wigs and glitter everywhere and the whole she-bang. Sometimes she’ll get offered gigs that are a bit more political or subdued, something which isn’t her, and I’ll get offered gigs where I have to be the biggest drag queen in the world, and we’ll independently be like “that’s not for me,” and the other person gets those gigs. It’s about learning how to market yourself in a way to still be authentic.

I also love doing things where I’m not gonna make money off it. I do a lot of work with the Bobby Goldsmith foundation, which is Australia’s oldest HIV charity, and the work I get to do with them is the most fulfilling work that I do across my portfolio. If we uplift everyone else then we’re all uplifted, we’re all higher off the ground then when we started, which I think is great.

The show is called Everything I Didn’t Learn at Film School. Can you give me one thing you did learn at film school?

Never assume that buying your lunch is a luxury you can afford. I would’ve spent probably equal to my tuition fees on getting food from the film school campus, and it adds up. I could’ve put a deposit down on an apartment in Sydney if I didn’t buy so many Bondi Burgers.

Pack a lunch and be nice to everyone. They’re the two rules to live by, and I’m pretty sure they’re in the 10 Commandments to be honest. Thou shalt not kill, thou shalt pack a lunch, thou shalt be lovely.

The production you’re doing is part of Sydney World Pride through Pride Amplified. What does it mean for you to be performing your own material during this international extravaganza?

It feels so good. So often I get told what to do or get handed things, and to be able to sit down and write a script and have control over the creative decisions and collaborate with people, it’s all I’ve ever wanted as an artist and a performer.

I think World Pride and all the events associated have done a good job in telling the stories of the multitude of queer identities which exist in this country, especially Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander queer talents and the trans community. People that are coming internationally have a chance to see how we do diversity here, and I think there’s a lot of richness in our queer community that should be appreciated and platformed.

Speaking as a drag race fan, are you emotionally prepared to be bombarded with Absolutely Everybody by Vanessa Amorosi during World Pride events?

[Laughs] Let me tell you, I used to perform that song four or five times a week, like that was a go to of mine, and I still perform that song. Every time I hear it, I think of standing there watching Maxi [Shield] pull out her rhinestone microphone and being so gagged. The minute she did it I was like, “bitch, I haven’t got a chance in hell, she’s sending me packing boots.” So I’m just gonna have fun, and I can’t wait to go home and eat some real food again, because the on-set catering was not good. So, yeah, I don’t have negative associations with that song, and I love it so much. I think it should be the National Anthem.

With shows like Drag Race getting so much bigger in Australia, how does the kind of drag you see on Drag Race compare to the drag scene in Greater Sydney/Australia?

I believe the biggest problem with Drag Race Down Under is its representation. We saw that in the first season, and I don’t necessarily mean in terms of numbers, but more so the stories that they tell on the show. Some of my favourite moments on Drag Race are the moments when I actually get to learn about an experience that is not my own, and get let into a world through someone speak authentically about their own experience.

I think there’s so many incredible older Australian drag queens who worked throughout the AIDS epidemic and helped build up this scene to where it is today who’d be amazing to see on Drag Race. There’s so many incredible Indigenous drag queens who could tell their stories on that platform, and I mean we’re yet to have the same representation for trans people on the show as other franchises, which is a shame, because we have a tradition of incredible trans performers here, especially in Sydney with Les Girls, Carlotta, Trans Glamoré with Victoria Anthony. I wish the world could see what I see working in the Australian drag scene, because it’s so much richer and full of life and special stories that don’t get shown on the show.

I will say, one of the best non-binary representations we’ve ever had on Australian TV is you on season one, and Art Simone’s amazing read. Do people still talk about that?

The number one moment I get tagged in online is clips of that read. She’s just so clever and so smart and so funny, it’s such a respectful way to not be a transphobe and also read someone down. Like, she got me gal. I think people need to realise that you can have funny conversations with trans people about trans people, as long as you’re respectful. It’s also nice to have my pronouns re-affirmed on an international TV show. Being a non-binary person and being scared sometimes to tell people I work with my pronouns, having it broadcast across the world was really affirming.

One more question about Drag Race: Was RuPaul in the room?

Yes, yes, 100% RuPaul was there. I smelt her, I felt the wind as she walked past me, and I saw the infamous track pants she wears underneath her gowns behind the desk. She was there!

Thank you so much for your time Etcetera! What can we expect to see from Etcetera Etcetera after this legendary production?

I’m hopefully going to take it around the country on more of a lil’ tour. I’m releasing a new single with Art Simone. I usually post everything on my socials, and if I don’t, you’ll probably hear about it somewhere.

You can catch Etcetera Etcetera’s solo show Big Screen, Small Queen (Everything I Didn’t Learn at Film School), presented during World Pride, at KXT from the 11^th to the 23^rd of February.