Dawn French confirmed as guest judge for Drag Race UK season 2

21st October 2020

The Vicar of Dibley is hitting the runway.

Dawn French has confirmed that she will be sashaying down the main stage for the second season of RuPaul’s Drag Race UK.

During the latest episode of Jessie Ware’s podcast Table Manners, French revealed: “Here’s a little scoop I’m going to give you.

“I’m going to be one of the [Drag Race UK] guest judges. They did originally ask me to be a full-time judge, but I couldn’t, I don’t live in London. But I am going to be a guest judge in a couple of weeks.”

She also said there will be a “Perspex between each judge kind of thing” due to concerns over the coronavirus pandemic, which forced the series to come to a halt back in March after filming an unconfirmed number of episodes.

French is the first confirmed guest judge for the second season, which will hit screens in 2021.

Earlier this week, main judge Alan Carr told Lorraine that production will finally resume in a few weeks. “I’m filming that in a fortnight’s time, so that will be nice to just get that finished,” he said.

“It’s also good for some of the drag queens who maybe their sewing wasn’t that good – because in the lockdown, if they’ve got any sense, they’d be on that sewing machine, with that pedal down! No excuse.”

Alan will once again sit beside RuPaul, Michelle Visage and Graham Norton on the panel for the highly-anticipated sophomore season, after serving as a revolving judge for the inaugural season last year.

In a recent interview, Baga Chipz – who memorably competed on the first season and came in third place – said she thinks the season two competitors will have an advantage when they return to the werkroom.

“If I was on the show I’d be sitting at home thinking, ‘Right, I know who’s on it, I’m gonna be looking at their Instagrams to see what they’ve done in the past.’ We couldn’t do that,” she told British newspaper Daily Star.

“Some of the queens I met on my season, I’d never heard of them, so they can now look on Instagram to see what kinds of costumes they’ve made, what they’re posting, is their makeup getting better and all this.

“I never did that. If I would’ve had five months off from the show… oh my god.”

However, Baga says the team behind Drag Race “are quite strict,” so they most likely won’t allow the queens to bring in any new items.

“They’ll be like, everything they would’ve brought with them for the show would be left in the studio and I think they’ll have to use that. I don’t think they’ll be allowed to bring new dresses and new wigs,” she explained.

“They won’t be allowed to change their mind on what they were gonna do, like Snatch Game and stuff. Since lockdown there’s been so many new characters. Look at Tiger King, imagine Carole Baskin on Snatch Game, or even Joe Exotic.

“You could have references to coronavirus if you were playing Boris or something. I think they need to be a bit strict and stick to the rules and be like, ‘It’s not your fault, but you’ve got to do what you were gonna do six months ago.’”