Interview: Sapphira Cristál of ONE SLUE OVER THE CUCKCOO'S NEST at PUNCHLINE HOUSTON

Sapphira Cristál is widely known for being a contestant on RUPAUL’S DRAG RACE season 16, where the performer finished in the top two, won the talent show, and also took the title of Miss Congeniality. Nymphia Wind snatched the crown, but Sapphira seems to be thriving after a huge one-woman drag tour and is now a comedy act coming to PUNCHLINE HOUSTON on April 17th. Sapphira was born in Bryan, Texas, and is a classically trained opera singer and composer. BROADWAY WORLD writer Brett Cullum got a chance to talk with Sapphira before she takes the comedy stage by storm. 

Brett Cullum: Where did that name come from? I mean, how did you come up with Sapphira Cristál?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: It's Portuguese for sapphire, which is my birthstone.

Brett Cullum: Oh! Well, that's so easy! What the heck? I was thinking I would get this long, down-the-rabbit-hole answer, but there you go. One of the things I wanted to ask you first is, how many times did you audition for Drag Race before getting on it?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: 11 times. I would see my friends get on, and then I'd be like, oh, okay. Some of them were like, it's a frickin' lottery! And in many ways it is, but also, the lottery is one of those things that you get when you're ready or not. Some people don't get things when they're ready. But when you're ready, for DRAG RACE. I feel like when you're ready… when I was ready, I didn't ask to be on DRAG RACE,  I wanted to be ready to be on DRAG RACE. And so, when I got on DRAG RACE, I was ready. So, I don't feel anything about it. Every time I didn't get it, I realized, okay, girl, you're not ready. And that's okay. Because I would hate to have… to get an opportunity like that and not be prepared.

Brett Cullum: Not at all. But how has being on this show changed your life and your career?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: I get to travel the world. I've been all over, and people know me everywhere I go. I, you know, I'm recognized by the most random people sometimes. There's this guy who was putting siding up on a building, and my Best Friend and I were walking by, and he just looked over and goes, “SLUE FOOT! Oh my god! Can I get a picture with you?” And, like, he's this guy who you would think watches the Eagles, definitely watches football, but watches drag queens? Huh? What is this? And he was like, “I need a picture with you, my wife would kill me if I didn't get a picture with you.”  It was just this insane interaction, and it's not the first time something like that has happened, either. Like, just having these insane interactions with people who you would think would vote against my interests, before I would expect them to support me and want to be photographed with me.

Brett Cullum: I can't imagine the level, and especially now that DRAG RACE moved over to MTV, and they're running it. The demographics for it are just crazy. And I'm always surprised by the people who tell me, “Oh, I watch Drag Race.” I mean, at work, I'm like, they just come up, and you're like, “What? You watch Drag Race? What?”  What is that? Well, I noticed you have many Texas connections, and I wanted to hear a little bit about growing up in Bryan, Texas. What was that like?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: Yeah, I think I was raised in Bryan for maybe a couple months, and then my mom sent me to, while she was finishing her degree, she sent me to live with my grandmother. I lived with her for a while. I went to Dallas for a while, and then my mom got a job in Houston when I was around 3 years old, and we moved there. So I've lived in Houston since I was 3. And I have loved growing up in Houston. I lived in Third Ward, or I lived in Riverside Terrace, but no one knows what that is, so I lived in Third Ward. I went to Peck Elementary, then I went to Bastion Elementary. I went to HSPVA for high school. And I loved it there. Loved, loved, loved it there. Now they have a new building, and all of us old heads are like, oh, we were told that was gonna be our new building. 

Brett Cullum: Yeah, and HSPVA seems to be doing pretty well, so there you are. But you discovered opera pretty early, didn't you? How old were you when you discovered opera?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: Four years old. My parents took me to see the opera. My mom, really. My dad went, but it was my mom who chose to see the opera. I think it was the Ebony Opera Guild that was doing La Boheme at the Miller Outdoor Theater. You know how the kids are just running around up and down the hill, and I sat in my seat, mouth agape, just taking it all in. It was watching over me as a little 4-year-old who just did not understand what this was, but knew I loved it.

Brett Cullum: Wow. And you trained. I mean, obviously, because during DRAG RACE, you famously won the talent show doing opera.

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: I had planned on that being my talent, no matter what. I knew I was gonna sing opera. I knew at some point I was gonna get on DRAG RACE, and I was going to sing opera. But then Monet did it first. I called Monet and was like, “Hey, how did this work?” And she helped me, and so that was really fun, too. Monet did it, but she didn't do it the way I did. If you're going to do something that someone else did, you have to elevate it in some way. Because if you don't elevate it in some way, people start comparing you to the other one.

