Review - Priscilla, Queen of the Desert: Survival Skills

With the opening of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, a stroll through New York's theatre district now offers a fascinating history of the evolution of that musical theatre genre we call "the jukebox musical."

While the Winter Garden's Mamma Mia! was certainly not the first attempt to create a book musical score out of previously existing pop songs not intended for the stage, it's no doubt the most commercially successful, still drawing in giddy crowds that apparently couldn't care less that having all of its characters express themselves through the hits of ABBA makes the show feel more like a concert with a connect-the-dots narrative rather than flesh-and-blood people.

The creators of Jersey Boys had the far more dramatically satisfying idea of using the catalogue of Four Seasons hits to tell the story of the vocal group through realistic musical scenes of them rehearsing and performing, mixed with moments where the songs serve as a background scoring that connect dialogue scenes.

Then came Rock of Ages, which follows the Mamma Mia! formula of having characters express themselves through pop songs - telling its 1980s romance through hair band hits - but does so with such a goofy, self-effacing tone that the fact that they're doing so is the running gag of the evening.

Million Dollar Quartet takes the Jersey Boys realism route to such an extreme that it's not even a musical. It's a play that happens to be set on an evening when a lot of music is being sung.

But the new musical based on the 1994 film, The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, beneath all its glitz and silliness and the whirlwind staging of director of Simon Phillips and choreographer Ross Coleman, is absolutely the best-written jukebox musical to ever hit Broadway, because bookwriters Stephan Elliott (who wrote and directed the film) and Allan Scott not only bring excellent storytelling and genuine warmth to the text, but incorporate a parade of pop, diva and disco hits ("I Will Survive," "It's Raining Men," "I Love The Nightlife," "Like A Virgin" and "Shake You Groove Thing," among others) so smartly into the text that the cobbled-together score becomes a better dramatic choice than using new music and lyrics.

Will Swenson is the emotional core of the evening as Tick, a Sydney-based drag performer whose ex-wife books him a gig at her resort in the middle of the outback so that he can meet the now ten-year-old son he abandoned in infancy. One reason he cut off contact for so long is that he's afraid of what his son's reaction might be to his profession. To quickly develop an act, he recruits seasoned transsexual performer, Bernadette (Tony Sheldon, who looks astoundingly female in a smoldering Lauren Bacall manner) and young hotshot Adam (Nick Adams, with boundlessly energetic showbiz charisma). A bit of generational conflict between the two stems from Adam's choice to occasionally abandon the drag tradition of lip-syncing and perform his own vocals, which Bernadette sees as a bastardization of the art form.

Traveling aboard a bus they've christened as "Priscilla, Queen of the Desert," they forge a friendship while Bernadette finds romance with a sentimental mechanic (C. David Johnson), Tick begins a relationship with his son and Adam fulfills a dream of performing in full drag atop Ayers Rock.

And while the show contains plenty of colorful on-stage antics (The lip-syncing is very cleverly accomplished by having a trio of divas - Jacqueline B. Arnold, Antastacia McCleskey and Ashley Spencer - singing hot vocals while perched above the stage on wires.) what's truly impressive about Priscilla's use of a pop score is that the characters seem perfectly natural singing these numbers as part of real life. The boys live with these songs every day, so when Tick starts singing "I Say A Little Prayer (For You)" as he imagines being reunited with his son it's done with a full awareness that the situation has reminded him of the hit tune. Later on, he sings a lullaby to the boy in an Elvis Presley voice; perhaps choosing a male celeb because he's still uncomfortable about being open with his son about his art, but his selection, "Always On My Mind," has a perfect lyric for the moment.

After vandals spray paint the bus with homophobic graffiti, Adam defiantly gets out a bucket of paint and a brush and leads his pals in a rendition of "Color My World" as they give the vehicle a fabulous makeover. When a chorus full of paint brushes joins in (the bright, bubbly and frequently hilarious costumes are by Tim Chappel and Lizzy Gardiner) it's perfectly acceptable to see this as Adam's fantasy of the world around him, using his creative imagination as a defense against hatred.

Priscilla, Queen of the Desert is not a campy musical, but Elliott, Scott and Phillips have fashioned a solidly crafted show about people who live in a world where camp provides both a career and an emotional shield. The merry explosions of color and sound are plentiful, but what makes the evening joyful is the heart that provides a healthy beat.

Photos by Joan Marcus: Top: Will Swenson, Tony Sheldon and Nick Adams; Bottom: Will Swenson, Nick Adams, Tony Sheldon and Company.

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