The Diva Rules Read online

  Which all goes back to working the crowd and connecting with people. It’s what I do best, and it’s been one of the cornerstones of my success. So, how do you do it—and do it well?

  Here’s the T:

  THE

  THE DOS AND OH-NO-SHE-BETTER-DON’TS OF WORKING A CROWD:

  DON’T ACT DESPERATE: That’s a big no-no. If you’re trying too hard, you come across as needy, and nobody is endeared to desperation. Instead, pull attention to yourself without crossing the line into obnoxious territory. Where’s that line? You’ll know it if you cross it. Be charming. Be charismatic. Be grand. And laugh at other people’s jokes; it’ll help you come across as confident.

  DON’T GO IT ALONE: The moment you walk into a room, try to find a person you know so you’re at least not standing alone. It’s just harder to work a room by yourself. Having someone by your side, even if you don’t really want to hang out together, can give you both a little sense of much-needed security.

  DON’T TALK POLITICS OR RELIGION: It has no place at a party or at work or, take it from me, in discussions with your mother-in-law. It just never ends well, so don’t even start.

  DON’T LINGER TOO LONG: Leave everybody wanting more of you. If you finally get into a conversation with the person you’ve been most eager to talk to—a potential boss, a casting director, a crush—politely excuse yourself while your banter is still going strong. You want them to feel disappointed that you left them, not happy that you’re gone. And if you ever get cornered in a boring conversation, do not stay in it, because you could be missing something better. My exit strategy is always, “Excuse me, I have to use the bathroom.” Never say you’re getting a drink, because they’ll probably follow you to the bar.

  DON’T ACT SUPERIOR, MAMA: You’re really not. Divas know there’s always somebody else to impress. And if you can connect with anyone, you can belong anywhere.

  DO VISUALIZE SUCCESS: Before you head out to a party, job interview, audition, or performance, spend five to ten minutes alone picturing what it’ll look like when you pull it off flawlessly. When you can see yourself succeeding, it only becomes that much easier to actually do it. All of my friends know that I need to be alone in my dressing room before any performance. I spend that time running my lines. It just helps get me in a positive mind-set and makes me feel like I’ve got a handle on what I need to do.

  DO MAKE AN ENTRANCE: I’m a Virgo, which means I’m always early or on time, but when I want to work a crowd, I show up a little late. I’m not talking an hour late, because I’m not an asshole. I’m talking five to ten minutes late. That way, everybody is waiting for me to arrive. Or, at least in my head they are, and that helps inflate my feelings of self-importance. Try it. It works.

  DO READ THE ROOM: You’ve got to be acutely aware of what’s going on around you so you can match the energy of the room. Are people eating hors d’oeurves? Are they kiki’ing? What’s the talk of the night? You’ve got to feel it out, so you can calibrate yourself.

  DO MAKE EVERYONE FEEL SPECIAL: There’s just no good reason to make anyone else feel bad, so do what you can to try to make everyone around you feel good. They may not remember what you say to them, but they will remember how you made them feel. (This holds true for social media too. My own personal rule: I try to respond to everyone, because I get it. I’m a fan too. What I don’t get is why the f*ck people like Zac Efron have a Twitter, when they so obviously don’t do the upkeep themselves? For better or worse, people are talking to me, and I want them to know I’m listening and I’m human.)

  DO KNOW THAT NO ONE IS BETTER THAN YOU: The only difference between me and you is that most likely, I have bigger tits (that goes for most of the men reading this as well). But, those superficial things aside, we are all the same. Everybody is important. Some people just project that more. Be one of those people.

  rule no. 16:

  FRIEND UP.

  I’ve just recently celebrated the seventeenth anniversary of my twenty-ninth birthday, which means, children, I’ve picked up a little bit of wisdom over the years. And what I’ve learned is that people tend to choose their friends for one of two reasons: 1) They make you feel better because you’re you or 2) they make you feel better because you’re not them. And let me tell you right now, the latter is shit. While it’s admittedly sometimes appealing, especially in moments of insecurity, to surround yourself with the most nonthreatening people you can imagine, it is not what real divas do. You can’t become a diva by default, just because you’re the sparkliest one of a dull bunch, the only diamond among cubic zirconia, the only Louboutin among Payless. Everyone will see through that and, more important, so will you. No, instead, divas seek out fabulousness. We are on it like it’s the warehouse sale at Barney’s. If it exists within a 120-mile radius of us, we will find it. Why? Because to be as grand as we are, we’re in constant need of inspiration. We need to lift each other up. Alone, we are fierce. Together, we’re on fi-yah.

