Billy Porter Launches His First Beauty Brand, Black Mona Lisa Beauty (Exclusive)

Billy Porter wants it all.

The Tony Award-winning actor, 55, has big dreams for himself and right now, two of them are coming true: He’s starring in Cabaret on Broadway and he just launched his debut beauty brand Black Mona Lisa Beauty.

“My dream is to be a mogul,” Porter tells PEOPLE exclusively. “My last albums were called Black Mona Lisa and Black Mona Lisa Volume 2, and when that name sort of dropped down from the sky, I knew that it was bigger than a song and an album. Black Mona Lisa has become my alter ego, and I’m building out the brand. I sort of have just been dreaming, and scheming, and manifesting, and putting things out into the universe.”

During that dreaming and scheming over the past handful of years, Porter started building Black Mona Lisa Beauty with makeup and skin care. As he thought about the products and working with experts to design them, he was very clear about wanting to make this brand authentic to him and gender-free. 

“I remember reading ingredients — there was a product for face wash for women, and then a product for face wash that was supposed to be for men — and it’s the same ingredients,” he says. Porter didn’t agree with that, so he designed everything to be all-gender. 

Much like any brand owner, Porter loves all his products. But, he is partial to the Liquid Shimer, which he says he played with a lot while working on Cabaret on the West End (even though they don’t quite fit the Emcee’s makeup look — they’re fun if you’re cosplaying as the character). He’s also big into the Kale Face Cleanser and the Rose Gold Oil.

“I really feel like this brand can hit the market at an exploratory level, because the price point is for people who want to set themselves free,” Porter explains of the products, all of which are under $70. “I know I’ve been set free through leaning into my authenticity, and who it is that I really am, and the clothes that I want to wear. Sometimes I want to wear makeup. Sometimes I just want a little shimmer on my lip. There’s no problem with that.”

The shimmers that Porter created (and loves) can be worn anywhere, and that’s exactly what the actor wants customers to do. They can be swiped onto your eyelids, dabbed onto your cheeks or wherever you want a little extra shine. As he says, “it doesn’t have to be perfect.”

“You can play,” he encourages. “There’s a sense of play in it that I want people to feel. And I want people to be set free. Set free to just be who they are. That’s what the messaging was really important for me.”

Still on Porter’s to-do list is foundation, which he says he knows is a tricky product to launch. The Pose star has seen other brands do it well — and not so well. He’s not about to get “dragged online” for falling into the latter category.

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“As a Black man, I need all the colors,” he says. “My next foray is into making sure that I have foundations for all skin tones, from the lightest to the darkest.”

If Porter is going to continue on with his dreams of being a mogul, though, the Black Mona Lisa brand has plenty more growing to do — and the Emmy winner is putting in the work to make it all happen. He wants to flex his creative muscles in new ways when the timing is right. What might be next?

“I want a clothing line. Millinery. Because you know daddy likes a hat. Maybe frames. Anything is possible. Anything and everything is possible,” he says.

For now, he’s starring as the emcee in Cabaret on Broadway until the show closes on Oct. 19. He also just dropped a new song with Big Freedia called “Holy Shuffle” and he’s rocking all his Black Mona Lisa Beauty products for everyone to see.

He’s well on his way to mogul status.