Theatre in Review: Drag: The Musical (New World Stages)

	Nick Adams. Photo: Matthew Murphy

Drag: The Musical is the theatrical equivalent of Drag Queen Story Hour; underneath its sequined, bewigged, heavily made-up surface, it's all about love, hugs, and community. It is, you should pardon the term, a fairy tale about acceptance and making a family with one's friends, however oddball or dysfunctional. Indeed, it is so busy affixing its heart to its glittering sleeve that it sometimes forgets to be amusing. Instead, the creators gamble that elaborate costumes, plenty of sashaying, and fierce displays of attitude will be enough. I'm not so sure about that.

According to the prologue, narrated by Liza Minnelli (who somehow got herself mixed up in this as an over-the-title producer), drag queens and ex-lovers Alexis Gillmore and Kitty Galloway operate rival across-the-street clubs: The Fish Tank (Alexis' cozy den of iniquity) and The Cat House (Kitty's queendom). As Kitty puts it, "Two drag houses. Both alike in their lack of dignity" and forever throwing casting shade at each other. For both establishments, however, hard times have set in: Alexis is stuck with a massive, bankrupting IRS bill while Kitty is hit with a skyrocketing rent increase and, later, the threat of redevelopment. The obvious choice -- the only one, really -- would be for both sides to kiss and make up, merging their operations. But it takes two wheel-spinning hours before the characters reach this conclusion.

Most of the action centers on The Fish Tank because Alexis, long estranged from his family, reluctantly calls on his brother Tom, an accountant (and widower) who shows up with his hurting ten-year-old son Brendan. (The boy, not unlike Billy Elliot's young friend Michael, is strangely drawn to glittery sunglasses and glamorous frocks, making his father nervous.) Alexis and Tom are plenty aggrieved -- each feels disrespected and abandoned in his moment of need -- but surely you can see where this is headed. Among Alexis' crew is Dixie Coxworth, a self-described female drag queen who exists largely to give Tom some dating possibilities. In one of the more amusing exchanges, Tom says, "I didn't know that women could be drag queens." "Yes," Dixie replies. "And we can be astronauts, and fire-fighters, and even doctors!"

I'd love to tell you that the rest of Drag lives up to that wisecrack but Tomas Costanza, Justin Andrew Honard, and Ashley Gordon -- collectively responsible for the book, music, and lyrics -- settle for any old thing in the dialogue department. Tom, sardonically surveying Alexis' decrepit surroundings, cracks, "By the way, I love what you did with the black mold. It goes with everything." An angry Alexis dismisses him as "Turbo Tax with legs!" (That doesn't even make sense.) A character known as Drunk Jerry wanders in and out saying things like "Who do I have to cock to get a blowtail around here?"

There's no question that a few drinks -- which, to be sure, are readily available -- would improve one's enjoyment of Drag, a show that inhabits its own, sequined fantasy world far, far from our everyday reality. Aside from a murky, easily forgotten plot point about the Russian mafia and an episode involving a "drag sale," almost nothing happens; even the so-called rift between Alexis and Kitty doesn't come to much. The songs are equipped with the most basic lyrics: "Take a good look handsome/This mug is flawless/And these leather boots/No they don't come from Pay Less." (I'd take another look at that "flawless/Pay less" rhyme if I were the authors.) The songs tend to announce themselves in their titles and then repeat themselves: "Drag is Expensive," "Straight Man," and "Gay as Hell," The latter, features Drunk Jerry, reliving his rakish past, recalling, "The only other Mary who could drink as much as me/Was all five foot three of genius known as Truman Capote."

Howard, who performs under the drag name Alaska Thunderfuck -- I can't believe I just typed that --- has a certain amusing hauteur as Kitty, especially when taking a swipe at The Gazillion Bubble Show, its neighbor at New World Stages. As Alexis, Broadway regular Nick Adams has fun melodramatically expressing his character's distress, but he is often weighed down by the pro-forma family therapy plot. Liisi LaFontaine is charming as Dixie, partnering nicely with boy band star Joey McIntyre as Tom. McIntyre looks like he can't quite take in this latest career turn, but he plays along gamely. J. Elaine Marcos, Adams' former co-star in Broadway's Priscilla Queen of the Desert, delivers a trio of villains with manic energy, shaking up things with each appearance. That old pro Eddie Korbich deserves a medal for giving his all to the thankless role of Drunk Jerry. At the performance I attended, Yair Keyda, one of two young actors cast as Brendan, got the biggest hand of the evening for his sweet, unaffected delivery of the number "I'm Just Brendan."

The producers have sprung for the gaudy production design that Drag surely needs, beginning with Jason Sherwood's cheerfully tacky, grungy set, which stands in for both The Fish Tank and The Cat House. It features a gilded balcony, a couple of staircases, faux-neon signs, and, in a nod to the score's surprisingly punk vibe, references to Meat Loaf, Divine, Blondie, and The Sex Pistols. Aaron Rhyne's video images -- which include leopard prints, moving shelves of liquor bottles, and the lyrics to "Gay as Hell" -- are lively but the fan noise from the projectors on the balcony rail is distracting; this may help explain the high decibel level of Drew Levy's sound design. Nevertheless, Rhyne's work is a key element, delivering the prologue and a Liza-narrated wrap-up. Adam Honore's lighting has plenty of rock-concert touches, including pans, sweeps, and blinder cues; it's a lot for even a biggish Off-Broadway house, but it's of a piece with director/choreographer Spencer Liff's vision, which stops at nothing to gin up a party atmosphere. Marco Marco's costumes run the gamut from the tackiest outfits to Kitty's all-black funeral ensemble complete with an expandable black boater hat that gets a considerable laugh.

Off Broadway is experiencing a peak gay moment just now, and I imagine the competition will be intensive. But where, say, The Big Gay Jamboree offers some magpie hilarity along with its borderline nonsensical plot, Drag relies on homey sentiments that were freshly appealing when Harvey Fierstein was young. It's not a good musical but I can see it finding an audience with the RuPaul's Drag Race fan club, especially since many members of the supporting cast -- including Jan Sport, Jujubee, and Luxx Noir London -- are veterans of that popular series. And don't forget the cocktails! --David Barbour