  That is certainly true of Ru and me. When I first saw him back in the clubs, I was completely drawn to him, but honestly, just a bit too intimidated to approach him. I don’t know why. It could’ve been that I was only a kid, barely eighteen, and he had a little more life experience under his wig, or it could’ve been his microscopic miniskirt, his big afro, his even bigger personality, or the fact that he was an intimidating seven feet tall in drag. Of course, I had a load of queens in my life at the time—after all, I was hanging out with the best of the lot in the ballrooms—but I also sensed instantly that there was just something special about Ru. He rules every room he enters, the millisecond he enters it. He just effortlessly owns everyone’s attention, and once he gets it, he doesn’t just suck it up. Instead, he’s like this spectacular prism, reflecting and refracting all that light and love right back at everyone around him. His gift is hard to explain, other than saying this: As fabulous and as beautiful as he is, when you’re in his presence, you suddenly feel more beautiful too.

  I had to know him. I didn’t know how we’d become friends, especially given that I could only muster a “hey, girl” in passing in the clubs, but call it intuition, I just knew instinctively that one day, when the time was right, we somehow would get to know each other.

  So it was kismet when, in 1996, we were serendipitously paired up professionally for the first time on New York City’s brand-new powerhouse radio station, WKTU. That on-air coupling was the start of our lifelong relationship. We became not only instant coworkers, but also instant friends. Our show was broadcast out of a little studio in Jersey City, and since we hosted the morning drive, we had to be there at the ungodly hour of four a.m. every Monday through Friday. Since I was living on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, that meant I had to wake up at two a.m. and leave my little apartment by three a.m. to brave the empty-except-for-rapists subway, and then the PATH train, to Jersey. Ru, however, did not. He was the star of the show, so the station sent a town car for him everyday. It’d wait at his front door in the Village to pick him up and after we’d finished, his driver would drop him back home. Nobody at the station gave a shit if I was riding public transit alone in the middle of the night, but the moment Ru found out, he put an end to it immediately. “Oh no, girl,” he said. “You’re going to take my car.” And that was it. From day two onward, Ru sent his fancy black car and driver to pick me up on our way to work every single day: me first, him second (ahem, like a true gentleman). And in the wee hours of all those mornings, and later in the girls’ room at the station, and even later after the radio show ended when we’d both go to VH1 to tape The RuPaul Show, we’d gossip and kiki, just as we did on the radio and television, and like we still do today. Literally for two years straight, when we weren’t sleeping, Ru and I were together. Our bond was forged then, and to this day, it’s unbreakable.

  We have a strict no-bullshit policy in our friendship. We know each other better than anyone else, and we never pretend to be—or feel like we have to even pretend to be—people we’re not. An
d he’s seen me through some bad shit too. When we started our radio show together, I’d been dating this guy, a stripper by night, psychology PhD student by day named Michael (not to be confused with my ex-fiancé, Michael). We’d been together for four years, and I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with him. He was one of my great loves. And then, one day in May 1996, out of the blue, he called up and broke up with me over the phone. Just like that. Never saw him again. It was torture for me as my heart was shattered beyond recognition.

  That summer, fueled by my devastating heartbreak, I went on a rampage of pure debauchery. I was doing weekend radio gigs at the Jersey shore, and when I was there, I’d basically pick up the hottest flavor-of-the-moment and have my way with anybody who was DTF. My heart was so destroyed that I was just trying to forget everything. Or at least, just Michael. After each of my Saturday night conquests, I’d coldly kick the guy—or girl—or both—out of bed and never talk to them again. I was treating them like I’d seen so many guys treat my girlfriends, and trust me, it didn’t make me proud. I was being a heartless, selfish dude. And come Monday, when Ru and I were driving in his town car to work, I’d tell him all about what I’d done. He was in a different place from me. When he started getting clean, he evolved spiritually, and after hearing too many of my stories, he eventually gave me a copy of A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson. I’m not into self-help books, but when The World’s Most Famous Drag Queen gives you one, you read it. I devoured that one and I’d call him the moment I finished every chapter. I remember one day standing on Sixty-eighth Street, dialing his number and just unleashing this torrent of emotion the moment he answered: “Oh my god! This chapter where she talks about how people come into your life for different amount of times for different purposes?” And he’d just say, “I told you, girl. I know.”

