Arts & Entertainment
The Kinsey Sicks’ COVID-era creations
‘From a Distance’ parody thrills fans
Sheltering in place but not standing still, veteran Dragapella Beautyshop Quartet-cum-satirical/political group The Kinsey Sicks (kinseysicks.com)—who would have been touring right now, were it not for shuttered venues—have amped up their online presence, with timely new music and a determination to get back on the boards just as soon as the all-clear is called. (The national tour of their “Electile Dysfunction” musical extravaganza has been postponed until further notice, although in the spirit of “subject to change,” it’s presently noted on their website.)
But if anything good can come out of this end-times scenario, count among that short list drag queens who’ve employed everything from gallows humor to heartfelt advice to score-keeping tales of woe to get them out of bed in the morning, in the hopes that one day soon, they’ll be bed-hopping again.
Chief among those able alley cats, The Kinsey Sicks: Trixie (Jeff Manabat), Winnie (Nathan Marken), Angel (J.B. McLendon), and Trampolina (Spencer Brown).
The group, whose “Social Distance” parody of The Divine Miss M’s “From a Distance” dropped at the tail end of March, finds our quarantined quartet biding their time indoors by playing Jenga-for-one, eating peanut butter straight from the jar, binging on Disney+, waiting for that stimulus check, and, sans a man, spooning toilet paper.
Early May’s “Don’t-cha Touch-a, Touch-a-Touch Me!” found our girls one month into self-isolation—feeling the strain of no human touch, and making due with suggestive cameo appearances by bananas and carrots. Still, their collective dry spell finds some solace in non-stop digs at Trump.
“I’ll trade off satisfaction for strong leadership and action,” goes the tune, based on a certain ditty from “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” And if you don’t get the reference, you’d better hand in your Gay Club Membership Card.
But it was sunny skies ahead, when the bill came due for The Kinsey Sicks to answer our burning inquiries.
BLADE: How did “Social Distance” come about? How was it written/shot, and what sort of feedback has it gotten from fans?
SPENCER/TRAMPOLINA: Anyone familiar with The Kinsey Sicks already knows that the group’s origins were inspired by attending a Bette Midler concert in the ’90s. When her classic hit “From a Distance” got into my head, I immediately sat down and hammered out the lyrics. Then Jeff, one of our other members, whipped up the arrangement and sent the music file for all of us to learn and record. Within a short amount of time, those individual recordings were sent back to him for mixing, and the combined four-part harmony track was then sent out for us to sing along to for reference. Over the next few days, we each got in drag and shot our videos, which were then sent back to me for a few more days of editing.
Finally, after a little more than a week since I was inspired to write “Social Distance,” we released the finished video to our fans all over social media. Their feedback has been nothing but positive. Though we are devastated to cancel our spring tour (something we’ve never done in our 26 years of this group existing), this video is a gift for our fans, and lets them know we’re still here fighting the good fight.
BLADE: Are there other group projects in the works?
SPENCER/TRAMPOLINA: This first video (“Social Distance”) was an experiment. All four members of the group live in different states across the country (Kansas, Maryland, California, and Illinois, presently). Being able to write a parody, get it arranged, learn it, then record it (individually!), and edit/mix everything in a short amount of time is something we’ve never attempted, but having done that and seeing the reaction of fans both old and new, we’re now inspired to create more.
BLADE: What impact did the realities of the HIV/AIDS epidemic have on the group’s worldview, and what parallels, if any, do you draw to the current COVID-19 crisis?
JEFF/TRIXIE: By the time The Kinsey Sicks was formed in San Francisco in the early ’90s, almost a quarter-million people, most of them gay and bi men, died from the epidemic, and San Francisco was one of the epicenters. Although thousands were dead and dying, mainstream American society still had a negative view of the community, and the American government had barely made any response to help. For several years, the LGBT community and its allies were almost entirely alone. And yet there was still a need to find some measure of joy amidst all the pain and tragedy, perhaps a creative yet politically charged way to respond to the incredible injustice from not just politicians, but our fellow Americans. Amid this atmosphere, a group of close friends was inspired to create The Kinsey Sicks.
