‘The Masked Singer’: Wendy Williams Reveals She Cried While Keeping Lips Costume a Secret From Her Family

Wendy Williams may not have been on The Masked Singer very long, but she certainly made her mark as the Lips. Being unmasked and sent home after just one performance of Odyssey’s “Native New Yorker” in Wednesday’s episode of the FOX show, Williams told Us Weekly a part of her was happy to no longer have to keep the secret of her identity from those closest to her.

“There were tears at night because this is something scary that I normally wouldn’t do and I couldn’t really talk to anyone,” the Wendy Williams Show host admitted. “My parents would call me, and I couldn’t pick up or anything. I think they thought I fled the country or something. It was all so emotional that it really hit me at night!” Williams added she only told her manager what she was doing. “That was it! It was so hard keeping a secret because it was very exciting to me,” she added. “We couldn’t go out for dinner or go out in L.A. or anything so it was just to set and back to the hotel!”

Williams is admittedly not a singer but was surprised she fooled some of the judges even for a while with her identity. “After I’d sing a line, then I would laugh. I thought that gave it away,” she said. “I was really filled with joy though.” Even host Nick Cannon “knew right away” Williams was under the Lips mask. “When we sat down, he said, ‘I’m not going to say anything, but I know who you are right away!’ And he said he couldn’t believe I pulled this off!” she recalled, joking that his red sparkly shoes even matched her costume.

That costume was more than just a glamorous way to keep a secret identity though, it was a serious “struggle” to perform in, weighing “literally 50 lbs.” Wanting to show off her signature long legs, Williams said the fittings for her costume were a whole production. “We would have fittings every day, and they would have to hold on the giant headpiece with a harness around my legs, it was so heavy. After they made some adjustments, it kept getting better and better,” she said. Even when she wasn’t performing, her identity was kept a secret from other cast and crew members with a “giant mask, shield” and a huge black hood. “I had to wear my hair in a ponytail so no one could see if I was a man or a woman, blonde or brunette, so I never saw anyone!” Williams exclaimed.