‘Avalon TV’ Season 2 Shows What Chosen Family Really Means
Television has graced us with all kinds of families, but there has never been one quite like the House of Avalon, the queer collective and chosen family made up of drag artists, stylists and creatives taking over Los Angeles, including Caleb Feeney, Gigi Goode, Grant Vanderbilt, Hunter Crenshaw, Marko Monroe, Rylie Holden and Symone. Today, the house’s second season of its show, Avalon TV, premieres on WOW Presents Plus.
Avalon TV first debuted last October with a genre-bending journey that combined sitcom parodies, talk shows and behind the scenes moments: Symone’s first Met Gala, Goode’s breast augmentation surgery and interviews with guests like Abby Lee Miller and Orville Peck. While the second season promises more drama and celebrity guests like Doechii and Janis Dickinson, Avalon TV will dive even deeper into the real lives of the members of the collective.
“Now we’re really in the writer’s room and putting this shit together,” Gigi Goode tells PAPER. “It’s like such a reflection of who we are as a family, who we are as individuals and our ability to adapt to different situations and characters.” Rylie Holden adds: “You get to see a little bit more of our inner relationship dynamics this time around. You’ll understand a lot more of why we are the way we are.
In the LGBTQ+ community, there’s always talk about finding your “chosen family,” but how do you maintain one? To celebrate Avalon TV season 2, PAPER asked the House of Avalon just that.
Caleb Feeney: It’s definitely a luxury for us. I feel like not everyone has that in their life, but I hope that whenever people see us, they’re inspired to try to find their own.
Rylie Holden: It’s very much an actual family. People bite, people make up, people argue, people love each other. It’s very much a real family dynamic, but without the spooky politics of real family.
Symone: Not just creatively, but emotionally, it’s really good because it’s crazy in these streets. It’s really nice to have people that you can communicate with and love and trust outside of work, and it’s going to be nice for people to see that and see what we’ve built as a collective for ten years — what we’ve done and how we’ve built this relationship. Everyone is an individual like, I can say we’re literally seven very distinct persons, and it somehow all works. It is gonna be fun to share that. It’s our community. It’s our home.
Gigi Goode: Even so much more than friends, we really are all siblings. We fight like siblings. We make up like siblings. We are honest with each other the way siblings ought to be. Radical candor! Ultimately, you can see what that produces, and it works. It’s the formula that works. You don’t have to settle for the family that you were given. You can have them, if they’re for you and with you, but you can also find a family that is the same dynamic where everybody gets each other.
In some way or another, we have all played a part in every success that has come about in everybody’s career. It’s a team effort. Nothing’s ever really done alone. We’re all there for each other. People are going to really understand the machine that goes into it. It’s a machine that’s full of love and humor and creativity.
Marko Monroe: Radical candor is just being completely, completely, 100 percent honest with the people that you love. That’s the biggest sign of your admiration.
Hunter Crenshaw: Everyone talks about your chosen family. You have to find them, and then when you find them, everything’s going to be glorious. But no one ever talks about how to live in a chosen family or work with the chosen family, you know? We are really showcasing that this season. The first season was about our humor and our brain, but this season is like, “How do you work together? How do you live together? How is it possible that you’re all still together after 10 years?”
Photography: Brett Loudermilk
Creative direction: Zain Curtis
Television has graced us with all kinds of families, but there has never been one quite like the House of Avalon, the queer collective and chosen family made up of drag artists, stylists and creatives taking over Los Angeles, including Caleb Feeney, Gigi Goode, Grant Vanderbilt, Hunter Crenshaw, Marko Monroe, Rylie Holden and Symone. Today,…