To decide who would take home the crown for RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 11, A’keria C. Davenport, Crystal Methyd, Dawn, Jasmine Kennedie, Joey Jay, and Silky Nutmeg Ganache competed in their final challenge of the season, an all-disco lip sync smackdown.
In five head-to-head matchups, the queens faced off in front of series judges RuPaul Charles, Michelle Visage, Ross Mathews, and Jamal Sims. In the end, one winner was named to take home the crown, a $200,000 cash prize, and a collaboration deal with sponsor Anastasia Beverly Hills to develop a custom beauty product.
With back-to-back Lip Sync for Your Life wins under her belt does A’keria have the edge in a main stage showdown? Or can Crystal take her frontrunner status as double maxi challenge winner all the way to the throne? Meanwhile, wild card pick Joey as well as Jasmine, Dawn, and Silky were all waiting in the wings to pull off an upset. Vote in our poll for who really deserved to win this season:
Read on for our recap of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars Season 11, Episode 12, titled “Disco Smackdown for the Crown,” which began streaming Friday, July 17 at 12 a.m. PT on Paramount+.
“There’s a pink furry box on the table with a big gaping hole and I am terrified.” — Joey Jay
When the receipt book for the MVQ Rate-a-Queen was opened up, A’keria was not shocked to learn that all of the other girls had placed her fifth after the Talent Rumble. She was not buying the “fake” excuses either — Jasmine and Joey said they expected more for an all star talent performance and Silky admitted to only putting her there because she expect A’keria to do the same to her. Dawn was the only sister to defend A’keria’s performance, but in doing so ignored the fact that she also placed her in the bottom.
As a “pregame warmup,” a pink furry box offered anonymous questions from the queens themselves to be answered publicly. Based on the Q&A sesh, A’keria had to explain why Jasmine is fake, some secret alliances got outed, A’keria, Joey and Jasmine all got named as least deserving of the crown, and Crystal and Joey got support for the ones to win.
“The only thing that could make me happier is this crown, dick on the regular, and a husband.” — Silky Nutmeg Ganache
For the Disco Smackdown for the Crown, Ru planned five disco track matchups over the course of three rounds. Based on their semifinal performances, Crystal and Jasmine got to skip Round 1 and advanced straight to Round 2, resulting in two first round battles, two second round battles, and one final head-to-head for the crown.
To determine the first round matchups, actor Evan Mulrooney returned to draw balls from the golden hopper. Silky was chosen first and she in turn chose Dawn as her opponent based on her previous comments of not being confident. For their song, Dawn selected “Star Love” by Cheryl Lynn without knowing that it was “one of the staples” in Silky’s repertoire. Dawn’s strategy was to “out-stupid” Silky, which sort of meant getting in Silky’s way a lot to obstruct her, but Silky managed to twirl her batons all the way to an easy win.
For the second matchup, A’keria’s name was drawn from the hopper and so she had privilege of selecting “The Boss” by Diana Ross as the song to battle to against Joey. In this matchup, the queens were equally strong, but the edge likely went to Joey who had yet to be seen in a lip sync by Ru and the judges this season compared to A’keria who had already been on stage many times. Joey was declared the winner and advanced to the second round.
“I think we’re about to have ourselves a disco bloodbath. There’s gonna be murders on the dance floor. ” — Crystal Methyd
In the first matchup of Round 2, Silky chose Joey as her opponent who then selected “The Main Event / Fight” by Barbra Streisand as their song. Despite the title of the track, Silky and Joey performed together like sisters throughout and had a cute moment pretending to box each other, but here Joey once again found the edge by putting her ballroom skills to work with elegant and fluid movement on stage. Silky’s second outfit reveal and humor wasn’t enough to overcome the queen who made Ru laugh all season.
In the second matchup, Crystal and Jasmine were left with “Knock on Wood” by Amii Stewart as their battle song. Crystal’s plan of attack for the track was to “keep it high energy and focus on conveying the joy,” expecting that Jasmine would easily out-trick her. Sure enough, Jasmine hit split after split with the sultry appeal that only she could, but Ru was more drawn in by Crystal’s innate joy and selected her as the winner.
To determine the queen to enter the Drag Race Hall of Fame, Joey and Crystal were handed the iconic disco ballad “MacArthur Park” by Donna Summer for the battle of their careers. Donning new outfits for the final lip sync, there was no Ruveal advantage in the finale and both queens started on an even playing field. Three lip syncs in, Joey struggled to display anything new this time while Crystal managed to make the most of the cake lyrics by licking her fingers and then timed two tear-aways perfectly until she was left with flamed pasties covering her sensitive spots.
At the top of her game and after being top of her challenges throughout the season, Crystal Methyd came out on top and was named the newest scepter-bearer as the winner of RuPaul’s Drag Race All Stars.