To get a fuller picture of the beginnings of the group, and to trace its origins to the current political atmosphere, it’s worth watching a remarkable monologue by Emeritus member Ben Schatz (“Rachel”), a Harvard-trained civil rights lawyer, former director of the National Gay and Lesbian Medical Association, and one-time presidential adviser on HIV issues, who created the first national AIDS legal project and authored Clinton’s HIV policy during the 1992 presidential campaign. The video can be found on YouTube.
Our worldview is still heavily influenced by this genesis. It’s embedded in our DNA. For decades, The Kinsey Sicks has produced works commenting on that nexus of politics, culture, and sexuality through drag and a cappella, and we will continue to be influenced by, comment on, and respond to the world around us that way.
There can be parallels made between the HIV/AIDS epidemic and the current crisis, such as the extreme measures by the GOP to use tragedy for their own political gain, and to pit communities against each other whilst hoarding more power. However, the swift response of the government on all levels—from federal to state to local—and the mobilization of the majority of Americans to support those in crisis is much different. Back then, it was several years before the federal government even acknowledged the existence of AIDS/HIV, let alone begin the search for treatment.
Today, the Coronavirus response has been a matter of weeks or months, and the search for a vaccine has become a national priority. However, for both times, higher powers have acted in ways that merit a critical response from artists—and for us, as it was then, it’s a response of the musical variety.
BLADE: Has this forced time away from public performance impacted the group’s output, and approach to using online/social media as an expression of your artistry?
SPENCER/TRAMPOLINA: Absolutely! When we’re not on stage, the group is always working behind the scenes on how we can effectively produce new material, and the traction that this new video [Social Distance”] has gotten really inspires us to keep going.
BLADE: Has the group had any notable virtual interactions with fans during this period of social distancing?
SPENCER/TRAMPOLINA: The Kinsey Sicks is no stranger to social distancing. Many, many, of our audiences have been avoiding us for years. So we keep our virtual interactions with fans to a minimum for their safety.
BLADE: This one is for every member of the group: The all-clear is called and we’re allowed to gather in public again. What are the first things you’re going to do?
NATHAN/WINNIE: As soon as we can go out in public, I look forward to getting back on the campaign trail with The Kinsey Sicks, sampling all the delectable vegetarian fare from coast-to-coast.
JEFF/TRIXIE: I can’t wait to go back to modern life’s basic public pleasures: dinner-and-a-movie dates with my favorite boyfriends, shopping sprees with my favorite sugar daddies, and multiple anonymous hookups via my favorite apps.
J.B./ANGEL: I’m planning a three-way with Mitch McConnell and social scientist Peter Navarro. It might not happen, but I’m trusting my intuition on this one.
SPENCER/TRAMPOLINA: Vote.
The LGBTQ+ Victory Fund National Champagne Brunch was held at Salamander Washington DC on Sunday, April 19. Gov. Andy Beshear (D-Ky.) was presented with the Allyship Award.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
The umbrella LGBTQ sports organization Team D.C. held its annual Night of Champions Gala at the Georgetown Marriott on Saturday, April 18. Team D.C. presented scholarships to local student athletes and presented awards to Adam Peck, Manuel Montelongo (a.k.a. Mari Con Carne), Dr. Sara Varghai, Dan Martin and the Centaur Motorcycle Club. Sean Bartel was posthumously honored with the Most Valuable Person Award.
(Washington Blade photos by Michael Key)
Television
‘Big Mistakes’ an uneven – but worthy – comedic showcase
In the years since “Schitt’s Creek” wrapped up its six season Emmy-winning run, nostalgia for it has grown deep – especially since the still painfully recent loss of its iconic leading lady, Catherine O’Hara, whose sudden passing prompted a social media wave of clips and tributes featuring her fan-favorite performance as the deliciously daft Moira Rose. Revisiting so many favorite scenes and funny moments from the show naturally reminded us of just how much we loved it, even needed it during the time it was on the air; it also reminded us of how much we miss it, and how much it feels now like something we need more than ever.
That, perhaps more than anything else, is why the arrival of “Big Mistakes” – the new Netflix series starring, co-created and co-written by Dan Levy – felt so welcome. We knew it wouldn’t be the Roses, but it seemed cut from the same cloth, and it had David Rose (or at least someone who seemed a lot like him) in the middle of a comically dysfunctional family dynamic, complete with a mother who gets involved in town politics and a catty sibling rivalry with his sister, and still nebbish-ly uncomfortable in his own gay shoes. Only this time, instead of running a charmingly pretentious boutique, he’s the pastor of the local church, and instead of a collection of kooky small town neighbors to contend with, there are gangsters.
