This perennial favorite is back for its 19th year. This “drag” version of classic holiday-themed Golden Girls episodes seems to grow in popularity every year. Since its inception in 2005 when it was originally performed to a select crowd of friends informed by email, it has outgrown the living room and 2 subsequent South of Market venues. This year for the first time they’ve moved uptown to the official theater district and The Curran Theatre on Geary Street.
Matthew Martin (Blanche), Coco Peru (Dorothy),
Holotta Tymes (Sophia), and D’Arcy Drollinger (Rose)
Why all the fuss over drag queens reenacting episodes of an old sitcom you ask? As many aging baby boomers, gay men and anyone nostalgic for things from the 80’ can tell you, The Golden Girls had it all. Like I Love Lucy and other vintage sitcoms, it had great writing with timeless themes and humor. Older friends living together with distinct personalities, misunderstandings, and schemes to find a man all tied together with a message of universal love. The appeal of The Golden Girls over its seven-year-run on NBC 1985-1992 is that even for a sitcom it was ahead of its time. Relevant issues of the day such as HIV, abortion, homosexuality, interracial dating, and suicide were presented and dealt with frankly, matter of factly and with wit.
The show depicted the women as friends first and foremost, and showed that true friendship can be found at any age — a message which resonates during the holiday season. Of course what really made it all work was the fact that the leads were all seasoned pros tagged as “past their prime” — in their “Golden” years, Bea Arthur, Betty White, Rue McClanahan and Estelle Getty milked all the lines for laughs for seven years.
Fast forward to 2024 when you take the well-written episodes filled with double entendres, sexual innuendos, sarcasm and campiness and have it performed by drag queens, it’s a natural fit and takes the humor to new levels. As with with the show that made TV better, casting is the key to its success. Local San Francisco Drag luminaries Holotta Tymes as Sophia, Matthew Martin as Blanche, and D’arcy Drollinger as Rose are perfection. For the second year in a row, Coco Peru, a beloved name in the queer community known for her spectacular one-woman shows, has been recruited from Southern California to reprise her role as the very droll and sardonic “Dorothy”.
As someone who has seen the show every year, it’s an amazing feat that the super-popular play continues to entertain as the drag queens milk lines, exchange glances, and react with perfect timing. It’s comic gold. The audience isn’t just seeing a drag show. They’re seeing veteran comedic performers at their best. The bigger stage of the Curran Theater allows for a full-size living room and kitchen set, complete with plants, throw pillows and colorful pastel prints and walls. With Scenic Designer Sarah Phykitt and Scenery Construction by California Scenic Designs, the entire set is done up from head to toe with Christmas garlands, lights and of course a big tree in the living room. For “older women” who all had their own unique sense of style, all four ladies are immaculately dressed in bright pastel hues, never wearing the same outfit twice. Costume designers Katie Dowse and Kipper Snacks‘ specialty costumes, along with Becky Motorlodge’s outrageous wigs, perfectly capture the girls’ four distinct and timeless fashions.
Perpetual supporting player Manuel Caneri is back as a “fey” waiter and as “Jean”, a friend of Dorothy’s (pun intended) who develops a crush on one of the girls. The amazing talents of Michael Phillis are put to good use as a horny Santa in one episode and as “Barbara Thorndyke”, a local snob who puts a test to the girls’ friendship, in anther. The handsome Snaxx has a cameo as a younger dashing male companion.
The author poses with the cast (photo Chuck Louden)
In between the episodes, the talented pianist Tom Shaw hosts the audience in a Christmas carol sing-along, so with all the added fun and costume changes, two 22-minute episodes become a two-hour delight. A special opening night thrill was having Cindy Fee, who sang the original show’s theme song “Thank You for Being a Friend”, perform after curtain call. Bring your ugly Christmas sweater, bring your friends, bring your grandmother, everyone will love it.
The house was packed! (photo by Chuck Louden)
production photos by Gareth Gooch
The Golden Girls Live: The Christmas Episodes
The Curran Theater, 445 Geary Blvd. in San Francisco
Thurs-Sat at 8; Sun at 2
ends on December 22, 2024
for tickets ($39-$125), visit Broadway SF
