New York Is Burning

Although I do remember seeing a documentary called Paris Is Burning I was still blindsided by the off-Broadway production (at Primary Stages) of Wig Out! I guess I was too influenced by the coupon I got in the mail (shown here) and, knowing zilch about the show, I just assumed it would be an amusing, campy entertainment; a perfect show for a weekend houseguest from out of town. A blast of NYC coolness to impress any rural American-citizen redneck passing through.

Paris Is Burning was filmed in the mid-to-late 1980s, released in 1990, and won a bunch of awards in ‘90, ‘91 and ‘92. PIB details the “ball culture” of the poor African American and Latino gay and transgendered community involved in it. At the time it was highly touted as “a thoughtful exploration of race, class and gender in America.” (I got that from Wikipedia.) Wig Out! is not based on the film but it does owe Paris Is Burning a debt in that it made us somewhat familiar with the milieu. Both the film and the play explore the elaborately-structured Ball competitions in which contestants, adhering to a very specific category or theme, must "walk" (much like a fashion runway) and be judged on criteria including the "realness" of their drag, the beauty of their clothing and their dancing ability.

Wig Out! succeeds in all those categories but also succeeds as a theatrical entertainment in and of itself, and to a high degree. By no means a documentary, there is a storyline with several subplots and yes, thank goodness, there are two acts and, boy, do you need that intermission to recover from the relentless attack on your senses. The music is raucous (read “loud”) and quite a bit of it is lip-synched, which is perfectly acceptable since that was obviously the usual mode of musical accompaniment at these balls. Also there is one major difference and this is really a personal opinion and maybe I’m not being as smart as I think: There is actually only one “real” drag performer (known in those circles as Sweetie) but the rest of the cast are actor/singers playing drag performers and, yes, I think there is a difference. I loved Sweetie and her two extra-extravagant solo numbers (her rendition of Grace Slick’s “White Rabbit” killed me but was, admittedly, a trip into my own checkered past) but, somehow, the rest of the cast made their numbers more “human;” does that make any sense? They are all mighty impressive in portraying the believability of their characters and I came out of the show with lighter shoes and Go Ask Alice on my lips.

A side note (I always seem to have one or two of those): Wig Out! opens with three black girls doing their harmonic-voices and synchronic-dancing thing and, for the rest of the evening, they serve as a Greek Chorus, making comments (sometimes in unison) and giving stage notes (“Lucian stomps off”). This is just fine but, hey, wasn’t this threesome a big part of Dreamgirls, Little Shop of Horrors, Hair and goodness knows what other dramas I missed? I guess it’s a tradition we haven’t seen the last of. I even saw it fairly recently in the Patrick Stewart production of Macbeth at BAM in Brooklyn, wherein those three opening-scene witches really rocked. There is probably the equivalent somewhere in Sophocles; I know not.

You know what, I don’t know if these “Ball competitions” are still being held. If not, I can see Wig Out! serving as the catalyst for their revival.

Update October 1, 2008: Wig Out! opened last night and in today's NY Times Ben Brantley, their No. 1 critic, gave it a sensational review. Told ya so, told ya so.