Everybody’s Talking about Jamie
Dan Gillespie Sells (Score) & Tom MacRae (Book & Lyrics)
Based Jamie: Drag Queen at 16, Directed by Jenny Popplewell
Ray of Light Theatre
What better way for a San Francisco audience to celebrate Pride Month than enjoying to the hilt a joyous, upbeat, and totally inspiring coming out story of a sixteen-year-old whose only dream is to be a drag queen performer? That the story spawns from a 2011 British TV documentary (Jamie Popplewell’s Jamie: Drag Queen at 16) about an actual high-schooler, Jamie Campbell, who convinced the BBC to produce his journey to overcome prejudice and bullying to step onto the stage in full glamour is a second reason why Everybody’s Talking about Jamie is the perfect Pride night out. That the Dan Gillespie Sells (score) and Tom MacRae (book and lyrics) 2017-premiering musical is now in the hands of Ray of Light Theatre is yet one more persuasion to grab a ticket now; for this is the company that has proven time and again to be the Bay Area’s best in producing edgy, big-stage, eye-popping musicals that other companies often will not touch (Carrie, Silence!, Reefer Madness, American Psycho, The Heathers, to name a few past hits). Finally, that all members of this cast of twenty-one sing and dance in manners only described as ‘wow’ and personify their characters – both as principles and as ensemble members – with an impressive mixture of authenticity and fabulousness is the crowning reason Ray of Light Theatre’s Everybody’s Talking about Jamie is a must-see this SF Pride season.
With a projected personality that is brimming with confidence and exuberance and a persona that is immediately likable, Romelo Urbi is a Jamie long to be relished and remembered. When Jamie announces in his eleventh-grade career class, “What I really want to be is a drag queen,” and goes on to expound that “these lips, these eyes, these legs, these shoes” are his plan “to the promised land,” there is no doubt that this is a princess soon to be crowned queen. A face that lights up like a Broadway marquee; eyes that bat their lashes with the speed of a hummingbird’s wings; and moves that swirl, swivel, and snap in their normal walk across the room – these are Jamie’s inbred keys to his soon-to-be success that Romelo Urbi so wonderfully demonstrates. And when his Jamie sings, tones are clear, persuading, and of course, delivered with flair and fling.
Jamie is blessed with one of the greatest support networks a high-school boy who is about to wear to school first heels, then a dress could have. Anne Elizabeth Clark is stunning in her role as Jamie’s mom, Margaret – a mother who is a constant believer and cheerleader for a proudly swishy son who would soon exceed the limits of most other parents. Vocally, her Margaret brings a country music style and depth of emotion to “If I Met Myself Again,” only to impress doubly more when her deep, vibrato-rich chords slide through the scales in a song bursting with love and admiration for her showy son, even after Jamie has for a moment flown off the handle in a teenage rage against her (“He’s My Boy”).
Margaret’s best friend, Ray, is another major anchor in Jamie’s life, with Jill Slyter bringing to the role terrific comic touches, an exciting edge to her singing voice, and a genuine caring for Jamie that exudes in her every word of advice and her strong encouragement for him to flaunt his real self in front of the world.
Likewise, Jamie’s best friend at school, Pritti, is unwavering in standing up for Jamie against the ridicule and bullying he faces from other classmates and even from their teacher, Miss Hedge (Andrea Dennison-Laufer, sporting her own high-heels and a singing voice that pierces through the air with dramatic effect). As a hijab-wearing “Muslim girl with a Hindu first name,” Pritti faces her own barrage of name-calling from the school’s most vicious bully, Dean (played with exacting meanness and biting snarl by Tucker Gold). As Pritti, Maedlyn Davis Haddad beautifully sings with contagious exhilaration her buoying message to Jamie, “Don’t wait for tomorrow, be happy today; and all those stupid people, who cares what they say” (“Spotlight”).
When Jamie walks into a shop called “Victor’s Secret” to find his first dress for his premiere performance as a budding drag star (and maybe one even to wear to the prom), what he finds is the biggest of hearts and best of mentors – a retired star of the drag stage, Hugo. As is often the case, J. Conrad Frank not just commands any stage he appears, but he also fast becomes the epitome of fabulous, sensational, and flamboyant – and all is only the best and most attracting of ways. His Hugo quickly teaches Jamie that “a drag queen is something to be feared,” who has to perform “in honor of the fallen warrior who have gone before you.” With a voice that projects, crackles, and booms in rich, trumpeting fashion, Hugo sings with strut and style “Over the Top” as he transforms into his former, larger-than-life, drag queen persona, “Loco Chanelle.” His Loco has the attitude, moves, voice, and facial expressions that quickly bring to mind the great divas of the ‘30s and ‘40s like Joan Crawford, Betty Davis, and Miriam Hopkins.
Joining Hugo/Loco Chanelle as huge supporters and mighty defenders of Jamie are three other drag queens that sizzle and sparkle as they explode with flash and fury on the stage: Sandra Bullock (Rahni NothingMore), Laika Virgin (Steven Ennis), and Tray Sophisticay (Samuel Prince).
Jamie’s classmates are an ensemble of exciting dancers and full-voiced singers that light up the stage time and again with the immensely entertaining, inventive, and invigorating choreography of Alex Rodriguez. Desk chairs become a second-level stage to show off their perfectly coordinated, fast moves of hands and arms in the opening “And You Don’t Even Know.” The group is later a tornadic storm of dancing frenzy as the students sing in rock-star fashion their excitement in Act Two’s opening that “Everybody’s Talking about Jamie.”
With a backdrop wall that is metallic and massive, Matt Owens’ set design is the perfect backdrop for the ever-changing hues and reflections of Weili Shi’s oft-dazzling lighting scheme. Four screens linked to form a stripe across the stage become the home to Eri Scanlon’s fascinating videographic imagination where animated cartoons, highlighted words, shadowed profiles, and captured photos become a supporting storyline for the action on the stage.
The night’s biggest standing ovation perhaps is most deserved by Daniel Harvey, costume designer extraordinaire who makes this ROL production zap and zing, glitz and glitter, delight and delish with a myriad of costumes from an ever-changing wardrobe for the uptight but fashion-conscious Miss Hedge to the wildly spectacular sparkles and spangles of high-heeled drag queens. Kudos goes also to Wigs by Tips for the exclamatory, crowning effects on the heads of Jamie, the queens, and others.
Finally, due credit must be paid to both stage and music direction by Alex Kirschner and Jad Benardo, respectively. Along with choreographer Alex Rodriguez, the three have teamed to lead this exceptional cast to produce for Ray of Light Theater an Everybody’s Talking about Jamie that proudly beams with the love, respect, dignity, and happiness that every boy who wants to wear a dress deserves to receive from the world around him. And as San Francisco’s Drag Laureate, D’Arcy Dollinger, announces as the curtain first rises, we should leave the theatre ready to “be a little more fabulous and change the world.”
Rating: 5 E, MUST-SEE-FOR-PRIDE
A Theatre Eddys Best Bet Production
Everybody’s Talking about Jamie continues through June 23, 2024, in a two-hour, twenty-minute (plus intermission) production by Ray of Light Theatre at the Victoria Theatre, 2961 16th Street, San Francisco. Tickets are available at https://www.rayoflighttheatre.com .
Photo Credits: Jon Bauer
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