Drag: The Musical

All seems set for the perfect drag musical – right?  Not.  It just didn’t happen.  The problem really wasn’t the plot.  It was simple.  You have a rivalry between the two houses of drag that makes for good competition than reconciliation – predictable but workable.  The problem was with all the drag elements.  Where were all the over the top outfits and wigs?  I have seen more outrageous things in bars than on this stage.  Where was the lip-syncing competitions that become the fodder of all drag shows.  Where was the over-the-top quips and snaps (there were some – but I set my bar high that the very best would be in this show)?  I saw little interest in fooling the eye to look like women and little insight as to the backstage magic as to how a drag queen goes about the transformation.  None of the songs were memorable or clever; you certainly didn’t leave the theatre humming them.  I will give the show credit that for the last half of the production it began to grow a heart and you began to care about the characters and their fate and began to wish them well on their endeavor to reunite their drag bars.  I guess when it came down to it, I wanted this musical to take the best of Le Cage Aux Folles and RuPaul’s Drag Race – combine them both together and put them live on stage with Broadway caliber performers.  I got some of this but by no means enough.

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