“If you don’t like intense drama, explosive emotions, unbridled romanticism, runny makeup and heart-wrenching love songs – or if you’re a right-winger – get lost!”

That’s overly-Botoxed narrator Steevy Shady at the start of Les Reines du Drama, AKA Queens Of Drama, which documents the tumultuous love/lust affair between lesbian punk icon Billie Kohler and newly minted pop princess Mimi Madamour.

Already a smash hit in its native France, the film is camp, funny, fantastical and full of bravura performances from the likes of Bilal Hassani who plays the acid tongued Shady – sample barb: “I destroyed careers with a bat of my eyelashes!” – with superstar élan.

A former reality TV show contestant who represented France at the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest in Tel Aviv – the genderfluid singer finished sixteenth with bilingual banger ‘Roi’ – the 25-year-old has angered traditionalist Catholics by striking a Virgin Mary pose on a magazine cover and taken legal action to close down racist online trolls.

Bil

All of which means they’ve one hell of a story to tell, starting with Queens Of Drama.

“I wasn’t planning an acting career,” Hassani reveals, “but the director Alexis Langlois, who’d done short films like Terror, Sisters! and The Demons Of Dorothy that I was obsessed with, came to me with their brilliant script and said, ‘I’ve a character you’d be perfect for’. So without having any experience or doing an audition, I was suddenly this obsessive Mimi Madamour stan, Steevy Shady, who tells her story from 2005 to 2055.

“Even then”, Bilal continues, “I thought it’d just be a one-off, but I’ve another film, Nino In Paradise, on the way. It’s the story of this young boy living in Paris with no money but big dreams and a determination not to do what society tells him.”

Queens Of Drama, which picked up the Queer Palm at last year’s Cannes Film Festival, features original songs that nod towards the likes of Cardi B, Gaga, Dua Lipa and, naturellement, Christine + The Queens.

“It’s very Steevy of me but my favourites are the ones that Mimi sings like ‘Pas Touche!’ which has this great ‘Touche pas touche si tu veux ma bouche’ – ‘Don’t touch if you want my mouth’ – hookline.”

Not to be outdone, Billie gets to yell lyrics like “Pumped up chicks/ Bums so thick” and “You and me will fuck the patriarchy” as she seduces Mimi with not only her words, but also a pre-warmed butt plug.

Equal parts A Star Is Born, John Waters’ Hairspray and a microbudget Barbie, the Queens Of Drama casts newcomers like Bilal and Gio Ventura and Louiza Aura, who are brilliant as Mimi and Billie, alongside such continental screen legends as Asia Argento.

Argento bravely helped blow the whistle on Harvey Weinstein in 2017 and was in the news for the wrong reasons again a year later when her former partner Anthony Bourdain tragically took his own life.

“The whole film was shot on the one soundstage so, even though we’re not in any scenes together, I got to see Asia act and sit next her to in the makeup room when we were getting our prosthetics done,” Hassani says referring to the startling things done to both of their faces in the film. “From the way she conducted herself on set to her actual performance as Magalie Charmer, everything about her was impressive. I felt like, ‘Okay, this is my acting school!’”

Are there any parallels between the movie’s fictitious Starlets Academy and Bilal’s own reality TV show exploits?

“It’s very much a fantasy version of a TV talent competition used to tell a love story, but there are bits – standing there with your number tag and the stress of waiting to hear the judges’ verdict – that remind me of being on The Voice in France. I also did The X Factor in the UK when I was eighteen and went through to bootcamp. What you need doing those shows is to have a good support system – I’ve always done everything with my Mom – and a plan for what you’re going to do afterwards. In both cases, I had music written and ready to release the moment I got kicked off. There was no waiting for a label or somebody else to do it for me.”

There’s a YouTube video of Bilal and a synth-playing mate absolutely nailing ‘Running Up That Hill’.

