Interview: Sherry Vine of THE SHERRY VINE SHOW! at OUT TV

We are all living for Sherry Vine! She's got a new season of her variety show, “THE Sherry Vine SHOW!” on OUT TV. She has two new music videos, "Showgirl” and “Pink,” which you can see on her YouTube Channel. BROADWAY WORLD writer Brett Cullum got to catch up with this elusive diva and television mogul to learn more. 

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Brett Cullum: I wanted to start at the beginning here. I know you started your drag career just a bit before RUPAUL’S DRAG RACE became a thing back when drag was actually punk. It was rebellious. It was something you did underground and kept a secret. What made you want to start pursuing this art form? 

Sherry Vine: When I look back now, I would be dressing up on Halloween. I was always the lady. But it wasn't until I was in college and I had to do this project. I was working with Anna Deavere Smith, who's an amazing actress and director, and she was our guest professor. We had to do this project, and I picked spending time with this real drag queen in Los Angeles named Erica and then presented her on stage. And I was spellbound. This connection! I thought, “Oh, this is really cool and fun, and it was really about the costume and the mask, the makeup being like a mask and just kind of allowing a freedom.” And Anna actually pulled me aside. And she said, “You know, you should explore that!” 

And I told a friend of mine in New York who was living there about this. And he's said, “I'm writing a play. And you need to come here and play the mother.” And I'm like, okay.

It snowballed from there!

Brett Cullum: How? How did Sherry Vine come about, the name, the actual moniker that you use?

Sherry Vine: Well, I have no idea where Sherry came from. I just remember my roommate at the time was doing my wig. He did the makeup; he styled me. He did everything. I did nothing, and I just looked in the mirror. I was like. Oh, she looks like a “Sherry.”

And then the Vine came from a building on Vine Street, just above Hollywood Boulevard, called the Sherry. It literally looked like a whorehouse, and I was like, “Oh, my God, it's perfect! Sherry Vine!”

Brett Cullum: What informs her? What is the DNA you hope to capture when I come to a Sherry Vine show? What are you hoping that I see? Also, I love that you have a Joey Heatherton quote on your site. 

Sherry Vine: I mean, all my references are so dated that it was like anyone young would be like, “Who's Joey Heatherton?” (laughs) 

I would hope. What I want now more than ever, with everything going on in the world, is for people to come to see my show, whether they know me or not, and leave saying, “Oh, my God! I laughed so hard! For an hour, I forgot about what is going on in the world and in my life!” I always put a disclaimer on that: I'm not trying to suggest that we don't, that we should not be aware of what's going on in the world; I am very aware. The first thing I do in the morning is read the paper.

I know what's going on all over the world. I'm very involved, but I don't put that on stage in my show because I want my show to be escapism, silly, and stupid! You're allowed to laugh in spite of everything that's going on.

Brett Cullum: One of the things that you're known for is doing parodies. You've developed this whole thing around it. I mean, your YouTube channel blew up. There are over 20 million views of these songs that you've done by Madonna and Lady Gaga, and one of my personal favorites is “Hole Clean” instead of Dolly Parton’s “Jolene.” When did you realize you were good at making a gag and a funny lyric? 

Sherry Vine: That comes from a high school! I certainly would never take credit for it. I mean, obviously, Weird Al Yankovic and all. But at the time. I didn’t know any other drag queens that were doing parodies. I started in high school, so way before the concept of drag came into my mind, I would write parodies of all the musicals that we were doing in high school and share them with my friends, and they were just like, you are so dumb. 

So, it was the logical path I would take when I started performing in drag. Even before drag, I had this little group. It was a duo, me and Robbie Daniels, and we were called “Skinny Boys,” because we were both so tall and skinny. And we did parodies. So before we were even doing real drag, sometimes we would throw on a wig or not whatever. But we had parodies of all the hit songs of 1990! And then, when I started Sherry Vine, it was just like. Oh, this is what I will do.

