Reviewer: Daniel Shipman
Upstaged Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
A drag parody of Agatha Christie-style whodunnits, complete with the remote manor setting. On paper, it sounds like a recipe for chaos. In actual fact, it IS a recipe for chaos, chaos of the most satisfying kind.
Chaos of the most satisfying kind.
Taking place on Tuck Island in 1991, the plot revolves around a dinner celebrating the anniversary of Charles and Diana… and it only gets camper from there, with guests beginning to kick the bucket almost as soon as they’ve finished arriving. The script cleverly uses the 1991 setting for knowing winks to the audience, with Charles and Diana’s marriage and newspaper editor Morgan Pierce (say it aloud) providing particularly rich sources of dramatic irony.
The cast boasts huge names in the form of Ru Paul’s Drag Race alumni Ra’Jah O’Hara, Willam, Vinegar Strokes and Karen from Finance. Each of these gets the obligatory cheer as they enter the stage from an audience that is on their side from the get-go, but they all prove themselves as more than just big name casting over the course of the evening, demonstrating their impressive comic talent. Writer Holly Stars also ‘multi-roles’ as the three Bottomley sisters – totally indistinguishable from each other but serving mainly to hike up the body count from tragic to absurd.
My personal favourite member of the cast would have to be Richard Energy, portraying the aging Tory MP Rich Whiteman (perhaps the least subtle name in a strong field of contenders which also includes Lady von Fistenburg). The physicality and energy brought to the role never gets old, and there is something to look forward to every time they take to the stage.
The script is a consistent source of hilarity and the audience have an absolute ball…
Occasionally, gags are built up but never quite pay off – the first act dedicates a fair amount of time to all the guests being under the impression that Diana herself would be coming, only for the attendees to find out that… she wasn’t invited.
Other than that, the script is a consistent source of hilarity and the audience have an absolute ball knowing that the next belly laugh is never more than a few lines away. I can’t wait to see what Stars does next.
-Daniel Shipman
Death Drop runs at The Lowry until Saturday 16 October 2021.