“Where should I be looking? There? Or there?”
His face smothering the camera as he wonders where his eyes should be, Leslie Jordan is settling into our video interview like it could be a comic routine about somebody trying to use Zoom for the first time. Puckered together in a kind of duck-face pout are his elastic lips. A delicate smile curls into formation.
Then Jordan scoots so low that only his forehead is visible. More duck face. A big eyes-squished grin. A peculiar sound that may or may not be a fart. And finally a tickled laugh when I tell him I recognize that he’s in the same room that made him a viral sensation.
“It’s the only room I’ve got!” he chuckles, noting that he’s on video from his bedroom in West Hollywood. “I’ve got everything set up. And there’s my bed!”
Sure enough, that is his bed. Throughout the pandemic as he’s documented his quarantine experiences, that same bed has been seen all over his Instagram feed. There, as a COVID respite, Jordan has delivered lighthearted frivolity and cheeky humor to those he calls his “fellow hunker-downers,” in, of course, his signature Southern drawl. In one clip, he listens to a Katy Perry song that is “so lit,” while another finds him curious about Lizzo’s definition of “her juice.” Internet virality might be new for Jordan, but, at least in the LGBTQ+ community, he’s always been a star.