Michelle: “I’m so proud of Phil – he is living freely now”
Drag Race UK star Michelle Visage on supporting Phillip Schofield following his momentous coming out, and how she’s regained her body confidence after suffering with an eating disorder for decades…
With a wardrobe to kill for, an attitude to match and a voice as big as her heart, it’s little surprise that Michelle Visage is the ultimate LGBTQ+ champion. And she’s previously revealed how being there for the community is her ultimate “calling” in life.
From trashing President Donald
Trump for his anti-gay agenda to calling on Northern Ireland to legalise same-sex marriage, Michelle, 52, is known for being an advocate for equal rights off-screen just as much as she is as a judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race UK – alongside her closest friend of over 30 years, drag icon RuPaul.
“Ru and I have so much love and respect for each other,” she says. “When you know someone as well as we know each other, you just see the other person for who they truly are, and love them no matter what.”
Michelle is understanding of the torment that can exist alongside coming out, and she reveals how she felt compelled to reach out to This Morning presenter Phillip Schofield, with whom she has been friendly for years, after he announced he was gay in February last year.
TOUGH LOVE
“When Phil came out, I saw a look of not just fear, but that what he was doing was a really big deal. So I reached out to him, and I told him that what he was doing was beautifully brave, and that it was going to help a lot of people,” Michelle says.
“I said if he was struggling or needed somebody to talk to, we could meet for coffee, so we did. I told him if he’s living a lie, that’s not going to do him any favours – not just him, but his children and his wife. He has a lovely and honest relationship with all of them. There are people who aren’t going to approve of it, there are people who are going to make fun of him, but I’m incredibly proud of him and he can live his life freely now.”
Last month, Phil, 58, described Michelle as “one of those really kind, compassionate people”, but Michelle says on TV, she still prefers to take the “tough love” approach Drag Race fans adore her for.
“Don’t tell anybody I’m really a soft person! As a friend, I don’t judge. I’ll be brutal with the truth, but I’ll also be understanding and comforting,” she says.
“But as a judge, who I am in my real life is nothing to do with who I am on TV, because I have one job, and that is to be the best entertainer I can be – and the contestants have the same goal. You have to turn your 15 minutes of fame into 15 years, if you can.”
STRICTLY
Michelle, who lives in California with her husband of 23 years, David Case, and their daughters Lillie, 20, and Lola,
18, has already reached that goal, and more besides. First thrust into the limelight in the early ’90s as part of band Seduction, she became the lead singer of R&B group S.O.U.L. S.Y.S.T.E.M. in 1992. Their single It’s Gonna Be A Lovely Day became a huge hit when it appeared as part of the soundtrack of the 1992 Whitney Houston film The Bodyguard – reportedly enabling Michelle to buy her dad a house.
She then went on to host radio shows for over a decade, while joining RuPaul on his chat show, before she became a permanent – and formidable – fixture on the Drag Race judging panel in 2011, which expanded with a UK version in 2019.
A huge fan of dance and performing, the former Celebrity Big Brother star couldn’t wait to hit the Strictly Come Dancing ballroom as a contestant in 2019 (she and partner Giovanni Pernice were the eighth couple to be voted off the show), and says, like the rest of us, she was glued to the most recent series, which saw Bill Bailey, 56, lift the glitterball trophy.
“Bill blew me away! He’s such a joy to watch,” Michelle says.
“I would love to be a [ Strictly] judge and I think I’d be amazing – I’m obsessed with dance, even though I don’t look like
it! Craig [Revel Horwood] is my favourite judge – I’m pretty good at guessing what he’ll do each week.”
It was shortly before her appearance on Strictly last year that Michelle revealed she had battled an eating disorder that caused her to obsessively take laxatives for 20 years.
“Bulimia in the traditional way wasn’t for me – I couldn’t handle puking. I thought that by taking laxatives the calories would be flushed out. I was relying on my body for happiness,” she said at the time.
But now, Michelle says she’s more confident than she’s felt before. “I spent so many years trying to please somebody else, trying to look good for this boyfriend or look skinny for this job… With age comes wisdom – and wrinkles and extra pounds – but at the end of the day, I’m happy,” she says.
“We’ve only got one go in these bodies and in this lifetime, so you have to make it count.” By Lauren Hill-Roger
● Listen to Michelle Visage’s Fabulous Divas on BBC Sounds
‘Don’t tell anybody I’m really a soft
person!’