Ts Madison can do it all. She is a singer, actor and author, she hosts a talk show, stars in reality television and is a vocal LGBTQ activist. She also breaks down barriers. Madison became the first Black trans woman to star in and produce her own reality show with “The Ts Madison Experience.”
Madison got her first taste of fame in 2013 when she went viral with a Vine titled “New Weave 22 Inches.”
“I had no idea that those six seconds were going to change the trajectory of the way my whole life was going to go,” Madison said in a 2021 interview with the New York Times.
From that six-second video, Madison signed with Pink Money Records in 2014 and released her first album, “The New Supreme,” and collaborated with the likes of RuPaul and Todrick Hall.
Madison penned her memoir “A Light Through the Shade: An Autobiography of a Queen” the following year and went on to appear in the film “Zola.”
Now, Madison is the star of her own reality show, “The Ts Madison Experience”; hosts her own talk show, “Turnt Out With TS Madison”; and will appear in the Billy Eichner comedy “Bros,” scheduled for release this fall.
This month, the Florida native returns to the Sunshine State for St Pete Pride’s 20th celebration with “Shades of Pride: An LGBTQ+ Juneteenth Celebration with Ts Madison.”
“Shades of Pride” will “celebrate the history of Juneteenth while showcasing the Art and Qulture of our Black and Brown LGBTQ+ siblings. Come join us to learn more about the deep impact of Black and Brown qulture on the LGBTQ+ community as a whole and its deep roots in the evolution of Pride.”
Madison will host the event from The Factory in St. Petersburg on June 19 starting at 2 p.m.
Watermark spoke with Madison ahead of her St Pete Pride visit to talk about what audiences can expect from the event as well as what she has been up to this past year.
WATERMARK: You’re a reality TV star, an actress, an activist, a musician, I mean the list goes on and on. What role do you think comes most naturally to you, and which one do you think is most challenging for you?
TS MADISON: What comes to me naturally is, now don’t laugh, but what comes to me naturally what I found out is activism. Because even when I’m speaking out on things that bother me and that are concerns that I have about things in my community as a person of color and a trans woman, for some reason it has a reach that sometimes I don’t even expect.
Like, I could go live and do a video talking about an incident, or just something that is just so minute, or something about relationships, something about love, or something about how we’re treated as LGBT people in general and it will trend. So I say maybe that’s my natural thing.
What’s challenging for me is when I have to become an actress because I’m so naturally myself. For me to embody another person, that becomes challenging to me because I have to absorb who this character is, I have to find similarities in this character to myself, and, you know, I have to embody that. The writer that has been writing these roles for me has been writing around my character, so she’s around my personality, so it can kind of work naturally for me, but you know I have had challenges on auditions where I was like ‘oh god, this is going to be very challenging for me’ because I’m not this person.
Speaking of acting, they just dropped the trailer for “Bros” which you’re in. It looks absolutely hysterical and like it’s going to be a huge hit. How did you get involved with that project?
This happened two, maybe three years ago, I got an email from a casting agent that the directors and producers of the show are interested and here’s the thing, I didn’t know who they were at first. And they said they were interested in giving me an opportunity to audition for a character in an upcoming film. And I was like ‘okay cool.’ I auditioned; I was actually on the road doing a gig coming from California.
So after a while, you know, that’s when COVID came through and shut everything down so the communication was very minimal, this is funny—and I never get a chance to say this stuff—the producers were fans of me from “RuPaul’s Drag Race” and “Lemme Pick You Up” and all the things I do over at World of Wonder, but I didn’t know it was Billy Eichner. I didn’t know until I actually had to attend a screen test, because they gave me the sides of every character that’s in the board room because we’re all the Board of Directors, so every character that’s in the Board Room I read for.
I read for the lesbian character, I read for the nonbinary character, I read for every character that’s in the room. They finally gave me the role of Angela. It was crazy, because then they were like it’s Universal Pictures and it’s a Judd Apatow film, it’s Nicholas Stoller, Billy Eichner, all these legendary actors and iconic people are in the film. This is a movie about love and every person that’s acting in the movie is a gay person, or a trans person, or nonbinary, it’s all under the spectrum and I was lie ‘whoa.’ We’re playing straight roles, gay roles, they gave our jobs back to us. And that was amazing.
You’re also doing a show, “Turnt Out With TS Madison,” on Fox Soul TV. What can you share about that project?
“Turnt Out With TS Madison” on Fox Soul, that’s my talk show. I’m able to control the narrative on that show and I communicate with everybody, all the guests. What’s amazing on that show is I had the opportunity to be a part of mending a 13-year feud between Lee Daniels and Mo’Nique. That was one of the most powerful things that I felt that came from my show because, you know, it was a huge cultural beef. It was amazing.
Also, I have a show coming on WOW Presents Plus, that’s the World of Wonders streaming service, it’s called “Bring Back My Girls,” and I do all the reunions for “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” there’s seasons from Canada, from Holland, I did the season 12 reunion, and I don’t know if you are familiar with “RuPaul’s Drag Race” but season 12 they only had a Zoom reunion on TV.
So I was able to do their big reunion right on stage there at DragCon and it was so amazing, I can’t wait for you guys to see it.
Have you always had aspirations to be a talk show host?
Yes, honestly. I didn’t know what I wanted to be at one point because I didn’t know really what it was, but once I understood what shaped and molded me, I was like “okay this is really what I want to be.”
