The grand premiere of The Boulet Brothers' Dragula season 6 has an opening sequence that reads, "written and directed by The Boulet Brothers" — solidifying the directorial role that Dracmorda ("Drac") and Swanthula ("Swan") have assumed for the fifth season of the flagship series and the first-ever edition of The Boulet Brothers' Dragula: Titans.
"We're still just excited to step up and take the reins of directing. It's been extremely rewarding," Drac tells Out about directing the sixth season of The Boulet Brothers' Dragula. "We spend more time behind the camera than in front of the camera, and I absolutely love it. It feels correct. This year, you'll see an elevation of the cinematics on the show. You'll see a higher production quality and better camera work."
Swan agrees, adding: "A lesson learned [from directing] might be that there are significant areas of the show that we should focus our energy on. In other places, we can rely on the skills, artistry, and talents of the crew. We've done that, and I think we let go of some pieces so that we could really focus on the stuff that we love. People will see it this season."
When asked about their favorite parts of making the show and which areas they can now focus on, Drac brings up the ideation process behind certain challenges.
"This is something we've always done, but when we come up with a challenge, sometimes it doesn't feel like we want to do it unless certain guest judges agree to do it," Drac explains. "You start with 30 challenge ideas… and then, over the course of pre-production, it gets weeded down. As we [start] reaching out to guest judges, sometimes we'll be like, 'Okay, we really want to do this challenge, but only if this [guest judge] does it.'"
Drac continues, "It's like what we did with the Halloween House Party on Titans; we really wanted Justin Simien and Elvira to be there. He was directing the Haunted Mansion [2023] at the time. Obviously, Elvira is fantastic. There's another challenge this year that's similar, with Don Mancini and Jennifer Tilly, that we were like, 'I'm not going to do the challenge if they don't say yes.' But they were very excited to do it, so it's going to be great."
Besides the impact of guest judges on the challenges that could be featured in a season of The Boulet Brothers' Dragula, Drac and Swan share an interesting (and unexpected!) dynamic that's also changed since they became directors of the series.
"I feel like we're a little closer to the newer seasons, to be honest, because we directed them," Drac notes. "So, when they see us for the first time on set, we're out of drag. It's like, the 'Ice Empresses' did not appear. It was us, instead, out of drag, just on set with a headset on."
That initial, out-of-drag interaction hadn't even crossed my mind, I confess… trying to picture those drag monsters and the Boulet Brothers meeting one another for the first time in person as Drac and Swan are both out of drag.
"You mentioned, 'Oh, I didn't even think of that; the first time they'd meet us would be out of drag.' But that was the first thing we thought about when we were deciding whether or not we'd step into the role of director," Swan explains. "We've always pulled strings, but there's been people between us and the direction. While it's much more satisfying to do the directing, we were like, 'How is that going to change our dynamics with them?' Because we're not going to have the veneer of the drag personas, and the respect that comes with it, and the intensity of those moments."
Drac chimes in, "I think they were stunned. But it also made them say, 'Hey, actually, these guys care about how we look, and they're helping us look better.' We'd talk to them every day, one-on-one. We'd explain, like, 'So, you're about to do the floor show. This is what you're going to do. These are the camera angles. If we need to retake something, we will.'"
"And I think that made us connect with them," Drac highlights. "They could see how much we actually care… where, in the past, we were more in the shadows. They'd just see us appear [in drag] to judge them. It used to be a little colder, but now I think they see how much we actually do care about them."
Drac and Swan underscore that the cast of The Boulet Brothers' Dragula season 6 reminds them of the iconically chaotic cast of season 2. Between Biqtch Puddin (who was the eventual winner), James Majesty (who's returning for season 6), Victoria Black (who won the first-ever Titans edition), Abhora, Kendra Onixxx, Erika Klash, and Dahli, that was a loud, dramatic, and bloody entertaining season of drag artistry and reality television.
"Every season, the cast has its own alchemy that we can't foresee, and we can't control. It just is what it is, and we make room for it on the show," Swan says. "I'm grateful because, this season, we went in with this idea of casting from our wild-card folder, like people that we're uncertain about [what to expect]. We were like, 'Let's just do it all,' so we cast all wild cards, and they showed up ready."
Swan continues, "They are chaotic, and energetic, and confrontational. Dare I say, a little bit of a throwback to season 2 vibes. They're not afraid of reality TV and sharing their opinions, which, for us, is like chef's kiss. It's like, 'Don't try to edit yourself. Don't produce yourself. Let us do that. You just be you.' And that's exactly what they did."
"Yes," Drag agrees. "I'd say that some of the most confrontational stuff that's ever happened on the show happens on this season. And, actually, some of which we aren't even including in the final edit, because it's a little bit too much."
The discourse around "bad edits" on reality shows has become exhausting for everyone involved: for the contestants trying to over-explain themselves on social media, for the producers still trying to tell the storylines they've put together, for the fans trying to pick sides or believe certain sources instead of others, and even for the media attempting to make sense of it all.
