Theatrical productions aren’t generally written about
Florida. The Sunshine State, with its gators and gulf coast, doesn’t set the
stage for a production in quite the same way a cosmopolitan city or the Midwest
does. But for Matthew Lopez’s 2015 play “The Legend of Georgia McBride,” a
small town Florida setting somehow works perfectly.
The plot
focuses on Casey, a 20-something Elvis impersonator who’s been playing The King
for a nearly-empty bar on weekends. When he finds out his wife is pregnant and
his act is being replaced by a drag queen duo, Casey decides to stay on as a
bartender so he’s not out of work. Instead, he finds himself thrown into the
act when one of the queens can’t perform, and Georgia McBride is born.
The play was
commissioned by The Old Globe in San Diego and developed at the Denver Center
Theatre Company before opening off-Broadway at the MCC Theater in 2015. It ran
for a month as a NY Times Critic’s Pick, and reviewer Charles Isherwood called
it “typically first-rate.” (Local audiences may remember Lopez’s Civil War-era
drama, “The Whipping Man,” which played at Geva
Theatre Center in 2013.)
Rochester
drag favorites Aggy Dune (Thomas Smalley) and Mrs.
Kasha Davis (Ed Popil) play the dynamic drag duo,
with Smalley in the role of Casey’s drag mentor-of-sorts Tracy Mills (Bobby),
and Popil as the pill-popping, unreliable Anorexia
Nervosa (Rexy). Audiences can expect the same tongue-in-cheek drag jokes and
innuendos here as they’d see in a “Big Wigs” show, only Lopez scripts these.
Smalley
embodies a warm, empathetic Mills, who steals many a scene with not only
personality but also lip-syncing numbers (Aggy Dune
as Tracy Mills as Liza Minelli, in particular, is a show stopper). Popil, a “RuPaul’s Drag Race”
alum who just came off a sold-out run as Dr. Frank ‘N’ Furter
in Blackfriars Theatre’s “Rocky Horror Picture Show,”
has a smaller role as the unreliable Rexy, but still demonstrates a diva-level
takeover of each scene.
Kevin Plinzke, a SUNY Brockport theatre grad who was last seen in
David Andreatta’s “Fielder’s Choice” at Rochester
Fringe this fall, portrays drag trainee Casey. Plinzke
is not a singer, so lip-syncing is an excellent fit. But he’s more convincing
as doting husband to Jo (recent Nazareth College alum Abby Prem,
who keeps up with this older cast impeccably) than he is as a successful drag
queen. Still, he’s charming as the bumbling Southern boy, and that’s enough to
pull off the role.
Rounding out
the cast are Nazareth College professor and local performer Matt Ames as
simpleton landlord and friend Jason; and D. Scott Adams (last seen at CenterStage in “The Flick”), who plays the
down-on-his-luck, conniving club owner Eddie. David Runzo,
who last directed “Buyer & Cellar” at CenterStage,
guides the cast in what is, overall, a lighthearted two hours (including a
15-minute intermission).
But it’s not
all tropes and laughs. Lopez works in important themes of partnership (both
showbiz and marriage), discrimination, perseverance, and career passion
throughout, making “The Legend of Georgia McBride” a production that’s both a
fun night out and worthy fodder for conversation afterward.
This article appears in Dec 5-11, 2018.
