Drag Race royalty Trixie Mattel is raising thousands for charity by playing The Sims in her living room – and you can join her
Trixie Mattel is playing The Sims on Twitch each Tuesday. (Instagram/Trixie Mattel)
Trixie Mattel is using her lockdown time wisely by sitting in her living room, in full drag, playing The Sims on Twitch for charity.
The Drag Race winner is one of countless performers who’ve found their schedules wiped clean by coronavirus, with a major tour rescheduled and other commitments cancelled.
But far from resting on her laurels, the drag queen, comedian, make-up mogul and musician has ramped up work on a host of other projects.
“I always work like, ‘What can I control?'” Trixie told Vice Canada.
“Well, you can still make wonderful makeup. I can still make great music, jokes, drag, and videos. Thank god before all this I was very tech savvy.
“I’m doing a music video tonight [laughs]. It’s for ‘We Got the Look’, one of my singles from [her album] Barbara. Let’s just say I have probably 65 wigs in my house, and I’m gonna make use of every single one of those in the video.”
One of Trixie’s current projects is Twitch Tuesdays, in which she livestreams herself playing video games for charity.
“I’ve been playing The Sims like you’ve never f**king seen,” she said.
“[On Twitch] we basically create famous drag queens and we drop them into The Sims, and the fans watch us play them.
“I had Sharon Needles, Alaska, and Jinkx Monsoon living off the grid in a beach town. I love Dead by Daylight, it’s a great horror game. I played the new Resident Evil game, that was pretty good.”
Trixie has been playing games on the platform for years to raise money for charities including the Trevor Project and Trans Lifeline, but under lockdown donations have been flying in.
“Since the pandemic started, I think I’ve raised $22,000 for charity from my living room playing video games,” she said. In comparison, she raised $12,000 throughout the whole of 2018.
Drag queens forced to go digital under lockdown.
Many other queens have ben forced to pivot to internet performances and livestreams as coronavirus shuts down queer bars and other venues.
Earlier this month Laganja Estranja told PinkNews that the crisis has had a huge impact on her financially, with gigs cancelled “one after the other”.
Despite this she said that she considers herself fortunate to have an online platform and a large following, meaning she is “able to translate my artwork from the stage to the digital world”.
“Fans can support queens watching their Instagram Lives, by tuning into things like #DigitalDrag, and by tipping these dolls honey!” she said.
“We all have Venmos and PayPals that will gladly accept coins.”
