Musicals Get a Gay Tune-Up

Comments (0) By Keith Bowers Wednesday, Dec 29 2010

More About

Showtunes: They're quite possibly the gayest thing in the universe, loaded with equal parts camp, pageantry, and flamboyance. They've also been places where gay culture could “hide in plain sight” on Broadway and in Hollywood (not to mention high school and college drama departments) during more morally restrictive times. Thirteen years ago, Tom Orr took off the disguise and wrote Dirty Little Showtunes, a queered-up collection of parodied Broadway favorites performed by six men who switch among leather daddies, muscle-bound drag queens, and impeccably dressed intellectual extroverts. This year's version includes classics from the likes of South Pacific (imagine what leather daddies and drag queens can do with “There Is Nothing Like a Dame”) as well as new bawdily tweaked numbers from Wicked, Hairspray, and The Producers. Orr's self-deprecating lyrics have the relentless verbal pace of a Marx Brothers movie — they keep you laughing but also wondering what you're missing whileyou're laughing. No matter. There's more to come with each line.
Dec. 15-19; Dec. 22-23; Sun., Dec. 26; Dec. 29-31; Sun., Jan. 2; Wednesdays-Sundays; Jan. 21-23; Jan. 27-29. Starts: Dec. 15. Continues through Jan. 16, 2010