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GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE

February 13, 2009

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www.GayPeoplesChronicle.com

America's next top queen

Move over, Tyra. RuPaul has TV's newest drag superstar, and she could be from Cleveland

by Anthony Glassman

Tyra Banks earned herself legions of gay fans with her competition/reality show America's Next Top Model, in which a gaggle of young women duke it out for a modeling contract.

Now RuPaul and the Logo network

Fashion journalist Merle Ginsberg, designer Santino Rice and RuPaul, joined by a rotating cast of celebrity guest judges, hold the fate of the queens in their hands.

Akashia, being the hometown girl she is, took time from her manic schedule to talk to her favorite LGBT news-

Akashia is also known for her association with her "sister" Shari Turner, Miss Black Gay Ohio 2008.

"Shari is the evil twin and I'm the good one, so I think we should market that," Akashia laughed. "Two beautiful black drag queens."

Akashia described herself as one of

are raising the stakes with RuPaul's Drag Race, following a similar formula but adding in one delicious twist: All the contestants are drag queens, and RuPaul will crown the winner the next drag superstar.

Among the nine divine creatures gracing the screen in this battle royal is a familiar face to clubgoers in northeast Ohio-Cleveland's own Akashia is a contestant, and had to lip-sync for her life in the first episode.

The first episode, which debuted on February 2, featured a "design on a dime" challenge, in which the competitors had to show just what they could do with thrift store fashions.

Unfortunately for Akashia, she and Victoria Parker were the two lowest vote-getters according to the judges, and they had to work, sashay and "shantay" to RuPaul's worldwide hit "Supermodel."

Akashia survived her brush with death to live another week.

paper, but she was a little tight-lipped about her strategy.

"If there were secret plans to kick the other girls' asses, I couldn't tell you!" she laughed.

While the program is grounded in competition, that doesn't mean the queens were always at each others' throats.

"I loved all the girls on the show. some more than others," she said. "We are all fighting for the same prize.”

Akashia got her start in Cleveland, and that is where her heart is for now. If fame and fortune come knocking at her door, though, she's ready to answer.

"It's my home and I'll be here until it's time for me to move away, which might be soon once this show airs and I blow up!" she said. "I've been working at Bounce for six years, it's a very wonderful place, it's where I made my start. But it will be time to move on soon-there's only so much me that Ohio can take."

Akashia

the most outspoken contestants on the show, and she was not afraid to talk about who she likes and dislikes.

Merle Ginsberg, for instance, she liked, "because she was the nicest and sweetest to me, and Santino was an ass and called me tragic, which was not right because he did not win his competition."

Rice was a competitor on Project Runway, another contest show focusing on fashion design.

Akashia didn't hesitate to say which of her fellow competitors was her favorite.

"Nina Flowers," she said, referring to the punk-rock Puerto Rican. “Nina is amazing, she was like everyone's mother. She talked to everyone, helped everyone."

After the show is over, Akashia has big plans.

"I will go on a nationwide hunt for my baby-daddy, I will be the next New York," she said. "My puppy needs a

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