Drag Race UK: Series five queens on being accepted in Britain

When Drag Race UK series five starts later, you'll see two queens hitting your screen who were actually born and raised abroad.

Alexis Saint Pete, from Poland, and Cara Melle, from the United States, both moved to Britain after spending their childhoods in their home countries.

RuPaul's award-winning Drag Race franchise, which started in 2009, is famous for its runways, drama and lip-syncing.

But it's also been a place for contestants to talk about issues like homophobia, abuse and gender identity.

Cara was born in Atlanta, Georgia, a traditionally conservative US state.

The 26-year-old dreamed of being on Drag Race but had to "literally hide in the closet" to watch the show, worried about the reaction of family.

She describes watching "the whole show and then all of a sudden be afraid that someone's gonna come in and see me watching this".

London-based Cara, who uses she/her pronouns, moved to the UK seven years ago to study fashion but ended up staying once her drag career took off.

"I really got comfortable, because I felt like the culture was just so welcoming and open," she says.

Cara says the UK was somewhere to let "your imagination go wild", but in America people expected her drag to be safe and "more cookie cutter".

"And so I just didn't really feel as comfortable. I felt that the UK was the place for me."

But Cara feels that the UK is not without its problems for trans people.

"When I came here when I identified as a male, I felt I experienced a lot more blatant homophobia than I did when I was in the US," she says.

"And I definitely think that homophobia is alive and going strong still today.

"I've been seeing some of the comments that people leave. And it's just like, wow this is what we're still going through."

Cara says her mum currently lives in Florida, where laws like the so-called "Don't Say Gay" bill have been seen as targeting LGBT people.

"It's definitely gone downhill over there," she says.

"And it's not that bad over here yet."

Another queen who's lived in the UK after growing up overseas is London-based Alexis.

The 28-year-old, who uses he/him pronouns out of drag, came to the UK at the age of 12 after being awarded a place at a prestigious dance school.

And he says that was an eye-opener compared to his home country Poland.

"We didn't really have any people that we could really look up to in the media from the LGBTQ+ community.

"We didn't have anybody like us, we didn't have any drag queens."

Alexis says he was "always a little bit different, a little bit more of a colourful child and I feel like that was really never accepted in my school".

"But I was always just being me," he says.

Even now, he says, he feels he has to dress a certain way when he goes back home.

He says the one exception is capital city Warsaw, where he doesn't "always have to dress up a little bit different because I'm with my mum and I feel like I don't want to stress her out by having people look me up and down".

Alexis feels Poland is "going the right way" thanks to social media, which has made everyone "used to seeing so many more colourful people out there".

"I feel like before they didn't really have anybody that they could see that was different," he says.

Despite this, Alexis says there are still some things that he does in the UK that he's not ready to try out in Poland.

"I would definitely not go to town in drag for a little drink with my friends," he says.

"I don't think I'd be able to do that safely in Poland."

Cara agrees with Alexis that representing a group can be a "weight on your shoulders", but says she didn't go into the show seeing herself as the "voice of the whole community".

"I kept thinking to myself just be you," she says.

"You can make all the statements you want, you can try and represent all you want.

"But it's about doing the best me I could do."

RuPaul's Drag Race UK is on BBC Three at 21:00 BST on Thursday 28 September, and on iPlayer afterwards.

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