The protagonists in Heated Rivalry
A new feature “My Take On: Short reviews from New York shows by Nunzio Michael Lupo, veteran journalist and an insightful appraiser of the arts. These pieces were first posted on his page at https://www.show-score.com/member/mrstrategery. Some of these are still running for you to see on your next trip; other have closed but remain interesting for his assessment.
La Cage aux Folles, New York City Center
Since its first Broadway outing in 1983, La Cage aux Folles has been a loving celebration of the LGBTQ community. News reports described people sobbing at the close of Act One, when the drag queen Albin roared through the anthem, “I Am What I Am.” The song threw an emotional challenge to LGBTQ people of that era: “Life’s not worth a damn ‘til you can say, ‘Hey world, I am what I am.’” This was, after all, a turbulent time for LGBTQ Americans. After the anti-gay crusades of Anita Bryant in the late 1970s came Ronald Reagan, the Religious Right and the scourge of AIDS. Scores of LGBTQ people remained in the closet.
The fact that this 2026 revival by New York City Center Encores! features a politician who wishes to keep LGBTQ people closeted makes the show as relevant now as it was then. And its tuneful score by composer-lyricist Jerry Herman is delivered by the Encores! 28-piece orchestra with all of the show business gusto it had originally.
Yet this production is no period piece.
This La Cage is about a specific brand of queerness shunted to the shadows in all previous incarnations. It celebrates Black and brown queerness – the kind that was on the frontlines of the Stonewall uprising in 1969 and found affirmation in the ballroom scene, mostly an underground urban phenomenon until Madonna’s “Vogue (1990).”
In producing creative director Clint Ramos’s vision, Black queens finally are given their due. At the top of the show, the ensemble is costumed to pay homage to those who have shaped our culture and served as models for legions of drag performers: Grace Jones, Bessie Smith, Donna Summer, Diana Ross, Eartha Kitt, Dame Shirley Bassey and the one-named goddesses Mariah, Janet, Sylvester, and Beyoncé.
A show about such ferocious queens needs a ferocious queen, and this show has Billy Porter. He knows drag queens. In 2013, he won a Tony Award for playing one in Kinky Boots, and from 2018-2021 he presided over a clutch of real ones in the television series, Pose.
He delivers an Albin with all the mannerisms that make Black queens so compelling – and so totally fierce. His arched eyebrow and a tart line delivery throw the kind of shade from which no one escapes unscathed.
This was undercut, unfortunately, by Porter’s struggles in the role. He strained and scratched vocally to reach the notes – forgivable and maybe even appropriate given the character’s status as an aging drag queen. Less so was his reliance on reading from a script in hand. While this is permitted in Encores! performances, it is rare to see a performer as dependent on the script as Porter was.
His romantic partner – a fine Wayne Brady as straight-acting Georges – did not need a script but carried one in scenes with Porter, perhaps in solidarity with his co-star.
Late in the second act, the show’s rousing 11 o’clock number, “The Best of Times,” is a testament to the strength that LGBTQ people can find in community. The ensemble of famous Black queens from the opening number is back. It’s a joyful act of defiance that is eclipsed only by the end itself: A handsomely suited Porter and Brady, the image of two gay men in a loving embrace.
Hey world, I am what I am.
Heated Rivalry: The Unauthorized Musical Parody,
You’d have to be in a hermetically sealed tube for the last decade to somehow miss the men’s butt phenomenon. Fueled by CrossFit and gym culture, and encouraged by fashion brands remaking trouser patterns to hug the legs and glutes, the male posterior is having a moment.
Nothing in the zeitgeist captures this trend with the sheer cleverness and verve of Heated Rivalry: The Unauthorized Musical Parody. The off-Broadway musical is a hilarious sendup of Heated Rivalry, the TV show about closeted hockey players. The series offered a heady mix of sports, buff actors and plenty of gay sex that featured the sculpted backsides of its hunky-twunky actors, Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie. It managed to attract more than just gay men and got to No. 1 on HBO Max.
That’s partly because women loved it, too. The musical wryly digs into this by framing the show with a trio of moms, all named Susan, who drink white wine from Yeti tumblers and escape their husbands to watch “gay hockey players with big butts.” When the angsty Russian hockey star Ilya Rozanov (Daniel Brackett) is introduced, it’s with a song that becomes his leitmotif, “Cold Heart, Big Butt.” It’s a nod to Storrie’s celebrated backside.
All of the music is similarly catchy and clever. In place of the sexual romps – many, many in the TV show – there’s a very funny ensemble number. The Susans sing about the hockey players’ “heated rivalry,” while the sex is presented in a comic montage over the space of four minutes.
There are so many in-jokes (book, music and lyrics by Dylan MarcAurele) that it’s difficult to keep up. Before you’ve fully digested the joke about the crucial role of a banana in a good smoothie, they’re onto the next about “guuuurl!” Jokes come so fast that a person who hasn’t seen the TV series might be lost. For those who know the show (maybe even binged it repeatedly, as some reportedly have), it’s a crisp 75 minutes packed with charm.
In addition to Brackett (subbing for Jay Armstrong Johnson the night we saw it), the cast is led by Jimin Moon as Shane Hollander. Both are strong singers with deft comic timing and the physiques (butts included) of the it-boys from the TV series. Ryann Redmond, Cherry Torres and Ryan Duncan all have great moments as the Susans and other characters.
The tale plays out on a stage about the size of a Zamboni, but scenic designer Sully Ross works wonders to produce the wide range of settings the story requires.
This includes the cottage Hollander owns in the woods, to which he invites Rozanov. Both in the series and in this show, Rozanov acts the typical jerk and declines. It takes a stunning proud demonstration by another gay couple to bring him to his senses. “I’m coming to the cottage,” he tells Hollander, marking the pair’s transition from F-buddies to genuine romantic partners.
If you get invited to this cottage, don’t be an ass. Just say “I’m coming.”
A PaperStreet Web Design
