Sydney drag queen Hannah Conda has opened up about her mental health struggles and an unsettling experience during a performance at a teenage boy’s 18th birthday party, in two separate interviews about her life.
In an interview on the “Mental as Anyone” podcast with journalist Jonathon Moran, Conda, whose real name is Chris Collins, shared that she once considered quitting drag due to the backlash she received for cultural appropriation in her past performances.
This controversy arose just over a year before she appeared on RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under. Conda admitted to wearing culturally insensitive costumes, including kimonos and afros, and acknowledged in a public Instagram video at the time that her actions had hurt people, something she deeply regretted.
In one example, Conda performed in a kimono outfit for the production show “Tokyho” at ARQ Sydney in 2017 and 2018 alongside drag queens Coco Jumbo and Decoda Secret.
The controversy peaked during the airing of RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under Season 2 in July 2022, where it came up as a point of discussion between her and fellow drag queen Kween Kong.
“I didn’t want to do drag anymore,” she confessed, explaining that the joy she once found in performing had turned into a source of anxiety and depression after the show aired.
“The thing that brought me so much joy and that I loved so much was like enemy No.1 in my mind at this point. But I had to keep going because I needed to make money so I could pay the rent and continue trying to figure out what I needed to do.”
“I was I was so depressed. I was so miserable. [I’d] go to … meet and greets and people would walk past me. They would go and meet everyone else and then just ignore me…”
Photo: ARQ/Gazzarazzi Photography
Conda described feeling like she was being “attacked by the entire world”, with people labelling her a racist and a bigot online. This intense scrutiny led her to question her future in drag, as she felt immense guilt and sadness over the hurt she had caused.
“It was like I was the worst person on the face of the planet… which broke my heart, and then I felt responsible for curing the world’s racism…
“I hated getting into drag, hated going to the gigs, and then I was starting to just … think about what other options do I have? Because, to be honest, I really put a lot of eggs in this basket.”
The situation became so dire that Conda experienced a blackout (not due to drugs or alcohol) while writing a “sorry note” to her partner, Jack, apologising for the emotional toll her struggles had taken on their relationship.
“I was just saying [in the note], ‘Here’s my bank details, take my money, take the dog, and … just go’.”
Her partner found her before she finished writing the note and professional help was then sought. “If he didn’t get home [while I was writing that letter], I don’t think it would have been a good thing,” Conda said.
However, her perspective began to shift when she was invited back to the Drag Race franchise to represent Australia on Drag Race UK vs the World.
“Although it was external validation, it was a little bit of validation that started melting my heart,” she said, adding that it reminded her that there was still something good within her drag career.
She said the only way society can make things positively change for the better is “with a rational conversation, without screaming and yelling, listening to each other, and that’s where the healing can start to begin”.
She added that when drag became mainstream, this was when some of its past practices started being viewed through a different lens.
“Of course, if you start putting on these modern lenses on something so aged, of course it’s going to look wrong, and it’s not going to be right, but no one could put context around things, so they struggled to.”
In a separate interview on the Exposed After Dark show with Joseph Shepherd, Conda recounted a shocking gig she performed before her Drag Race fame.
The booking was for an 18th birthday party, which she assumed was for a queer young man supported by his family. However, upon arriving at a mansion in Sydney, she quickly realised that this was far from the case.
The birthday boy’s mother had booked Conda under the mistaken belief that drag queens were like clowns for teens. The party was filled with rowdy, testosterone- and alcohol-fueled boys, who responded to her performance with crude and inappropriate remarks.
“I felt like a sacrificial lamb, dancing on top of this concrete slab,” she said, adding that some of the boys were shouting “Show us your dick” and “Get your tits outs”.
Throughout the ordeal, the mother clapped along, seemingly unaware of how uncomfortable the situation had become. Conda decided to cut her gig short and refused to perform a second number as planned.
To add insult to injury, the mother paid her only half the agreed fee.
“I should have got my full $200 cash. But no, they gave me 100 bucks,” she said with a laugh, acknowledging that she only performed one of two agreed performances but defended this by saying she showed up to do her job but left because it was an unsafe space.
Reflecting on the birthday party experience, Conda described it as “torture” and “scary”.
She did, however, find some humour in the situation, admitting with a laugh that she did leave something behind — using the bathroom before making her exit.
“I’ve got IBS, so yeah, I did .. you go when you gotta go.”
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Gay Sydney News editor