Drag Race season 17 winner Addresses Divisive Finale Lip-Sync: ‘It Worked’

Onya Nurve did it.

Another season of RuPaul’s Drag Race has been and gone, and Onya Nurve is our latest superstar.

Nurve faced Jewels Sparkles, Lexi Love and Sam Star for the season 17 crown and title last week.

Going into the finale with four main challenge win put Nurve in a strong position, and after Love and Star were knocked out, it came down to the final lip-sync with Sparkles to Lady Gaga’s “Abracadabra.”

While Sparkles brought several reveals, an element Drag Race fans have come to expect from lip syncs, especially in the final, Nurve notably did not.

That has sparked some strong reactions from the Drag Race fandom, a notably opinionated crowd. One person claimed on TikTok that Nurve’s victory “ruins the legitimacy of the show”, a comment decried as “crazy” by another fan.

Someone else declared: “Jewels was robbed” while another said Nurve hadn’t deserved to win.

However, others rushed to defend the winner with one writing that the runner-up’s reveals were “too much,” adding: “Almost every finalist wants their Sasha Velour moment but they always over do it.”

Now Nurve has had her say, telling Variety that she was proud of her success and growth on the series, and picking up on the absence of the main-stage mainstay.

“Lady Gaga said that the category was dance or die,” she said. “I knew that at the end of the day, it was about serving the song, and I really hope I encapsulated what that song meant.

“I’m not a queen of doing reveals or a bunch of gags in real life, outside Drag Race. I felt I didn’t need them and it worked.

“After performing the song, there was a level of relief. It was regardless of what happens, I did it.”

Nurve admitted to Entertainment Weekly that she “did have a couple of reveals I was working on,” before repeating: “I’ve never been a queen of reveals.

“It came [came down to] what type of queen I am. I figured if I never did reveals before I got on Drag Race, why would I do them now? I’m a great performer and I put all my bets on that.”

She now hopes to work alongside her idols, screen legends Viola Davis and Meryl Streep, as well as having a stint on Saturday Night Live.

Season 17 of RuPaul’s Drag Race is available to stream on WOWPresents Plus internationally.