Y’know… we get on this show’s ass a lot for forcing a bunch of mostly Millennial and Gen Z queens to constantly work with mostly Boomer and Gen X references. And we fully admit that we cringed a little bit when this week’s Mommie Dearest-themed Rusical was announced, but this episode was full of surprises for us. Sorry to be a little shady, but we didn’t think this collection of queens had musical greatness within them and we assumed at least half of them would be so clueless about the references that they wouldn’t know how to make their characters work.
Perhaps we should have been less dismissive of Mommie Dearest‘s cultural cachet among the gays. We also probably should have had a little more faith in the Drag Race musical production team (although they’ve given us plenty of reasons to doubt them over the years) to pull it off without making us wince. It would take cultural critics far wiser than us to unpack why gay men have always loved it so much, although we think it has a lot to do with processing the pain of one’s own childhood through the queer lenses of camp, divas, and glamour.
We definitely got our mouths shut for us on the question of whether these queens could pull it off. Yes, we had serious doubts. But in the end, this Rusical was a triumph because first, the songs were better than they usually are and there didn’t seem to be any “trap” characters (i.e., deliberately written poorly so that the queen cast would have to work harder to make it work); second, every single queen landed on the exact right part for her, and third, this actually served as a pretty good biography of its subject without glossing over anything and without trying to make the domestic abuse a centerpiece of the story. Also: the costumes were top notch.
We’ll get to the judging in a minute, but we have to say, we were shocked by Kahanna’s performance. Casting her as Ingenue Joan made sense, but we figured she’d just be the prettiest girl on the stage. She was, but she also gave a hell of a performance, with some slightly wonky, but surprisingly good vocals and some pretty fine dancing.
Jaymes couldn’t have been more right to play the Mommie Dearest part, largely because he’s the campiest of the queens. She did a great job with it but she was hurt by two things: She got one of the lesser songs (low-key and witty, but without any real crowd-pleasing moments) and she sang it mostly in her patented high-pitched, sweetly femme, babytalk style, which just doesn’t work for Joan Crawford drag. To be fair, he was very good, but as Michelle noted, at this point, they’re grading A-plusses vs. A’s.
Kandy and Jessica Wild fought over who would get to play Wire Hangers Joan. Either of them would have killed, we think, but we had originally had doubts that Kandy could pull it off. Her vocals were also surprisingly good, her dancing was among the best, and she benefitted from having probably the best song of the bunch – a disco-infused call-and-response that couldn’t help but please the crowd.
Jessica may have killed it as Wire Hangers Joan, but she landed on the other part best suited to her, Bring Me The Axe Joan. She probably would have been great with the disco vocals of Kandy’s song, but she’s at her best when she lives up to her name and the glamorous rage of this song really suited her.
LaLa finally, FINALLY had her moment and it was worth waiting for. We’ll admit, we thought she was one of the queens who just wouldn’t know what to do with this material, but she was fantastic with it. It helped tremendously that she got probably the hottest of the songs, a Vogue-inspired talk-sing number based on Mildred Pierce, but her wild-eyed performance and the way she nailed the choreo really made her stand out. She would have been our pick for the win.
Alexis landed on one of the more challenging but more rewarding characters, Don’t Fuck With Me Joan. The look is iconic and well-suited to her and the whole number is based on one of the most quotable scenes in the film. On the other hand, it was a hoedown-inspired patter song, which could have been a disaster for her. She nailed it. It couldn’t have been easy doing that style of dance in a pencil skirt and heels, but she not only pulled it off, she was crystal-clear with the rapid-fire lyrics.
Jimbo was perfect for Baby Jane Joan. He made it very clear that losing all of his lip syncs has been humiliating for him, so we suspect he worked extra-hard on this number to prove he’s a performer and not just a clown. We think he made his point nicely, but he was, for once, the epitome of a safe queen in his efforts. He was fine. The song was fun. The choreo was extremely basic and we could see how hard he was working at it. Also, we think he could’ve done more to pull off a Joan face.
The runway category was Night of a Thousand Grace Joneses, which strikes us as a particularly challenging one, given how specific and iconic her looks were. Not every queen can pull it off and to no one’s surprise, not every queen did.
Kahanna was fine, but it was “just” another showgirl look. Jaymes’ costume designer may have done a good job of replicating a specific look, but it wasn’t particularly flattering to her. She’s probably the least-suited of these queens to nail this one. To be fair, Kandy is also pretty far from a Grace Jones type, but she looked great.
The judges seemed to like it, but we thought Jessica’s gown was pretty ugly.
LaLa also looked great, but the judges got extremely nitpicky about hers, probably because they needed some reason to not give her the win this week.
To our surprise, Alexis really nailed this one. She looked amazing.
Jimbo wants to prove he can be a high-fashion queen, but turning Jones’ hat into a wig was a mistake. He also really needs to be more diverse in how he applies his makeup. That is so very NOT a Grace Jones face.
Kandy won the challenge. As we said, we would have chosen LaLa, but there’s probably more story potential in giving a win to a queen who got caught up in some drama the week before. We can’t get mad about it. She was great in her number and had one of the best runway looks. They brought Angeria out to go against her for the lip sync. Both of them struggled like hell to make “I’m Not Perfect” into a lip-syncable number, with Kandy edging out Angeria, who really didn’t seem to know how to work the song. Jimbo keeps leaving money on the table, only to watch another queen come along and snatch it up.
Kandy gave Jaymes the chop (it looks like everyone else picked her too), which is a genuine shame. She’s been doing a fantastic job of rehabbing her rep this season and she might have had a shot at making it to the finals. She and Kahanna were in the bottom this week, but despite feeling like she’s clear cannon fodder who’s been struggling, we can’t see how Kahanna could’ve been sent home, based on her performance. Unfortunately for Jaymes, she gave an only pretty-good performance and then walked out in the worst of the runway looks. We’re sorry to see her go.
Legendary Children: The First Decade of RuPaul’s Drag Race and the Last Century of Queer Life, a New York Times “New and Notable” pick, praised by The Washington Post “because the world needs authenticity in its stories,” and chosen as one of the Best Books of 2020 by NPR is on sale wherever fine books are sold!
[Photo Credit: Paramount Plus via Tom and Lorenzo]
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