Watch: I Wish I Were Amanda Lepore by Sharon Needles
Sharon Needles made her obsession with plastic surgery no secret on season 4 of RuPaul's Drag Race. She even walked the runway on the main stage dressed like a plastic surgery patient, complete with syringe.
Since then, Sharon has name-dropped plastic surgery enthusiasts like Amanda Lepore in interviews. The allure is the exaggeration of the human figure to become the person you want to be.
It was pretty obvious when Sharon Needles released her debut album PG-13 that "I Wish I Were Amanda Lepore" was screaming to be a music video. You don't write and record a song twisting the appeal of plastic surgery into an anthem for self-empowerment and not aim for a visual component. That video is finally here and it does not fail to deliver.
Amanda Lepore appears in her typical performance attire and Sharon Needles slowly transforms into an Amanda clone. It's really beautifully done.
Sharon Needles and Amanda Lepore are a good artistic pairing. They're both performance artists with extreme looks and personas. They're strong, proud, and intelligent. People assume one thing because of their appearances and both performers continually betray those expectations.
This video is just the moment where the two artists get to show there's more than just a look to their material. The look is literally the surface level. The attraction as defined in the song and the video is not the physical beauty but the confidence to transform yourself into who you want to be.