Brett Cullum: They're amazing! And you've transitioned out of bars and spaces like that. Now you've had a couple of TV shows. I mean, it started with “She's Living for This!” And now you've got a variety show on OUT TV called “The Sherry Vine Show!” How could you get less descriptive than that? So, how did you make that leap? How did you become the TV Mogul that you are?

Sherry Vine: Mogul! I love it. Well, “She's Living for This!” happened because of Josh Rosensweig, who literally directed the first thing I ever did on stage and drag, and then he was the director of our theater company Theatre Couture in New York in the nineties. He worked for Here TV, and he was the one who got that. So all of that happened because of Josh. It was a great opportunity, and we had so much fun doing that. And then I really was trying to push “The Sherry Vine Variety Show!”. And through PEG, a talent company that represents many of the queens, I was on the phone with Jacob one day, and he was like, “Oh, this would be so much easier to sell if you were in Los Angeles!”

I was like, Okay. Click (motions hanging up the phone)! I'm moving to LA! Everyone was like, yeah, right! And I did. And I got here, and he made that show happen. And so now the “Sherry Vine Variety Show! Season 3” is on Out TV. 

It's literally my dream project come to life. 

Brett Cullum: It's so funny. I mean, it takes off with many skits and commercial parodies. I recognize a lot of faces in every episode. I'm always like, “Oh, my gosh! How did you get them to appear on this show?”

Sherry Vine: I say that, too. How did I get them?

Brett Cullum: What inspired you to create this variety show?  

Sherry Vine: I grew up watching the variety shows of the seventies. Carol Burnett was my biggest inspiration, and it encapsulates everything that I love. I get to do musical numbers, commercial parodies, and sketches.

I get to be so stupid with people I love, and we have so much fun. When we finish, I can tell by the people who work on the show behind the cameras. They're just like, “I've never had that much fun filming anything or working on anything,” and I'm like, “Oh, my God! That's the best compliment ever.”

Brett Cullum: It really is funny. It's interesting that now drag just seems to be everywhere. It surrounds us. There's almost this overload of pageants and shows. You go to a brunch, and all these men in dresses pop up and bring you your omelet. Do you feel like some of the teeth have been filed down? Can drag be dangerous anymore? 

Sherry Vine: Yes. (stares menacingly)

 Brett Cullum: Okay. (shifts nervously)

Sherry Vine: Yes, and Jackie Beat and I always talk about this. I mention Jackie a lot because we work together so much. And we're literally the closest in terms of what we do. We say all the time, we're like, okay. If people feel like drag has been homogenized or watered down, or it's everywhere, it's so mainstream. Well, my job is to keep it cutting-edge. I've been doing these parodies for 34 years in drag, and it hasn't changed. I'm not going to all of a sudden start singing about the beautiful smell of jasmine in the air. I mean, that's not what I do in my songs about poop and penis. That's not going to change. And luckily, Out TV says, “Go with it, whatever you want!”

You brought up “Hole Clean,” my parody of “Jolene,” which is brand new and stupid; when I was writing, I thought this might be a flop because it's just so dumb. I just did a tour opening for Bianca Del Rio for two months. People were cackling. They just were laughing. So I was like, “Okay, people still want stupid!”

So that's my job. My job is to keep it entertaining and fresh, even if the theme is not fresh.

Brett Cullum: I wanted to talk to you about the state of Sherry Vine now and going forward. What do you want? What do you feel like you're career will look like?

Sherry Vine: Well, it's funny. I have so many things that I still want to do. I would love love, love to do more TV and more film. I really miss doing theater! I haven't done a proper play in so long that I really would like to try and do something like THE THREE SISTERS with drag queens or HEDDA GABLER… something really theatrical. So those are kinds of things that are on my plate that I'm going to try and make happen.

Brett Cullum: Okay. So, if you were going to give advice to somebody who has never done drag but wants to start. What would be the groundwork or the foundation, according to Sherry Vine?

Sherry Vine: Take care of your knees.