I learned a lot about the world through talk shows. Because my mother was a Christian and there were lots of things that she shielded us from and kept us from being involved in — you know I didn’t get the chance to run the streets until later on if you want to put it that way. So I learned about the world through talk: Phil Donahue, Geraldo Rivera, Sally Jessy Raphael,
Jenny Jones, oh my god, let’s talk about Jenny Jones! What really set me with a new understanding of not homophobia, but fragile masculinity was that episode of Jenny Jones where she brought out secret crushes and the crush was a neighbor, it was a gay man, and he had a crush on his neighbor. And I remember saying ‘I think he thinks it’s a woman’ I remember those words because after that episode aired, the neighbor killed him. And it was then when I was like ‘wow, the world is crazy, he only had a crush’ he didn’t say that he had him or it wasn’t like they had a sexual time, he just had a crush on him. This man was so embarrassed that the world was going to perceive him as homosexual that he risked his freedom and risked the rest of his life over a crush.
I remember that, and that case really hit home the responsibility that talk shows and talk show hosts have to their audiences and to the guests they bring on that it’s not just all entertainment, you’re interacting with real lives.
Yes. That show stuck with me so hard. And also Jerry Springer was talking about trans people, I saw so many other trans women in the world. Talk shows are what shapes culture. And I wanted to be a part of shaping, influencing and moving culture.
Speaking of shaping culture, here in Florida there’s a big culture war going on. You’re originally from Florida, and we’ve got the “Don’t Say Gay or Trans” bill, now law, that made national headlines. Do you want to share a couple of thoughts on, I assume you’ve been following along with it since its national news and you’re from Florida, but do you want to share a couple of your thoughts on what you’re watching happen over the last couple of months as this was coming into law?
I was really blown away. I just wonder why are we on a witch hunt for LGBT people? Why are we on a witch hunt for trans people? What is the obsession, why can we not just co-exist with everybody? Why do we have to have a law, or why do laws have to come into play, like why do we have to be outed? Why does this stuff have to go on?
So I was confused at first, like it says “don’t say gay” but what does it really mean? In the words of Cardi B, “what is the reason?” It’s weird! It’s crazy, and this is why its so important for us as gay people, trans people and everybody that falls under that umbrella, to get out and make sure that we put people in office that represent us. And that we know, when we’re voting for these people that we don’t need to just run out to the polls during the presidential elections. We need to do it in the local elections, people need to talk to city councilmen, the mayor, voting is important for us and we need to be resilient in doing that.
What message do you have for LGBTQ Americans, particularly the youths watching this happen and may be still closeted or in homes where they feel like the only place that they had to turn was a teacher or someone at school?
Well, this is a time that we need to really set petty differences aside. And we really need to come together as a family. I know its easier said than done, but this is the time that we really need each other. And we need to show up for each other and be there for each other. We need to be the strength in our communities. We need to be unified because if we can’t turn to our family and we can’t turn to our teachers, we need to be able to turn within. And so we need to be stronger. And the youth are the only people that are going to be able to change the future.
So we need to start with letting the youth know that whatever petty differences that we have, they need to lay down and we need to come together as a family and be strong.
You’re coming to Tampa Bay for St Pete Pride, not only to celebrate Pride, but to honor Juneteenth with your event “Shades of Pride.” Talk to me a little about this event and why it was important for you to have this event in St. Pete.
I can’t believe it’s 20 years! I remember 20 years ago, I was 24. Oh my god, it’s definitely important for me to be there to celebrate because I’m from Florida honey, so I must come back and celebrate Pride in Florida, and because its Juneteenth and this is something people of color need to celebrate. It’s two freedoms — the freedom of us being LGBT and the time that we found out we were free from slavery. And so it’s double important.
There is a lot of racism in Florida. A lot of racism, and a lot of homophobia. This is important because we need to walk through those streets, we need to march through those streets, we need to parade, dance and let them know honey that we’re Black and proud; we’re Black, gay, trans, queer and everything and damn proud of it honey.
What do you want people to take away from this experience, from your show?
Well, I don’t know to be honest with you. Every time someone comes in contact with me, they say they have a different takeaway. Like some people say that I’ve changed their lives over the course of just watching me online and watching me maneuver through the obstacles that I’ve had in my life, and the public scandals that have been on in my life. But what I really want people to take away honey is we’re here, we’re queer, bitch get used to it.
You mentioned how, as a country and in the state of Florida particularly, there is racism and homophobia and transphobia. Unfortunately some of that racism and transphobia comes from within our own community. How can members of the LGBTQ community help to elevate marginalized voices within it when we’re seeing that kind of transphobia and racism within our own people?
What we have to understand is if we ain’t got us, who else does? If we don’t have us, who else has got us? And it’s like I said earlier, we’ve got to set aside petty differences and know that there is strength in numbers and we’re stronger together. What needs to happen is we need to not be gatekeepers.
The gay men need to stand behind their trans sisters and understand that just because you might be passable as a gay man in straight culture, your sisters might be passable or whatever, you can get bashed too, you can get bashed too by straight people. So, you have to uphold and stand behind your people. And we don’t need to fit in, we need to stand out. We need to stand up and stand out for each other. That pisses me off, when I think about how the gay men are like ‘oh well that doesn’t have anything to do with me, that’s a trans issue.’ No, that has everything to do with you. Everything to do with you. And you say ‘oh well, you know, that stuff is for white people.’ Girl! It’s for all gays! Or ‘that’s for Black people’ you know, we’re gays.
When it’s time for us to be rounded up, we’re all going to go.
“Shades of Pride: An LGBTQ+ Juneteenth Celebration with TS Madison” will be held with no cost on June 19 from 2-9 p.m. at The Factory in St. Petersburg, located at 2622 Fairfield Ave. S. Learn more at StPetePride.org.
