Royal Crown Prince Patrick Noonan, Grand Duchess Landa Lakes, Grand Duke Carlos Medal-Romanoff and Royal Crown Princess Pollo Del Mar lit up the Ducal Council’s float in this year’s Pride Parade.

Notorious Sainted Glamazon About Town

It was past midnight early Tuesday morning when the first set of images from Jose Guzman-Colon arrived in my email box. Despite every fiber of my flu-riddled body crying out to stay in bed, I dragged myself up to examine the results of my Pink Saturday photo shoot with the photographic genius behind the upcoming coffee table book Glam Gender.  

After all, I thought, one of these images would grace the July 17 cover of the Dore Alley Street Fair issue of GLOSS magazine. I’d be damned if a few – ok, maybe a lot – of sore muscles, a little diarrhea, nausea and a pounding headache were going to keep me from taking that first peek. 

Considering I had been struggling with this God-forsaken cold during our arduous six-hour session, I was absolutely shocked how gorgeous the images turned out. In one set, I look like a larger-than-life dominatrix towering over two scantily clad subjects played to delicious perfection by Michael Turner and Michael Lamb. 

In another series, I was transformed into a raven - and fiery-haired, otherworldly Goddess reigning over the same two, barely clothed minions. The photos are everything I had hoped for – yet feared completely impossible because of my inner, physical turmoil.

For days prior to our shoot, through the entire last week of The Golden Girls: More Gay Pride Episodes, in fact, I could barely pull myself together. The last two nights of the show, in particular, the best I could do was hope to make it through to the final curtain. 

Things certainly didn’t bode well for me to capture a magazine cover-worthy image in that condition. However, knowing Jennifer Schultz had spent hours cutting out vintage bondage magazine covers and Anjie Myma spent ample time taping those into a back drop, and because the photographer, other models, stylist and my personal assistant were already booked, I knew we had no choice but to go forward.

By the time I arrived at Jose’s fabulous Lower Haight apartment for the photo shoot, I was already feeling rather wiped out. Earlier in the day, I joined Grand Duchess Landa Lakes, former Grand Duchesses Sophylia Leggz and Collette LeGrande, Keira Bella, Bill Jennings, “Mr. Royal Bunny 2009” Matt Renck (my little Otter Del Mar), “Mr. White Knight 2009” Javier Ruiz and Grand Duke V Fred Townson working the gates at Pride. Between the heat and whatever nasty little cold I’ve been brewing, it felt like an accomplishment just making up the flight of stairs to where we’d be shooting.
Thankfully, Miss Nix – who was on-board as Jose’s assistant for the shoot – was able to work wonders as I basically passed out while she went to town on my face. Not only did she paint me for the gods, as drag queens often say, she styled me like you wouldn’t believe. And how she managed to get me into some of those outfits, short of a pound of Crisco and prayer, I’m not sure. 

Once the shoot was in full-swing, Jose – who is known to many fans of Trannyshack as the legendary Putanesca – proved to be the perfect combination of cheerleader and drill sergeant to keep me motivated. Even when I could barely keep my eyes open, she pushed for one final set of images. And, I’ll admit, having a drop-dead gorgeous guy wearing nothing but boots and a rubber apron to use as a man-prop helped a little as well.
Once I was able to soak up those oh-so-secret images, I knew it was time to get back to bed. Even though I can dress up like, be photographed as and sometimes compare my secret-identity-filled life to some kind of drag superhero, with a simple little cold kicking my ass, it was abundantly clear that I’m not.  

And though, days later, I’m still under the weather and waiting for this damn flu to pass, I’m doing it with a smile on my face. As soon as I can, I’ll share those images with you here. I just wanted you to know, in advance, what was really happening behind that glamour. Now you know the story behind the smile.

Vote to See “The Glamazon” in Round 3 of RuPaul’s Drag Race.  http://RuPaulCasting.com/people/PolloDelMar