As it turns out, it really does feel cut from the same cloth, but the design is distinctly different. Set in a fictional New Jersey suburb, it centers on Nicky (Levy) and his sister Morgan (Taylor Ortega) – he openly gay with an adoring boyfriend (Jacob Gutierrez), yet still obsessive about keeping it all invisible to his congregation, and she drudging aimlessly through life as an underpaid schoolteacher after failing to achieve her New York dreams of show biz success – who inadvertently become enmeshed in a shady underworld when a gesture for their dead grandmother’s funeral goes horribly awry.
They’re surrounded by a crew of equally compromised characters. There’s their mother Linda (Laurie Metcalf), whose campaign to become the town’s mayor only intensifies her tendency to micromanage her children’s lives; Yusuf (Boran Kuzum), the Turkish-American mini-mart operator who pulls them into the criminal conspiracy yet is himself a victim of it; Max (Jack Innanen), Morgan’s live-in boyfriend, who pushes her for a deeper commitment and is willing to go to couples’ therapy to prove it; Annette, his mother (Elizabeth Perkins), who lends her society standing toward helping Linda’s campaign against a misogynistic opponent (Darren Goldstein); and Ivan (Mark Ivanir), the seemingly ruthless crime boss who enslaves the siblings into his network but may really be just another slave himself. It’s a well-fleshed out assortment of characters that helps our own loyalties shift and adapt, generating at least a degree of empathy – if not always sympathy – that keeps everyone from coming off as a merely “black-and-white” caricature of expectations and typecasting.
To be sure, it’s an entertaining binge-watch, full of distinctive characters – all inhabiting familiar, even stereotypical roles in the narrative – who are each given a degree of validation, both in writing and performance, as the show unspools its narrative. At the same time, it makes for a fairly bleak overall view of humanity, in which it’s difficult to place our loyalties with anyone without also embracing a kind of “dog eat dog” morality in which nobody is truly innocent – but nobody is completely to blame for their sins, anyway.
In this way, it’s a show that lets us off the hook in the sense that it places the idea of ethical guilt within a framework of relative evils, as it permits us to forgive our own trespasses by accepting its “lovably” amoral characters, each of whom has their own reasons and justifications for what they do. We relate, but we can’t quite shake the notion that, if all these people hadn’t been so caught up in their own personal dramas, none of them would have ended up in the compromised morality that they’re in.
However, it’s not some bleak morality play that Levy and crew undertake; rather, it’s more an egalitarian fantasy in which even “bad” choices feel justified by inevitability. Everybody’s motivations make enough sense to us that it’s hard to judge any of the characters for making the choices – however unwise – that they do. In a system where everyone is forced to compromise themselves in order to achieve whatever dream of self-fulfillment they may have, how can anybody really blame themselves for doing what they have to do to survive?
Of course, all things considered, this is more a relatable comedy than it is a morality play. As a comedy of errors, it all works well enough on its own without imposing an ideology on it, no matter how much we may be tempted to do so. Indeed, what is ultimately more to the point is how well this pseudo-cynical exercise in the normalization of corruption – for that is what it really about, in the end – succeeds in letting us all off the hook for our compromises.
In the end, of course, maybe all that analysis is too deep a dive for a show that feels, in the end, like it’s meant to be mostly for fun. Indeed, despite its focus on being dragged into the shady side of life, the arc of its messaging seems to be less about a moralistic urge toward making the “right” choice than it is a candid recognition that all of us are compromised from the outset, often by choices we only force upon ourselves, and that’s a refreshing enough bit of honesty that we can easily get on board.
It helps that the performances are on point, especially the loony and wide-eyed fanaticism of Metcalf – surely the MVP of any project in which she is involved – and the directly focused moral malleability of Ortega; Levy, of course, is Levy – a now-familiar persona that can exist within any milieu without further justification than its own queer relatability – and, in this case, at least, that’s both the icing on the cake and substance that defines it. That’s enough to make it an essential view for fans, queer or otherwise, of his distinctive “brand,” even if he – or the show itself – doesn’t quite satisfy in the way that “Schitt’s Creek” was able to do.
Seriously, though, how could it?
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