An unsuccessful but cheerful Elvis impersonator in a cockroach-infested bar in the Florida panhandle bounces two rent checks in a row, finds out his wife is pregnant and loses his job when the bar owner hires his aging cousin to stage a drag show instead.
That’s the setup for The Legend of Georgia McBride, Matthew Lopez’s tender and rollicking comedy running through Sunday at the New Vic as part of the Ensemble Theatre Company’s 40th anniversary season.
When his only hope to make the rent is to don a dress, lipstick and heels, Casey relents and takes the stage for his awkward first appearance lip syncing an Edith Piaf torch song.
Stephen Spencer’s Casey so epitomizes a beer-drinking, pizza-loving, guitar-playing straight guy that his reluctant transformation is all the more entertaining and moving.
Tracy, the queen who’s saving more than the bar with this gig, is played with due flamboyance, wit, depth and grace by Bill Brochtrup (whom you’ll likely recognize from years on the small screen in NYPD Blue, Major Crimes and Shameless). She takes Casey under her wing, mentoring him on more than just dresses and shaping undergarments.
The drag scenes are abundant, joyful, hilariously funny and cleverly staged. The show moves swiftly through the year, marking holidays and musical eras.
We are the audience at the club when the queens are on stage. The lights come up and the performers take to the house, flirting and joking with us.
Backstage, we see more complex layers and transformations behind the gowns and wigs. A pair of silent stylists appear to effect minor changes in Casey as he deepens and refines his look and persona as Georgia.
In the show’s summative moment, Carlton Byrd, as the alcoholic queen Rexy, differentiates between Casey’s up-to-then superficial cross-dressed performances and her own experience of being assaulted for being gay and in drag, and not giving up or hiding: “Drag isn’t a night job. Drag is a protest, a raised fist in a sequined glove.”
At the moment when no stylists appear, and Georgia expertly applies her own makeup and sings her own song, we witness a person become truly integrated — and shine in the process.
Every character unfolds and evolves during the course of the play. Eddie the bar owner, played by J. Stephen Brantley, oh-so-slowly warms up to taking the microphone even just to announce the performers, and finds more than just financial salvation in the undertaking. Casey’s spirited wife, Jo, played by Keiana Richàrd, finds that there’s more to her husband — and to loving him — than she is sure she can manage. And Byrd, in his other role as Casey and Jo’s neighbor Jason, shares a heartfelt story from his past that belies his stereotypical “guy” persona.
At the time of year when many of us celebrate once-in-all-history miracles, Georgia McBride pertains because it celebrates the everyday miracles we can all experience firsthand: becoming more than you imagined, loving more than you thought possible, finding belonging in unlikely places, turning the other cheek without compromising yourself and learning that the path to being truly loved lies in being who you truly are.
These things, more than the twinkle lights and the red, white and green finale, are what make Georgia McBride a perfect holiday show. Treat yourself and those you love most to a gift you can enjoy together.
— Noozhawk contributor and local arts critic Judith Smith-Meyer is a round-the-clock appreciator of the creative act. She can be reached at news@noozhawk.com. The opinions expressed are her own.