The moment Orlando Weekly knew that the winner of Season 18 of RuPaul’s Drag Race was going to be Orlando drag queen Myki Meeks was not during a lip sync battle or modeling a stunning look. (Or even mirroring Drew Barrymore.) It was, in fact, toward the end of the “Good Morning Bitches!” chat-show challenge from Episode 14 on April 3, when Darlene Mitchell and Meeks were giving it their best Hoda ’n’ Kathie Lee, guzzling white wine on the a.m. broadcast airwaves.
Before the duo instructed guest Zane Phillips on how to “properly” walk the runway, Meeks delivered an over-the-top “Now fill that coffee cup with something fun, because this party is about to starrrrt,” accompanied by this wonderfully over-the-top shoulder roll/mom-breakdown. Odd choice for certainty, sure, but what else do you expect from Orlando Weekly? Of course it’s the first thing we ask her about in our post-victory interview.
“I’m raised in theater. I take on the role,” laughs Meeks. “I have to give it up for Kristin Wiig, who is my ultimate comedic muse. Her character work is the best of the best. She transforms into each character. I hope to have just an ounce of that ability.”
That, however, was not the actual moment where Myki Meeks became America’s Next Drag Superstar. That would come two weeks later, on April 17, with Meeks facing off against Nini Coco and Mitchell. Formidable competition, to be sure, but for Meeks, everything was falling into place.
“I knew I could make it all the way to the finale once I got my first challenge win. I said, ‘I’m finally in.’ That was Episode 7, I believe, and I won the political ad challenge after being put in the bottom. So I now have stakes,” explains Meeks, “and it wasn’t until I got the third win — three out of four, thank you so much — the third challenge win right near the end, when I said, ‘I’m now head-to-head with the frontrunner,’ who we all thought was Jane Don’t. Then when Jane Don’t got sent home the same episode, it really hit me, like now I’m the frontrunner. And I knew I couldn’t take my foot off the pedal to get to that finish line.”
Meeks was indeed the comeback kid of this season. Her dramatic arc on the show was a nailbiter, from a last-place finish in the Rate-a-Queen voting for the talent show (Episode 6), to surging as a contender with four challenge wins, three of which were right in a neat row. Not to mention a certain viral moment appearing on Drew Barrymore’s talk show as a note-perfect Barrymore doppelgänger.
The final episode saw the trio of Mitchell, Meeks and Coco face off, each performing an original track with their own vocals — Meeks belting out the showtune-esque “Versatile” — with Meeks and Coco advancing as the final two. They duly battled it out to the tune of Miley Cyrus’ “Every Girl You’ve Ever Loved.” And though Coco was a formidable opponent, it was Meeks who took the crown.
“RuPaul said it best on the finale, ‘This queen came in a chorus girl and she’s leaving a star.’ And I feel like that’s my big story arc of the season. I felt very ‘big fish in a small pond’ coming into an ocean full of other big fish,” says Meeks. “It wasn’t until they put me in the bottom for the talent shows, when that kind of shook me up. I faced my biggest fear, which was going home without making a mark. I knew from that point I couldn’t be in that position again, so I turned up the dial.”
While the winning lip-sync may have been Miley Cyrus, just as notably, in New York City immediately after the episode aired, Meeks gave an emotional victory performance of Sophie’s “Immaterial.”
This was a fascinating — and personal — choice. The much-missed trans singer was a pop icon, yes, but on her own terms, effortlessly traversing between the experimental underground and pop mainstream in a way no other recent performer has.
“Sophie is kind of the mother of this type of pop we’re listening to today. She was already ahead of the sound, and she’s always been ahead of the sound of what pop music could be,” Meeks says. “As for ‘Immaterial,’ the meaning of the song is beautiful. ‘I could be anything I want,’ which is how I live my life. I set my eyes to what I want, and I will do what I can to reach that goal. … I performed that song for my very first local drag competition [Orlando Drag Race Live]. It was the first time I won something. And then to do it six years later on the biggest platform I could be on? I saw it for myself. I wanted to win Drag Race and I did it.”
As the last notes of “Immaterial” floated into the night, the real grind began. Interviews with Entertainment Weekly, Good Morning America (life imitating art) and The Hollywood Reporter, a busy schedule of headlining gigs all over the country and even some homecoming shows. The itinerary is intense, and now it’s international.
“I’m going overseas for the first time. I’m heading to the U.K. and Paris, performing a few gigs there, and then I head straight into the Kitty Kat Ball,” says Meeks of her daunting road schedule. “It features the top four queens from Season 18, myself, Darlene Mitchell, Nini Coco, Juicy Love Dion, hosted by Angeria Paris VanMicheals. And we’re heading all across the country every day, a new city. So it’s very much Lady Gaga — club, bus, another club, all that.” (Yes, there is an Orlando stop for the Kitty Kat Ball: Monday, June 8, at the Plaza Live.)
Even before this frequent-flyer mileage bonanza, it’s been a long road for the self-confessed “recovering theater girl” who found her way to drag and a home with the weekly Off the Record drag nights and then the Renaissance Theatre Co.