  Whenever I fell, Ru was always there to pick me up. When I moved to Los Angeles in 2011, after getting fired from my six-figure radio gig in West Palm Beach (more on that later), the only thing I had going for me was Drag Race. Sure, it was something, but the show was still fairly new, and the money I was making from it was not enough to support my family of four. (After all, we only taped for four weeks out of the year.) My husband was home, raising our kids, so it was up to me to put food on the table, clothes on our backs, gas in the car, and at this point in my life the pressure nearly broke me. I felt lost. I was trying my hardest to make shit happen, but it just wasn’t and I didn’t know how to change that fact. I remember meeting Ru one day for lunch, and I just broke down in his arms. I’m not usually a crier, but with tears streaming down my face, I told him, “I just don’t know what to do.” He put his hands on my shoulders, looked me in the eyes, and said, “Michelle, you are the most resilient person I know. You have never been let down by this universe. You will never fail. It’s not in your cards. You just have to know what you want to do, and then you have to do it. You, my friend, are a f*cking star, and we both know you’ve got what it takes.” By the end of the conversation, we were both crying, but he’d said exactly what I needed to hear, and knowing he believed in me in my weakest moment helped me believe in myself. I always walk away from him feeling more confident.

  THE

  IF I HAD ONE WISH FOR YOU, it would be that you’re blessed with a solid-gold friend as wonderful, loyal, supportive, and fabulous as Ru. Remember, it’s quality, not quantity, and soul mates aren’t only lovers. Now, I hear you asking me, “Michelle, how do you meet him or her?” Here’s my advice: Find the most fabulous person in the room and have the guts to get to know him. The person you’re drawn to and don’t know why. Even if you never sleep with him or her, you’ll learn something, and so will they. And, who knows, if you’re ridiculously lucky, some twenty-five years later, you two could even be starring on a TV show together. #Blessed

  And he, too, knows that I will never let him down. I know some people say I ride his coattails, but the truth is, we are better together than we are alone, at least from where I’m sitting. I’m the Ethel to his Lucy, the Flo to his Alice, the Rhoda to his Mary. Nobody can deliver him quite like I can, and I will always be there to do it—on air, off air, under water, in space, wherever he needs me.

  Ru and I have grown up together. We’ve watched each other fall in love. We’ve watched each other become mothers—me to my two daughters and him to an entire community of young drag queens. We’ve helped each other through the darkest times and happiest times, and we’ve become each other’s partners in both work and in life. I love him more deeply than I knew possible, and I know he loves me too.

  rule no. 17:

  SCREW THE PENIS CLUB.

  (Figuratively speaking, darling.)

  File under maddening but true: Our world is ruled by a not-so-secret, informal organization that has no official name but which I like to call The Penis Club. The only membership requirement: a dick. (To be clear, you just have to have one, you don’t have to be one. Although it’s amazing how often these two things coincide.) And boys, listen up, because for some reason, if you do have a penis but are not regularly sticking it into a biological female, your Penis Club membership is only second-tier, so much of this applies to you too. Anyway, anyone who does not fulfill the aforementioned membership requirement is automatically punished accordingly, mostly through exclusion from opportunity, economic penalties, harassment, condescension, and other totally f*cked-up, annoying, and often arbitrary means. There’s one more catch: If you dare mention the existence of this club or challenge its rules, you will automatically be branded a raving bitch.

  I’m not being dramatic. I mean, I WOULD NEVER. I’m just speaking the cold, hard truth. Sexism is alive and well. It doesn’t matter which field you’re in—finance, law, medicine, marketing, media, whatever—you, as a woman, will make less money than your male coworkers, especially the straight white ones. And to earn the paycheck you do bring home, you’ll have to work, if not longer and harder, then smarter for it. Don’t get me wrong here: I love me some good male domination. I just prefer it in my bedroom, not my workplace.