Brett Cullum: No, absolutely, and that's a big thing with DRAG RACE contestants, there are so many of you all that it's hard not to. There's always somebody you can compare another to. How did you find drag? How did that happen?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: Ugh, I watched TO Wong Foo? I don't know. I love opera. Opera's drag. It really is. I feel like maybe TO Wong Foo, maybe RuPaul was on something, other than that, but I remember RuPaul from TO Wong Foo, and when she came down as Rachel Tensions, I remember being like, “Oh, wow! That's beautiful.” And then the other girls came around, too, and I was like, “Oh, this is really interesting, I'm not really sure what I'm seeing.” I watched the rest of the movie, and you're like, oh, these are some powerful people. I'd like to do that. And then I forgot about it, because I used to watch it all the time. I would actually have my parents rent it again and again and again. And they didn't know that I was gonna be a drag queen, which is crazy. Or they didn't know I was gay, which was crazy. Well, queer. Cause I do identify as pansexual. I would say I was exposed to drag through TO Wong Foo. Because I can't remember another time. Oh, well, there's also Shanaynay from MARTIN. There's also Wanda from IN LIVING COLOR, Eddie Murphy's drag roles, and Mrs. Doubtfire. You have so many drag roles that people don't really consider drag when it's totally drag. And it inspires you to be a funny drag queen, too, not only just, “I'm a beautiful queen.” And I wanted to blend those two, like, I wanted to be a beautiful woman, but also be hilarious.

Brett Cullum: Well, and you did a lot of pageants, too, right?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: I did, I did do a lot of pageants, and I've won about 16 of them.

Brett Cullum: Drag is why you're here today, because we're talking about the PUNCHLINE HOUSTON on April 17th. And you are doing stand-up.

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: Right downstairs from where I was doing my drag tour two years ago, I was upstairs at the House of Blues, and now I'm gonna be downstairs at the PUNCHLINE! 

Brett Cullum: Why stand-up?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: Why stand-up? My original show had dancing, singing, comedy, and my album, but it also had stand-up, and that part was kind of the thing that made me go, “I really love this!” I've always loved stand-up growing up, but it was never a thing. It wasn't a romanticized kind of art form, if you know what I mean. If you ever see a show about stand-up comedians, or you hear an interview, they're all like, you know, no one wants to do this, you don't want to do this. Like, this is hard. Successful comedians have a sort of nihilistic approach to their chosen art form. It also didn't seem like a moneymaker, and one thing about Sapphira  Cristall, she's gonna make money. One thing about me, as O'Neill Haynes is, I'm gonna make money, and I choose the art forms that people are bringing in, raking in the dough. During my tour, I realized, “Oh, it makes you money if you make it make money!” And I also want to give my fans more than they expect, so this is an hour-long comedy show. 

Brett Cullum: I already have tickets for this thing. I'm already in the front section, I paid for the… the upgrade! 

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: I want the VIP I'm having bottles. I want bottles, baby! Where's the chicken wings? I heard there were free chicken wings with this.

Brett Cullum: So what do you see as your, like, next evolution? Is this it? I mean, are you gonna go for stand-up? I mean, obviously, you're a performer, you're an opera singer, and it says that you're a composer, too. I mean, you actually compose as well?

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: Yeah, I write a lot of my own music, so if you've heard THE CRISTÁL BALL, I wrote a lot of that. I went to the Eastman School of Music for composition. I've never not been able to do that. That's one of the reasons why I got into composition after getting into classical music and vocal music and singing opera, and I was like, oh, I want to write this stuff. Because I was hearing stuff that I could not personally do. And as a young kid, I couldn't do it, but I wanted to sing something I could, so I wrote something I could. I'm very grateful I went to HSPVA, because it was a school that really cultivated and cared for its artists and made us learn this stuff. You're an artist, I know that you know this if you can make art out of it. I cannot fail. I cannot fail.

Brett Cullum: We can see you at the Punchline on April 17th in H-Town, I guess your hometown, sort of.

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: Well, it's the place I was raised. And, like, what is a hometown? Many people have multiple hometowns, and I do have multiple hometowns. I call Philadelphia my home. Philadelphia has embraced me as the hometown gal. I am now officially (it's written on paper, it was given to me by the Philadelphia government) the crown jewel of Philadelphia. But I'm also a Houston gal. I went to HSPVA. I went to St. John's United Methodist Church. I went to church with Beyoncé and Kelly. I'm about as Houston as it gets. I'm from Third Ward. I love Frenchy's Chicken.

Brett Cullum: I love them too! I may sneak some into the show and bring some to you.

SAPPHIRA CRISTÁL: Baby, if you bring me some Frenchy’s chicken, you might get a little extra something-something after that.

Brett Cullum: Well, thank you so much, Sapphira. We are excited to see you. Thank you for taking some time with me. I appreciate it. I'm just mind-blown by everything that you can do, and I'll be there to cheer you on.