“I have always had this performer instinct in me, but theater wasn’t really checking off all the boxes at that time. But what was checking off the boxes was that I met a very queer group of friends who introduced me to this world, and we would go out to Southern Nights or Parliament House. We would just dress in silly themes, not drag, but just like silly costumes or silly themes, whatever. And that was a certain feeling I had not felt before,” Meeks remembers. “And then I left for a very intense internship for theater, and I was getting very burnt out, and I decided as an outlet for that if I want to do drag, I’ve got to start now. In 2019 once a month, I would post a look, although I looked crazy. And those photos are archived so no one can find them. I would put myself out there in that way.”
From those memory-holed beginnings, Meeks honed her drag persona, synthesizing different parts of her own creative background with cherry-picked references from the long history of American pop culture.
“My aesthetic reference points are old Hollywood glamour and party girl. I see myself as a cross between Ava Gardner and Charli XCX,” says Meeks, who also mixes drag pageantry elegance with the “modern party girl” clubland look.
“I don’t really want to restrict myself to a certain way of dressing when we are choosing what we want to be. I’ve always said that the character of Myki Meeks is the actress underneath it all, and she’s taking on whatever role is thrown her way.”
It’s impossible to talk about Myki Meeks in any substantive fashion and not talk about the Renaissance Theatre Co. and Off the Record. The venue and the Best of Orlando®-winning weekly drag show gave Meeks both a tight-knit community of peers and a place to hone her craft.
“Off the Record started at Stonewall, which is no longer with us, and the Renaissance people, the crew there, would come to see that show on Wednesdays,” remembers Meeks. “They were doing their very first year of Nosferatu, which is the big Halloween vampire experience, and Donald Rupe asked me to perform at the afterparty for Nosferatu. It was the first time they had a drag queen perform there. And I got to host with Blake Aburn. I did the Lady Gaga ‘Paparazzi’ VMA performance, and I poured a whole chalice of fake blood on my nice outfit. I still have that outfit, but instead of white, it’s very pink. I feel like they overpaid me because I don’t think they knew how to do the club rate for drag queens, and it’s got to stay that way now. But it was amazing. And then a few months later, Off the Record moved to the Ren, and that’s how it became what it is.”
OTR has become a place to see the drag stars of tomorrow and, per Meeks, “a solace” for young people figuring themselves out. All vital. Returning to Orlando, post-Drag Race win, she immediately returned to the Ren for OTR performances. These homecoming shows only reinforced the vital importance of the OTR community for Meeks.
“It meant the world to be able to come back to the venue that raised me. I’ve been a part of the Renaissance Theatre Co. now for five years, and they took our little show Off the Record and made it into a production. I’ve been fortunate now to be able to go to a lot of cities and see the scenes there. They all have their own amazing qualities, but there’s really nothing like Off the Record,” says Meeks. “And to be with my cast again, Allegra D and Coco the Siren, those are my closest sisters, and we got to celebrate together. Also it keeps me humble, because as soon as I get back in the dressing room, they’re reading me to filth.”
“I’ll be honest, I’m not at all surprised that Myki did so well on that show. Sometimes, good things happen to good people and Myki is a genuinely kind, hardworking and talented artist who deserves this moment,” says Donald Rupe, creative director at the Ren, to OW. “We’re so proud to be Team Myki, and we’re so excited to continue to invest in the art of drag in Orlando.”
“Myki truly does mean a lot to the drag scene in Orlando. She has helped build one of the queerest parties in the city, where they allow you to present some insane high-caliber drag,” Anesthesia, an Orlando alt-drag performer who has guested at OTR numerous times (including at the recent “Night of 1,000 Mykis”), tells OW. “I remember the first time I saw her perform at an old OTR, I turned to my friends and said, “Whatever show she goes on she’s gonna win it,” which obviously we all saw come to fruition. I think her post-Drag Race run will be incredible for her career and for the city.”
Meeks is already looking past the extensive touring and considering her next moves, grateful for the opportunities this win gives her to try new things.
“I feel like I have more access to what I’ve been working towards. It’s a little bit easier to be booked in venues that I’ve always been wanting to perform at but I also feel like with this title, I now have even more of a license to produce my own stuff,” says Meeks. “I think people are wanting to see more of what I do, and I hope to bring that this year.”
There’s a beautiful and satisfying irony in Meeks, a queen from Florida, winning Drag Race in the Year of our Lord 2026. Lest we forget, Florida is a state that — under Gov. Ron DeSantis — has repeatedly demonized and even attempted to ban so-called “indecent” drag shows. And now a Florida performer has won the biggest showcase of drag in the world. Meeks is unafraid to get political, throwing well-deserved shade at the intolerant wing of our elected representation.
“I think if the right wants to be extra loud with their megaphone, well, bitch, give me the speaker. I’m gonna blow you all out, because it’s just idiocracy. Ron is a bully. He’s ugly and he fears people living their lives truthfully. I wish that he could just have a touch of the empathy and intelligence that we all have. But he’s a robot, and he’s purchased by that side. And it’s just sad. I feel bad for him, because he lives such a miserable, miserable life. He’ll never have an ounce of the happiness that queer people have, and he’s jealous of that, really,” says Meeks.
“I am fortunate that I live in Orlando, which is a blue dot in a sea of red, but I hope to inspire others to speak up and show that, just because people are like, ‘Oh, I could never live in Florida’ — well, we do, and I don’t plan on moving for a while. So we’ve got to speak up, create the community that we want and show the younger generation to not be afraid.”
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This article appears in May 20-26, 2026.