“When they asked me to cover the song I was like, ‘Oh no, not Kate!’ because the original version is perfection. Rather than copying it, I gave it an electropop-y feel and was amazed when the audience didn’t look like they were being tortured too much!”

Also to be found on t’internet is a beautiful photo of Bilal with Cher.

“They say, ‘Don’t meet your idols’, but I have and they’ve all been really nice,” they smile. “I got to hang out with Cher at the party her French label threw when she released her Christmas album. I’d have been happy with a quick ‘Hello!’ but she stopped and gave me loads of really great advice. I met Mariah Carey when I was just coming out with my first song and she was phenomenal, as was Kylie Minogue who has the same PR team here as me.”

Asked when their own LGBTQI+ journey began, Bilal says, “Very early on. I came out of my Mum like a flappy bird and said, ‘Hey guys, this is me!’ By five or six years of age, it was obvious to me who I was. I was twelve when I came out to my close family in France.”

Did being from a Moroccan Muslim background make coming out more difficult?

“My father is very religious but open minded and loving enough to go, ‘Okay, teach me about this’. What was funny is that Eurovision happened before I’d come out to my family in Morocco. They just saw me one day on TV with a wig on and, instead of focusing on my sexuality, were proud that here was a person with Moroccan blood doing something big. Since then they’ve asked questions and educated themselves about it, which is really cool.”

I can only imagine what Bilal’s Eurovision participation meant to the LGBTQIA+ community in Morrocco who are still forced to live their lives in the shadows.

“What was heartwarming was going back there two years ago and meeting loads of people who are out, loud and proud. While same sex relationships still aren’t legal there, things are definitely getting better.”
An unexpected Eurovision bonus was Bilal being invited to cameo in Will Ferrell’s loving The Story Of Fire Saga parody of it.

“Will was at Eurovision filming scenes, saw me and three months later sent an email saying, ‘Hey, I’d love you to be in it.’ Having finished sixteenth with only 105 points, I thought, ‘This has to be a scam or a joke’ and put it in the bin. When we didn’t reply, they tried contacting me through my social media channels and various email addresses they’d found. When we finally spoke on the ‘phone and I realised Will’s interest was for real, I just squeeled and said, ‘I’d love to!’

“You don’t always get to meet the stars when you’re doing a cameo, but me and my Mom spent the whole day hanging out with Will, Dan Stevens and Rachel McAdams who I’ve loved ever since I saw her on Mean Girls. It was so much fun.”

Rewinding to Steevy Shady’s opening Queens Of Drama preamble, are French artists standing up to Marine Le Pen and her National Rally goons?
“I think we are,” they nod. “We’re living in scary times and this film is part of the fight back. Everybody needs to take a stand.”

Which Bilal did in 2019 by taking legal action against the owners of Twitter accounts who’d been bombarding them with homophobic and racist tweets, which included credible death threats.

Meanwhile, last month saw four men being prosecuted for hate crimes, which lead to the singer cancelling a 2023 gig in a desacralised church in Metz.

“I’ve been exposed for four years, I’m still a human being, I’m 23, I started when I was 19, it’s a lot to carry on my shoulders,” Hassani told the France 5 TV channel at the time.

“While it’s really important and interesting to provoke people with art, I consider all religions to be equal and would never mock somebody’s faith,” they say now. “Touring my Théorème album I wanted the shows to be in unusual venues and discovered this beautiful building in Metz, which had been a church for fifty years and was then desacralised and turned into a public swimming school. When people started rioting over it I was like, ‘What’s going on? There was a concert there last week and you didn’t say anything.’

“We never usually respond to stuff like that but this time the threats were so intense and so unfair that we decided to sue. I’m glad, even though it was mostly symbolic, that we won and a very clear message – we won’t accept your hatred – was sent out.”

• Queens Of Drama screens at the BFI Flare London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival on March 23 and will be coming soon to Ireland. BFI Flare runs from March 19-30 at BFI Southbank. Bilal Hassani’s ‘La Question’ single is on digital platforms now.