The Irish have no mercy... I love that, their BITE
Michelle Visage has now become an adopted Irishwoman, and is a fully signed-up fan of Louis Walsh
It’s always harder to say that you are not good enough to a sparkly-eyed child
WHEN she looks at the starry-eyed teenagers, desperate for a chance at fame, Ireland’s Got Talent judge Michelle Visage can’t help but think of her own life. She’s had success in many areas - singing, radio presenting and television. But the dark-haired diva, who turns 50 this year, says to succeed in showbusiness, you need to be prepared for a daily struggle.
‘I battle every day,’ she admits, with a toss of her luxurious black hair. ‘I am a grafter, do you know what I mean? We all have to learn how to hustle to stay afloat and stay alive, especially in the state of the world and especially in the United States with the regime in charge. Everything is a fight. But if you’ve got it in you, you won’t fail. So for me, it’s always been a battle.’
After stints as a judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race and Celebrity Big Brother, Visage was asked personally by Louis Walsh to be a judge on Ireland’s Got Talent which starts broadcasting on February 3. It was a dream realised for the Irish/American girl who was brought up in New Jersey, a kind of return to the roots she still doesn’t know too much about - for a good reason.
‘I have Irish blood,’ Michelle explains. ‘I do biologically. I was adopted so I didn’t find out my DNA technically until I was 26 and I met my mother. My grandmother is fully Irish, I don’t know the family line and my mother died last year. But my grandmother is still alive so I would like to talk to her to find out where in Ireland she is from. My grandfather is Hungarian so that is where my bloodline is. My grandmother is called Irene and I know she is Irish. I would like to find out which part of Ireland she is from.’
Growing up, Michelle Lynn Shupack always knew she was adopted and felt there was a piece of herself that she was missing. It wasn’t until she was in her late 20s that she discovered what that part was.
‘My parents told me from birth that I was adopted,’ she explains. ‘I always knew it. My parents loved me but I never really felt like I totally fitted in. I always knew there was something that I needed to know. And then I met my mother when I was 26 and that was almost like full circle closure.’
As with everything in her life, Michelle is matterof-fact about the meeting too and tells it like it is.
‘It wasn’t an open the skies sort of moment,’ she says. ‘But it was a beautiful moment of woman to woman, me telling her ‘ thank you for giving me this beautiful life.’ Her life was tough and my life wasn’t so tough.’
Michelle’s mother Joanne was just 18 when she got pregnant, something that was unexpect-ed and frowned upon in the late 1960s for a girl with an Irish-Catholic upbringing, even in America which seemed a world ahead of Ireland at that time.
‘She was 18 and she lost her virginity and the same night got pregnant with me,’ Michelle explains. ‘So my father at the time told her to go and have an abortion. This was 1967. I was born in 1968 - abortions weren’t legal so she went to live with her father and stepmother as she never told her mother that she was pregnant.
‘She felt her mother wouldn’t understand. And they told her she was going to have the baby and then give her up for adoption. And at 18 years old I think that was the right thing to do.’
Michelle’s adoptive parents Arlene and Marty gave her a good upbringing full of love and she feels the Irish have a lot in common with those from New Jersey, making her feel quite at home here.
‘My mother Arlene is not with us any more but my dad Marty is still around.
‘He is 79 and he’s amazing, my biggest fan. He has been there for me through it all – both of my parents were there for me through it all. I grew up in a lower middle class family.
‘My parents both worked, I was a latchkey kid letting myself in and out of the house, going to school. We grew up in central New Jersey. And to me I feel like Ireland is the New Jersey of the EU in a sense that everyone works really hard but everyone tells it like it is.
‘I like Irish people, I like the wit, I like the bite, they have no mercy, I love that.’
Michelle had a love of performing from an early age, attending an arts high school in New Jersey before heading to the American Musical and Dramatic Academy in Manhattan New York. She had wanted to become an actress but her powerful singing voice led her down a different path, performing as a vocalist with a number of different groups. Later she became a radio DJ, hosting successful morning shows in New York and Florida.
And it was through this work that Visage had her first encounter with the Irish entertainment business.
‘I was a morning radio presenter for 17 years and 2FM were looking for somebody to do gossip and entertainment reports,’ she says. ‘Our radio station was the number one in New York city at the time so they called and asked who was doing our morning stuff.
‘So I was put with 2FM and Dusty Rhodes and we just clicked. I did that for a couple of years. I came over twice to do it live but mostly it was down the line. I was the Hollywood correspondent for him. It was basically Take a Bite Out Of The Big Apple with Michelle Visage. Then more recently in 2008/9 I worked with Michael Cahill on the weekends, the same kind of idea. I have been back and forth over the years so there is a little bit of a connection there. But I am still quite American.’
