A campy family drama, a play about sexuality and violence, a witty trio of drag queens on a road trip in the vast Australian interior, a compulsively singable musical and an extravagant pageant of costumes. The story follows them through love and heartbreak, gay-bashing and the mercurial nature of show business. It’s enough to fill an entire season of theater, yet they’re all rolled into a bus and presented onstage at the SHN Orpheum Theatre in San Francisco in a single night. This production boasts talent both up front and backstage and makes for a colorful evening that even Bay Area audiences are unlikely to forget.
“Priscilla Queen of the Desert” boasts a spectacular cast. Wade McCollum plays Tick/Mitzi as the truly complex character that he is, neither hamming up the jokes nor making his drag too ostentatiously feminine. McCollum’s Tick is tender and touchy — a loving father and a fierce friend. Bryan West as Adam/Felicia is playful and tart, using every inch of his youth and native snark to play a coquettish queen with a blade for a tongue.
The principal standout of the trio, however, is Scott Willis as Bernadette. Playing a trans* character is a delicate job, and Willis never cheapens Bernadette. Willis’ mastery of the subtle gestures of the bygone era of stylized drag belies a dedication and deeper understanding of the character.
The ensemble cast added shimmer to the already glittering array on stage; the chorus of Divas suspended from the rafters were a wonder of technical and artistic skill. Babs Rubenstein as the humorless Shirley served up great physical comedy with cunning facial control and a stunning sense of timing. Appearing as Miss Understanding, Nik Alexzander was an inescapable mistress of ceremonies, both with hilarious delivery and a delicious mocking of latecomers to the theater. The chorus is rounded out by a bevy of beautiful men who elicit catcalls and wolf whistles from the entire audience, regardless of gender and usual deportment. This production does not lack for eye candy.
What candy nature didn’t provide the costumer designers Tim Chappel and Lizzy Gardiner were happy to supply. In change after change, the audience is moved to gasps and laughs and cheers by such offerings as a minidress made of flip-flops, a full chorus line dressed as pink paintbrushes and disco monsters of distorted proportion in enormous boat shoes.
The choreography recreated by Joshua Buscher takes full advantage of the outlandish costuming and emphasizes both the exaggerated nature of drag performance and the whimsical quality of the larger musical numbers. The visual elements of this musical never stop dazzling, and the subject matter of drag queens grants license to try some things that might not work in any other show but are gloriously campy in this one.
The visual playfulness is matched by a score made up of the very singable hits of the last few decades, ranging from “A Fine Romance,” in its lovelorn quietude, to such knockout numbers as “Go West” or “Shake Your Groove Thing.” The ensemble numbers are the strongest in this show, over the top in their staging and choreography as well as toe-tapping to an audience that knows every word. The arrangements were a little schmaltzy on the more emotional numbers; both “True Colors” and “We Belong” lagged a bit and felt like obligations rather than plot developments. Nevertheless, show-stoppers like “MacArthur Park” wipe them from memory, and the overall feel is an explosion of joy, camp and glitter.
“Priscilla Queen of the Desert” is a nonstop sparkling series of tableaux, both serious and silly, accompanied by expertly delivered one-liners. It isn’t hard for an LGBTQ-themed play to charm a San Francisco audience, but “Priscilla” delivers more than typical theater audiences are expecting. Where many drag shows elicit groans and tired cliches, “Priscilla” concentrates fun into a rollicking spectacle of gayness and gaiety.