Tammy Faye Starlite's La Passion du Christ: Menage a Trois Spoofs Evangelical Hypocricy

It's nearly impossible to not have a front row seat when Tammy Faye Starlite is in town. Ignoring the stage of Joe's Pub for most of Thursday night's performance of La Passion du Christ: Menage a Trois, the trailer-park evangelist who commonly sports a phallus-sized crucifix dangling between a push-up bra enhanced cleavage took full advantage of her wireless mic, climbing atop tables, scaling the walls to the second level, and seeing to it that everyone got an up close and personal view of her hard-rock wails of ecstasy as she covered Glen Campbell's "I Knew Jesus (Before He Was a Superstar)" with the kind of hyper-frenetic energy that would have had Little Richard pleading "Calm down, girl!"

The creation of performer/writer Tammy Lang, Tammy Faye Starlite spoofs the likes of Tammy Faye Bakker, Pat Robertson and others who claim to speak the gospel truth through show-biz inspired sermons that lean far to the conservative right. Only this messenger comes in the guise of a white trash, kinda slutty, occasionally potty-mouthed angel in a pure white bustier who tickles potential converts with an equally pure white feather boa. Backed up by her band, The Angels of Mercy, Starlite spreads the word (and her legs when an audience member is taking snapshots) through catchy ditties like "If You're Coming Down, Sweet Jesus, Won't You Come All Over Me" (She says the idea for that one came "while I was lying on my back, motionless and silent, performing my wifely duty of providing pleasure for my husband.") and her anti-abortion anthem "God Has Lodged a Tenant in My Uterus" (which ends with "As a woman, I haven't any choice.").

That last tune, by the way, is preserved on her CD, On My Knees, as a live performance at a Columbia University radio station broadcast. The DJ apparently had no idea what Tammy was all about and the track ends with the host, admitting to be on the verge of tears, apologizing to her listening audience, many of whom were jamming the station's phone lines to complain. You can faintly hear Tammy, off-microphone, giddily asking "Did anyone call to make a request?"

Although Lang is certainly accustomed to having people walk out on her performances, those who stay generally catch on to the idea that they have become a part of the joke. When she throws herself into the audience in search of converts, Lang takes full comedic advantage of the "hate the sin, love the sinner" attitude. So when Tammy Faye says, "I understand there are a lot of Jews in New York. Don't you know you're going to Hell? All the Jews, Muslims, homosexuals, Catholics... all going to Hell. I know you Catholics think you're Christians but you're really not.", she's speaking with the loving concern of a preacher who wants everyone to join her in Heaven by simply conforming to her exclusionary beliefs.

Her humor is never racist or homophobic, nor is it ever anti-religion. Rather it's the type of humor that mocks closed-mindedness by personifying it. That's why it's okay to laugh when she describes Heaven as "better than even the biggest klan rally you've ever been to", or when she introduces her "third husband twice removed by birth through marriage", Jim-Rob Gandy (played by Eric Drysdale), who sings of being a "reformed homosexual" with lyrics like "Sweet Jesus, let me swallow my gay pride."

There's also humor that feeds on traditional trailer park stereotypes, but in a way that underscores serious issues, as when she proudly tells how her mother gave birth to sixteen children because she wouldn't listen to "all that nonsense put out by Gloria Steinem and Andrea Dworkin about birth control and how a woman's body is her own." Her finale number, "Did I Shave My Vagina for This?" tells the story of a young wife's distress when her husband continually comes home too drunk to appreciate the nice dinner she cooked and the sexy lingerie she's wearing ("The pork chops are cold and my panties are dry", she laments.). The performance ends with a (clothed) demonstration of the song's title act, complete with a distorted guitar suppling sound effects.

It's easy to laugh at a singing and dancing Hitler plotting out world domination when theatre provides a fourth wall. It's easy to laugh at Archie Bunker's racism when television separates him from our world. But when an actress playing a self-proclaimed messenger of the Lord comes right up to you, offers her hand and asks you to renounce your beliefs, otherwise suffer eternal damnation... that's when comedy enters the danger zone. A performance by Tammy Faye Starlite will certainly make some people uncomfortable. Good theatre often does. But those who accept the satire of her gospel message should have a good ol' time.

Photos by Bob Gruen

For information on future performances, visit tammyfayestarlite.com