  I spent nearly two decades working in radio, one of the most male-dominated industries in America. It’s been dude domain forever, even long before WKRP in Cincinnati cemented the idea in our heads that men are made to be DJs while women are more suited to looking like Loni Anderson, working behind a desk, and pushing papers. (Her hair, though! I would’ve killed to have had it!) In my own seventeen years on air, the only other women out there who found success doing what I was doing were Angie Martinez, Miss Jones, and my mentor-in-my-head, Wendy Williams, whom I used to listen to growing up. Soon after I got on the air, people even started calling me The White Wendy Williams. The four of us? We were it, the only busty broads holding our own among all-male station owners, program directors, and DJs.

  People thought I’d fail. No one thought a female DJ could win as many hearts (or ears) as a male one. So, as you might imagine, it quickly became my mission to prove everyone around me wrong. I could do everything the men could do, and not only could I do it, but I could do it better. Look, you’re not going to topple the patriarchy, but you can learn how to work within it until things do change, or you make them change. Here’s the T on how to use your diva strengths to gain power and kick ass in a male-dominated field:

  Accept every challenge

  When I started on the radio, I started at the bottom, but I vowed to do whatever it took to work my way to the top. For my first job at WKTU in 1996, I was getting paid $55,000 a year, the union mandated dirt minimum, even though Ru and I were the top-rated, most-listened-to radio team in NYC. We were literally the number one show in the number one market, and we successfully dethroned the king of all media and my favorite radio personality in the history of ever, Howard Stern, in our first ratings book. Even so, at the time, Howard was probably making upward of two million bucks a year, and I was earning pocket change. Did I get a raise? Nope. Did I ask for one? I didn’t dare. At the time, I wasn’t exactly panic
ked, but I was incredibly driven to make this radio thing work. My money from The Bodyguard (Track 9, baby!) had run dry, after I bought my parents a house and car, and my brother a car, and, it probably needs to be said, myself about a million pieces of Diamonique from QVC. And I was so much happier sitting behind a microphone with Ru than I knew I would’ve been had I been twirling my titties at Scores. I wasn’t being paid what the ratings showed I was worth, but I took it as a challenge to prove myself until they either ponied up or someone else poached me.

  By the way, that pay inequity has persisted throughout my career. I always try not to talk about money with my colleagues, but it would come up every now and again, and whenever it did, I always discovered I was always doing more work for less money. Sometimes I made a stink about it. Sometimes I didn’t. I’ll only take on challenges I know I can win. You’ll never see me competing with anyone in a chin-up contest or a turtleneck fashion show, but if you want to try to outtalk me, I know for a fact that you will lose. I’ve been given the gift of gab. I can entertain anyone with my mouth. (Get your mind out of the gutter, girl. You know what I mean.) And once I got on the air, there was just no stopping me.

  Be the first one in the office every day

  In every major market I worked—New York, LA, Miami—I always anchored the coveted morning-drive slot. And I’m proud to say that every single day of my career, I was always the first one in the office. If we went on air at six a.m., I was there at four a.m. If we went on at five a.m., I’d arrive at the studio by three-thirty a.m., even if that meant I had to set my alarm for two a.m. I wasn’t there to put in face time. After all, all of my coworkers and bosses were home in bed, so no one else was even there to appreciate my presence. I used all those extra hours to prep. I did a segment called “The Scoop,” which was a celebrity gossip bit. When I started radio, that segment was seven minutes long with lots of interactive banter, which is an eternity on the radio. I started radio before the Internet was used for resources other than checking your AOL, so every Thursday, I’d go to the newsstands to pick up the Enquirer, the Sun, and Star magazine, and I’d try to plot how I could make the gossip in them last a week. By day five, I’d inevitably be talking about somebody’s dog, but it didn’t matter. The segment was a hit. I was good at it, because I put the extra work in to be good at it. And because I worked just as hard if not harder and longer than my male cohosts, every single time that on-air sign lit up, I knew I was more prepared than anyone else in the room. That made me better at my job than everyone else in the room too. Plus, it gave me the confidence to keep reaching higher.