Colorado’s new duchess: “Drag Race” all-star takes on historic celebrity role at opera

The Duchess of Krakenthorp in the opera “Daughter of the Regiment” is a grande dame, an over-the-top, woman of wealth whose son is expected to wed the opera’s heroine, Marie.

It’s historically a spoken role, and a number of celebrities and high-profile figures have graced opera stages around the world as the diva duchess, including “The Golden Girls” actor Bea Arthur, stage and screen legend Kathleen Turner, and the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, an opera aficionado who received big applause upon delivering her lines in a Washington National Opera production at The Kennedy Center in 2016. 

In Opera Colorado’s staging, the company’s first time performing Donizetti’s comedic opera, a drag star with powerful singing chops takes on the Duchess of Krakenthorp. 

Monét X Change, who wowed judges with her singing during a “RuPaul’s Drag Race: All Stars” appearance, performs as the duchess at Denver’s Ellie Caulkins Opera House Nov. 9-17. The classically trained singer is thrilled to be performing with U.S. opera companies recently, a long harbored dream that she had once bid adieu to after she “got bit by the drag bug.” Now that she has a foot firmly in both worlds, Monét has found a lot of crossover between opera and drag. She also thinks embracing some of those similarities could draw new and younger audiences to the centuries-old art form. 

“Opera, we wear just a little more blush,” said Monét, who was one of two queens crowned as winners of “Drag Race: All Stars” season four. “To be a successful drag queen and to be a successful opera singer, you have to be well aware of your talents and you can’t take no for an answer, ever. A lot of those skills that I learned as a queen lend itself to opera.” 

Monét’s Opera Colorado performances are a reprisal of the role for her. She debuted the part in 2023 with the Minnesota Opera — a career milestone for the artist who cites opera as one of her first artistic loves. And just like in her performances in Minnesota, Monét X Change’s latest interpretation of the Duchess of Krakenthorp will be a singing one, performing a chosen aria in her Colorado performances. 

Ryan Taylor, president and general manager of Minnesota Opera, caught Monét’s performance of a Bellini aria on “RuPaul’s Drag Race: All Stars” and said it seemed to spark interest in opera from the general public. 

“We’re always grateful when artists with a large public following advocate for the art form in a broad, joyful way,” Taylor said. 

Then, as the Minnesota Opera team was on the hunt for a “well-known actor with terrific comedic timing and an interest in appearing with an opera house,” Monét came to mind.

Monét was overwhelmed by the response to her Bellini aria and “how so much of the opera community was like, ‘whoa, this queen has chops,’” she said. Then, she got an email from Taylor, asking her if she’d ever be interested in performing with an opera company.

“I was like, Yeah! And then here we are. The rest is herstory,” she said. 

Monét was also blown away by the thought of being in company with the people who have performed the role of the Duchess of Krakenthorp prior: “In the multiverse of opera madness, there is this role where me and Ruth Bader Ginsburg have played the same thing. It’s kind of wild. I think it’s cool.”

Lip synching, it turns out, is storytelling in a foreign language 

The drag star spent time in a young artist opera program after graduating from college, but the Minnesota Opera invitation would mark her mainstage operatic debut. And because she can sing, the Minnesota Opera team thought it would be a shame not to take advantage of that, adding an aria for the duchess to perform. In fact, there is tradition within comedic operas giving artistic license for characters to sing repertoire outside of that opera’s score. The chosen composition works best when it ties in thematically, and for the Opera Colorado production, Monét will sing the aria “La vendetta” from “The Marriage of Figaro.”

Opera Colorado general and artistic director Greg Carpenter said the show’s artistic team put their heads together and landed on “La vendetta” to heighten the drama and tension between the Duchess of Krakenthorpe and the Marquise of Berkenfield. The two characters are often in conflict, and  “‘La vendetta’ is all about getting back at somebody, and it just felt like it was perfect for Monét’s voice and her voice category,” Carpenter said. 

Monét loves that the aria taps into her character’s “vengeful streak that comes about because the marquise is lying to me.” 

“It lends itself to the calamity and the eccentricity of this opera, and so the fact that I get to play this rich woman that’s annoyed by people, honestly, that’s what sold me on the whole role,” she said.

Monét credits opera with giving her skills that have been invaluable to her drag career. The artist has a degree in opera performance from Westminster Choir College, which is on the campus of Rider University in New Jersey. While attending the school, she took a class called “The Singing Actor,” in which she and her classmates would do an exercise that had them lip syncing to a recording of one of their favorite operas. The goal was to learn how to embody the feeling and intention of the music without uttering a single note out loud.

“I had to learn how to storytell, in a foreign language, not singing, but lip syncing. It is a connection, because lip syncing is, I feel, an art form cultivated and perfected by queens,” she said. 

Maybe opera is for everyone, not just the old and wealthy

Though Monét’s love of opera goes back to her high school years in New York City, and credits her choir director with exposing her to classical works and “educating us on the beauty of classical music.” It was a genre that Monét initially thought wasn’t for her, but fell head over heels for.

“In classical music, I discovered an appreciation for, for lack of a better word, the structural integrity of music, right? Like seeing how all these parts blend and work together to create this sonic wall of beauty,” she said. “You’re having this kind of spiritual moment, and not realizing that it is literally just the music causing you to have that.”

That said, she also thinks the opera world could stand to shake things up a bit more. She’s even been dreaming up a version of Mozart’s “The Magic Flute,” where it’s “queen versus queen” with drag queens in the roles of Queen of the Night and Priest of the Sun.

“I think it could be a really fun production that will open up the beauty of opera to younger folk,” Monét said. “Show people that opera can be cool, not just because the music is cool, but the production can be cool too.”

There’s been some intentionality in pushing the notion that opera is largely for “people with money or rich older white people,” Monét said, adding that that’s been a disservice to the art form and the potential opera goers out there who have come to the belief that opera is not for them. 

Opera Colorado’s Carpenter agrees. He’s hoping Monét will draw new audiences to this production of “Daughter of the Regiment,” and he thinks bringing more people into the opera house is something that’s on many artistic directors’ minds. 

“I think the industry, and I certainly put myself in the same category, we must acknowledge opera as a form of entertainment,” Carpenter said. “Because in the world we live in now, our competitors are not just symphony, ballet, theater, music, Broadway, etc. Our competitors now are staying at home and watching Netflix and going out to dinner.”

Carpenter said it’s also important to help people see opera as a living, breathing and evolving art form, which might involve programming new operatic works, highlighting some of the timeless themes in older works or revamping classics. Monét, who will return to Denver for a one-woman show in the new year, said people simply want to consume good art, whether it’s theater, dance, music, a Netflix show or opera.

“Yes, [opera’s] a little more formal. Yes, it sounds a little different. But I just think there’s so much beauty in there,” she said. “And when you go see a good production, it’s just good art.”