It was also through her radio show that Michelle met her husband, author and screenwriter David Case.
‘We met in Central Park,’ she explains.’ He was going to Juliard and I was on the radio in New York City and we were put together unintentionally by a friend that day. She had told me about him and wanted to introduce me to him. He showed up that day, not because she arranged it but it just so happened and we got engaged three weeks later. ‘I had got out of a long relationship and he’d got out of a long relationship and we just clicked. It was love at first sight. And we have been married for 20 years.
We are very opposite but it just worked.’
Together the couple have two girls, Lily, who will be 18 on St Patrick’s Day and Lola who is just 15. And like every showbiz mom, Michelle has to spend long periods away from home as she did with Celebrity Big Brother and now Ireland’s Got Talent.
‘It’s always hard for me to leave my kids,’ she says. ‘But I have been touring for the past five years so coming here for a short length of time is nothing to them. I have been gone for six months at a time with singing and that’s when things get difficult. Thank God for Facetime and thank God for modern technology because when I talk to them I can see them. I am lucky to have a stay-at-home husband so at least when I am away, I know their dad is with them.’
When she was in her late teens Michelle met RuPaul and they have been firm friends ever since. They have presented on radio together, made albums and, of course, Michelle is a judge on the world-famous entertainment show RuPaul’s Drag Race.
‘I have known RuPaul since I was 17 years old,’ Michelle explains. ‘We kind of grew up in New York in the same group so RuPaul’s Drag Race was conceived with me as a judge. ‘That’s how it happened, he is my best friend so I’m doing a show with my best friend.’ And it helps, she says, for her new role on Ireland’s Got Talent, although she admits, ‘I was always really judgmental. When Louis asked me to do this it was a dream come true. I have been a fan of Britain’s Got Talent for years and I love Louis so it was an honour for me to sit next to him. I jumped at the chance, are you kidding me?
‘I got to spend time in Drogheda I spend a lot of time in Belfast, I love the north. But being here with Louis in his town is amazing. This guy will drive the wrong way on a one-way street and know that he won’t get pulled over. He is the King! He’s the king of Ireland! And everyone has been really kind to me here. And you have Penneys, the original birthplace of Primark.’
With her dramatic looks – the tan, the towering heels, coiffed hair and ample cleavage – Michelle knows she’s the judge most likely to be labelled a diva. But she insists she has every auditionee’s best interests at heart – even if their interests should be pursuing a career outside showbusiness.
‘None of us are divas,’ she says. ‘I know that you could take a look at us and I would be the obvious one to play that role but we all get along and we are all pretty cool.
‘I’m not a cryer, Denise is a lot softer than me in that respect but she is tougher at pushing that button.
ILIKE to wait it out and I will be honest and say that I waited for delivery but it wasn’t there. ‘Sometimes you just need people to hear you out or see it through and I am more of that kind of a person before I say no.’
But as a mother to two girls who both like acting, it can be hard to pull the plug on someone young, she says. Still, she won’t pull any punches when it comes to telling the truth, even if the audience behind her don’t like it.
‘People in the audience want their people to go through and they want them to do well,’ she says. ‘But I think a lot of the time people are passionate about people who shouldn’t really be performing. That’s the truth.
‘I am all for encouraging someone to chase their dreams and follow their dreams. But I am also all for being honest with people and it is a fine line.
‘Denise and I are both moms so we both have compassion for the kids too. It’s always harder to say ‘you are not good enough’ to a sparkly, starry-eyed child.’
With this in mind, does Michelle worry that her girls might also follow in her footsteps?
‘Lola is into acting,’ Michelle says.’ Lily is a theatre kid, she is brilliant, she is applying for school overseas, in Scotland and in England. Making it in theatre is very tough and Lily does it because she loves it. Lola has a passion to be in front of the camera. If she is good and she sticks with it then she will love it. But if it is just a passing thing right now, then no. We will see, only time will tell.’
But one thing is for sure – if the girls have the same determination as their powerhouse mom, then they will definitely succeed.
‘The best thing I have ever done in my life was get married and have my children,’ Michelle says. ‘But in my career, Ru Paul and I talk a lot about this as we have a podcast, about the art of sticking with things. ‘Stickwithitness.’ A lot of people in entertainment give themselves deadlines – ‘ til I’m 30, til I’m 35 and if I haven’t made it, that’s my sign.’
‘I have never given up, I have always had one foot in, whether it be the radio, the music business, whatever I was doing I always had one foot in the door. So I think there is an art to grit and sticking with it.’
And if there’s one lesson the hopefuls should take away from Ireland’s Got Talent, then Michelle’s grit is probably it.
Ireland’s Got Talent begins on TV3 on Saturday February 3.