Documentary Spotlighting Late ‘Drag Race UK’ Star The Vivienne Sets Premiere Date, EP Remembers Queen as a “Bright Light” (Exclusive)
Dear Viv, the career-spanning documentary spotlighting the late RuPaul’s Drag Race UK winner The Vivienne, is set to arrive on WOW Presents Plus and will air locally across the pond on the BBC on Aug. 28.
The Vivienne, whose real name was James Lee Williams, died in January of cardiac arrest due to the effects of taking ketamine. The drag artist was a mainstay in the Drag Race landscape, notably winning the first season of its UK-based spinoff and becoming the first international queen to appear on the American franchise in RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars season seven, which consisted of a cast of all winners.
Dear Viv is produced by World of Wonder, the Emmy Award-winning production company behind RuPaul’s Drag Race, which was co-founded by Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato. The doc is directed by Pete Williams, a longtime producer of WOW’s beloved UNHhhh shortform series, which stars Drag Race season seven contestants Trixie Mattel and Katya Zamolodchikova. Jeffrey McHale served as editor.
In the wake of The Viv’s death, Bailey tells The Hollywood Reporter that his team knew they had to document their legacy in film format when he saw an outpouring of support from fans at this year’s DragCon UK, an annual convention that celebrates the franchise’s stars.
You Might Also Like
“Viv died just shortly before DragCon UK, and it was devastating. And in that moment, it was like, ‘How can we go on with DragCon?’” he recalls. It was Barbato who had the idea to make sure The Viv had a booth at the fan convention, equipped with a book where supporters wrote handwritten tributes to the late queen.
“We called it ‘Dear Viv,’ and the outpouring, what people wrote on the wall and in the book, was just so moving and powerful,” Bailey says. “It was like, we’ve got to document this.”
Dear Viv will feature interviews with The Viv’s family and friends, and a lineup of Drag Race alum, including Cheryl Hole, Baga Chipz, Blu Hydrangea, Danny Beard, Monét X Change, Raja, Trinity the Tuck, Tia Kofi, Crystal and Michael Marouli.
For Bailey, it was important to include firsthand recounts from their former competitors turned friends because the “relationships that form on the show are real and continue in real life.”
“The queens who were with Viv on Drag Race, you are in a fishbowl together for a protracted period of time,” he explains. “Yes, it’s a competition, [but] the camaraderie and the bonding that happens in the workroom is really extraordinary. … It just seem[ed like] who better than to talk about The Viv than other queens from Drag Race? It’s a real community, a very strong community.”
The doc will, too, highlight archival clips from the drag queen’s time on their two varying seasons, plus the slew of other projects Viv took part in with WOW. Bailey further acknowledges that their star-turning appearance as the first queen from a foreign franchise to take part in the American franchise solidifies that they were “an international star.”
The Emmy Award-winning producer also confirms that The Viv’s cause of death will be tackled in the documentary. The artist’s family, primarily their sister Chanel Williams, has been an outspoken advocate against ketamine since their death.
“I think it’s really important not to shy away from that, not only because there wasn’t anyone more full of life than The Viv, … but I think it’s important for people to know that the dangers of drugs,” he adds. “There’s no judgment here at all. But I think there is no harm in telling the truth, and I also believe Viv would really want that. Viv would not want us to hide anything.”
When the doc hits WOW Presents Plus later this month, the RuPaul’s Drag Race EP merely hopes “that anyone who watches this film feels inspired.”
“When I think of The Viv, I just think of this sort of bright light, and I just get this warm feeling,” he pronounces. “And I think that’s what I would love anyone who watches this film to feel touched by and feel that as they go about their life, whatever they’re doing, drag queen or not, that they have a little bit of a lift, or a tiger in the tank, because that was Viv. And as sad as it is that The Viv was taken from us so young, oh my God, how much she gave people. It’s just unbelievable.”
Bailey concludes, “Personally, I hope that wherever she is, The Viv gets to see this film [in] some way, shape or form. And I hope that she would love it as much as we loved her, as much as we do love her.”
