BenDeLaCreme and Jinkx Monsoon are two personalities who emerged from the Ru Paul’s Drag Race juggernaut. Jinkx was the winner of season five. DeLa is the only performer to have won five maxi challenges in a single season and also to have won Snatch Game twice. If you know what that means, those are significant accomplishments. If you don’t, it probably sounds idiotic. It is – in the best way – which is why the Emmy Awards are piling up. This holiday season they are touring in All I Want For Christmas is Attention.
As they will inform, “everyone is traumatized by Christmas.” In this singing, dancing, comedy burlesque, these two very talented performers will focus on the negative about Christmas “rather than the fictitious.” They ask serious questions such as “what the hell is wassailing?” Both are very funny and the many costumes are sparkling or witty, or both.
The persona of Jinkx Monsoon is that of a substance addled boozer. From a poor background, Christmas was never the one she saw on television. They take Lorde’s song “Royal” and turn it into “Spoiled” to express their frustrations. Jinkx’s grandmother passed down a recipe which “wound up being the number for the local Domino’s.”
At the other end of the spectrum is the self-described “terminally delightful” BenDeLaCreme. In an interview, Benjamin Putnam said that he considers drag to be “an inherently political act.” He views it as an opportunity to encourage people to think about complex issues related to gender and sexuality through humor and theater. Adding religion to that outlook is the concoction these two co-creators have put into the punch bowl.
BenDeLa holds a glass and sings “when you wish upon a nog.” The eggnog becomes the vehicle by which his dead Nana communicates from the beyond. His childhood Christmas memories are happier ones than those of Jinkx. In one of a number of well-done video clips, DeLa sits in front of a fireplace and shares her ideas for “festitaining.”
In the best drag shows, edgier fare shines brightest. There is some mild blue humor sprinkled in for giggles. Regarding Pfferernusse: “you can really taste the P.” Neither performer’s character is too raunchy though. The humor is much smarter than that. When DeLa tells the story of Jesus, he starts with “Mary was just virgining around.” She postulates the immaculate conception as potentially predatory by God. What holiday song best fits this interpretation? “Mary, it’s Cold Outside” is the hilarious answer.
Both make a few points about our culture of Christmas and the excess of consumption. “Let’s not kill the Earth to celebrate Christ.” I had forgotten that the classic holiday film White Christmas contained a Minstrel Show. With their tongues planted firmly in cheek, a theory emerges. Could it be that every religion is a cult?
The joyously silly All I Want for Christmas is Attention is a deftly conceived and professionally executed entertainment. This show is for people who can embrace the spirit, see the hypocrisy and have a sense of humor. If you are game, “cross your chest” and “shake your hips” because “everybody’s doing the Nativity Twist.”
All I Want For Christmas is running is various cities through December 29, 2019.