Take a closer look at that character’s over-styled hair, ‘60s getup, and obvious make up. She’s wearing a pearl necklace, but is that an adam’s apple? Die, Mommie, Die, the latest endeavor of the prolific on-screen crossdresser, writer-director Charles Busch, is distinct from other 60s parodies: Our leading lady is a flamboyant drag queen.
Charles Busch stars as Angela Arden in the film adaptation of his latest play. Angela, a has-been singer and movie star, is stuck in a loveless marriage with an equally washed-up director. She looks for love with her gigolo/tennis pro, played by an aging Jason Priestley. When Angela’s husband catches her in her latest fling, rather than granting her a divorce he sentences her to “life in prison.” In her desperation, Angela finishes her hubby off with an arsenic-laced suppository. But her troubles don’t end there-she’s now left to deal with her outrageous children.
Edith, a suspicious daughter is hilariously portrayed by Natasha Lyonne, of But I’m a Cheerleader and American Pie I and 2. Edith had a bizarrely close relationship with her father and does not take his death well. Played by Stark Sands, Angela’s troubled son Lance has just been kicked out of college for initiating a male orgy in a biology lab. He also turns on mommy dearest.
Just in case it isn’t weird enough, mommy’s gigolo seduces both daughter and son. It’s probably the last time in Priestley’s career since 90210 that he will sleep with all his co-stars.
As demonstrated in his other work, nuance and subtlety are not Priestley’s or Busch’s. After bringing you Vampire Lesbians of Sodom, Psycho Beach Party, and Now Voyager, Busch parodies early ‘60s Hollywood melodramatic suspense films in Die, Mommie, Die. The action begins with such intensity that it has nowhere to go, and so, despite boundless energy, the film seems flat. Although the actors successfully spoof the wide-eyed starlets and dashing leading men of the era, it’s too bad they don’t have a better script to work with.
The film is certainly not intended to be subtle, but it is meant to be funny. It opens with obviously masculine Busch, in a silver-screen song and dance number. The Grace Kelly-style starry lens glamour shots, clever at first, quickly become overdone. The joke is always the same, just tweaked, and gets very old, very fast.
Despite a few funny scenes, the film’s 80 minutes drag disappointingly. With a clever premise and quality acting, Die, Mommie, Die should be hilarious. But jokes like, “As catsup is to meatloaf, so joy is the condiment of sorrow,” leave the audience furrowing their brows in confusion rather than laughing. And, by the end, it has most viewers screaming “Just die already, so I can get the hell out of here.”