But Drac echoes a similar sentiment that's been heard from producers of other drag-related TV shows.
"If someone seems like they have a 'bad edit,' or they come off as hostile on the show, I promise you they were 10 times worse during filming," Drac says. "We try to smooth the edges and protect everybody. If you're seeing someone who's coming off like an assh*le, then they've been like that the whole season, so we can't edit around it."
"And if anyone ever contests that, we have so much footage as receipts," Swan adds.
Fans are excited to see how 'Season 666' will play out, but they also have another lingering question that I might've been "exterminated" had I not asked Drac and Swan about it. What's the status of The Boulet Brothers' Dragula: Titans season 2?
"It's definitely something that the network and the production company want to see happen. We weren't sure," Drac reveals. "The first season was very successful. But, emotionally, it was very taxing for us. The people coming back, we assumed that they would be pros about it. That they'd be like, 'I've already been on reality TV, so I'll get into it now.' But instead, they came on being very paranoid and very careful. It was uncomfortable, and then [the format of people coming back] made them come off even weirder."
Drac goes on, "The fans' reaction was also weird to them. I don't know, they were treated very well, but I don't think they had the best experience in terms of how they were received. So, at first, we were like, 'I don't know if I want to do that again. I don't want to deal with all this, the fans and the crying and all the bullsh*t.'"
"But I think we've come around to a different stance," Drac muses. "We're actually excited to do another Titans season. I think the experience would be very different for the competitors. That was a trial run, right? That was the first time we'd done it."
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It's obvious that the art form of drag is all about the illusions and fantasies and personas.
However, I do zoom in on that emotionally taxing experience felt by the Boulet Brothers during the first season of Titans — not only as the hosts and judges of this competition series they've created and were now expanding, but also as the new directors of the whole thing, too.
Drac says, "I would obviously never do the finale that way on a second season of Titans. But that was shocking to me, because I was like, 'This is a spinoff. This is not the main season of the show. We can't make it exactly like the show… because then it's just the same show.'"
"That's why we didn't do the exterminations; they dropped through the trap door," Drac continues. "And the finale, too, to be honest, I was like, 'This season has been so hard on them. I don't want to make them come up with three more looks.' That's the truth."
Drac elaborates, "We just wanted them to put everything they had into one show and be done. We didn't want to keep them here for three more weeks buying all kinds of sh*t and making all this stuff. But the fans' reaction to it… I was very surprised. Like, 'Wow, you would think we had run over a family with children in a murder van or something. What's going on?'"
"The season was great. It was the most-watched season of the show at that point," Drac Boulet points out. "I did think it was kind of a weird, crazy, mass hysteria about it."
Drac concludes, "But I'll tell you this: it will not happen again next time. We will put the finalists through the wringer, and make it super-hard on them, and have them make a thousand costumes."
Swan adds, "And it will be an absolute bloodbath to the point where there's a tidal wave rolling out of the soundstage because people were crying about not having a blood dump."
The Boulet Brothers' Dragula franchise was nominated for its first-ever Emmy Awards this year at the 76th Primetime Emmy Awards. Those nominations were in the Outstanding Hairstyling category and in the Outstanding Makeup category within the variety, nonfiction and reality TV genre of the ceremony.
Even though Saturday Night Live won in both of those categories that The Boulet Brothers' Dragula was nominated for, there was another standout reality show that emerged victorious in the top-line Emmy categories for reality TV: The Traitors. And speaking of which, can we be real for a second and acknowledge that The Traitors feels eerily similar to Dragula, but without so much drag and without the fabulously gruesome extermination scenes?
"I do think that Dragula, existing as it does, influences people in high [places]," Swan teases. "And we actually are huge fans. I watched season 2 and I loved the show. I love Alan Cumming. Drac has said it: we even think that maybe he channels a little bit of Boulet energy in his hosting style."
Facts are facts, America! Except that The Traitors doesn't do the exterminations that fans love so much from the Boulet Brothers' universe. "The reason they don't do the death scenes is because they're not as masochistic as we are," Swan says with a giggle.
And just like that, everything feels right in the world again. I feel spooky season entering my body, as if these two ghouls known as Drag and Swan have just possessed me while I thought that I was just conducting an interview… and who knows, maybe they did.
For the next couple of months, drag monsters Asia Consent, Auntie Heroine, Aurora Gozmic, Desiree Dik, Grey Matter, Jaharia, Majesty, Pi, Scylla, Severity Stone, Vivvi the Force, and Yuri will battle it out to win the sixth season of The Boulet Brothers' Dragula and become the World's Next Drag Supermonster.
We will certainly be tuning in for 'Season 666' to watch it all play out and not miss any of this juicy drama teased by Drac and Swan.
The Boulet Brothers' Dragula season 6 airs new episodes every Tuesday on Shudder and AMC+.
