God Save the Queens: Here Come RuPaul’s All-Stars for Season 3

Welcome to the anything-but-flat screen, as the queens from RuPaul’s Drag Race All-Stars Season 3 gathered to play nice together — maybe for the last time.

On a chilly windy Manhattan night, the queens strolled the red carpet in their finest — or at least their most outrageous looks — to chat with members of the press in advance of the show’s premiere January 25 on VH-1, the new network home that welcomed the original Emmy-winning Drag Race when it jumped networks last year.

Over the course of the series, Metrosource will be rolling out our exclusive interviews with each of the rivals.

This season’s returning contestants include Milk (season 6), BenDeLaCreme (season 6), Morgan McMichaels (season 2), Trixie Mattel (season 7), Thorgy Thor (season 8), Kennedy Davenport (season 7), Aja (season 9), and the always-a-bridesmaid, never-a-bride Drag Race veteran Shangela, from seasons 2 and 3 of the parent series. In snippets leaked of Season 8, fourth-place finisher Chi Chi DeVayne is seen staking her claim in the cast by executing a death-defying aerial full spit while her rivals look on with astonished appreciation.

The event Wednesday night just off Times Square was a combination cocktail party and round-table interview with each of the queens was stationed at a table as reporters, cameramen and photographers meandered around them as if they were sequined items on a buffet line. Aside from one of the queens tripping over a cables and another developing a rash from her gown, it was an altogether civilized affair free from the catfighting that has become a staple of the show.

But make no mistake: they’re all acutely aware that this is yet another moment in the sun, and an opportunity to burnish their show business legends. Drag Race, and this spin-off, have done more to elevate the art of drag than anything in civilized history. And, like shows that came before, including Will & Grace, Queer As Folk and The L Word, RuPaul’s exploits with her queens has moved this once LGBT-centric art form from the margins of society into the mainstream of American pop culture.