Oh, my God! I've been wearing stilettos; I mean, I only wear stilettos. I refuse to wear anything other than a pointy five or six-inch heel. But now the payback has begun, and like everything hurts.

So if I could go back in a time capsule to when I took really good care of myself, I think, in the nineties, I probably would have been a little bit more aware of what I'm doing to my knees and my feet. Cause I'm literally paying for it now. 

No, the advice I would give, the advice I do give when I'm asked about this from younger baby queens is don't be afraid to fail! Try different things, but find what you are great at, and exploit that, really focus on that. Don't try to be “Well, I need to be funny and mean to people like Don Rickles because of Bianca Del Rio. Don't try to be someone else. Be you! Find what you're good at and that you love doing, and do it.

Brett Cullum: It's funny because I have the same conversation with actors, and we always talk about that about the the sense of self. You can bring that to the stage once you are cemented into who you are. Then you're finally where you need to be, and then maybe.

You can have your own variety show, like “THE Sherry Vine SHOW!”

You've got two new music videos that are hitting the YouTube Channel! One of them is called “Showgirl,” which I've seen and it is super fun. And it’s not really a parody. It's kind of an ode to who you are.

Sherry Vine: OUT TV from the beginning was like, “No parodies!” They're not even gonna touch it. I was like, legally, we can do these sound-like tracks, and they're like, No, no. So, we knew that the musical numbers had to be original. So this was an amazing chance to push me out of my box

Markaholic is a genius who's done all fifteen songs for THE Sherry Vine SHOW SEASON THREE. And “Showgirl!” I really wanted to do something burlesque or vaudeville, but also like a Las Vegas showgirl song that goes back to the original seed of Sherry Vine. Like this ex-Las Vegas, tattered, broken-down kind of showgirl.

And I love this song so much. It's literally going to open my new show 

It's like I'm a showgirl.

Brett Cullum: And here we are, full circle back to Joey Heatherton. What is happening?

Sherry Vine: Circles are happening.

 

Brett Cullum: Okay. So you've got Season 3 on Out TV of THE Sherry Vine SHOW! You've got new music videos, including “Showgirl” and “Pink.”

And you've got appearances around the country and things like the Golden Girls parodies where you get to play Blanche, which, I mean, come on, every gay guy's dream role right there.

Sherry Vine: When people are like, “Who do you play in the Golden Girls?” I'm like, who do you think?

Honey. So yes, the Golden Girls, we're doing it in LA at the end of this month. We do it every August and January in LA, and now every June in New York City! It just brings me joy.

Brett Cullum: Well, tell me about Season 3. Who else going to be in it? I know there's a ton of people there.

Sherry Vine: Well, episode one just came out. It has Latrice Royale, Alaska, and Monet Exchange. Monet is actually in every episode, as is Jackie Beat. The song is. “I'm a showgirl.” We've got parodies of THE EXORCIST and a Goop commercial skit.

The lady cops are back. Lady Cops was like a fan favorite from season 2. So that's back. That's just episode one. And then we've got Nina West and Ben De La Creme.

So many amazing queens. Bianca Del Rio is in several episodes.

 Laganja Estranga! Laganja killed! She's so funny.

Brett Cullum: All on OUT TV! THE Sherry Vine SHOW! I'm excited, and of course, you tour all the time, too, so I'll be watching for you and all of that on your solo shows. 

Sherry Vine: People follow me on Instagram, Miss Sherry Vine; you can see where I'll be because I'm always touring. You can see the music videos every week on YouTube. And then the show, of course, on Out TV.

Brett Cullum: Of course, there's SherryVine.com, where you can get all your fabulous merch.

T-shirts, mugs, whatever.

Sherry Vine: It has links to everything and all this. So if you just if you're confused about where to watch the show, go to SherryVine.com, because that has links and places to watch it wherever you are in the world.

Brett Cullum: Well, I will definitely be one of those watchers. So thank you so much. I'm so excited to have talked to Sherry Vine.

Photo is provided by Magnus Hastings

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