August: Osage County, NT Lyttelton, London Wig Out!, Royal Court Downstairs, Lon

[Shana A]

August: Osage County, NT Lyttelton, London
Wig Out!, Royal Court Downstairs, London
Tombstone tales and Boothill Ballads, Arcola, London

Reviewed by Kate Bassett
Sunday, 30 November 2008

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/reviews/august-osage-county-nt-lyttelton-londonbrwig-out-royal-court-downstairs-londonbrtombstone-tales-and-boothill-ballads-arcola-london-1041116.html

These shortcomings tiresomely resurface in Wig Out!, though for his fanfared Royal Court premiere, McCraney has shifted to the big city and the spangled underground scene of African-American and Latino drag queens.

Wig Out! zooms in on a competitive strut-your-stuff talent competition between rival gay clans or "houses" (of the sort documented in Paris Is Burning in the 1990s). Director Dominic Cooke has reconfigured the main house for the nonce, stretching the stage into a long gleaming catwalk. Kevin Harvey, as the mournfully ageing "house mother", is splendiferously magnetic and droll, slinking around in white stilettos and a glossy bob, with a quivering bass voice. Danny Sapani has predatory menace as the butch "house father", moving in on the easy-going new sweetheart of the younger ->-bleeped-<-, Nina.