These drag queens have no time for culture wars
By David Mack
(CNN) — When Adam Shankman signed on to direct a spoof of a disaster movie starring a bunch of drag queens, he never imagined he’d end up creating something so full of giddy joy and immature silliness that he would ultimately be left wondering just who his intended audience is. “I made a kids movie, sort of,” Shankman said, “if it weren’t for the d**k jokes.”
To be clear, Shankman’s new film — the RuPaul-led comedy “Stop! That! Train!,” which opens Friday and is rated R — is decidedly not a children’s movie. In addition to a couple of gags about a train conductor’s genitals, there’s the occasional swear word, a shot of a puppet using drugs and repeated instances of naughty passengers and crew misbehaving as they veer toward a killer storm in a runaway train.
And yet, amid a political environment that has sought in recent years to portray drag queens as degenerates out to offend any and all decent sensibilities, the most remarkable part of “Stop! That! Train!” may well be just how accessible it is to mainstream audiences. Like 1980’s “Airplane!” and the “Naked Gun” movies before it, this new parody leans heavily on puns, sight gags and slapstick. There are no jokes about race or religion, and very few about gays and lesbians. There’s not even a single joke about drag. (So far, the film’s biggest controversy has been speculation about whether it used artificial intelligence to generate special effects—accusations Shankman has denied.) “The movie is, from a humor standpoint, as politically free as you can be, and I did that intentionally,” said Shankman, who previously directed films like “Hairspray” (2007) and “A Walk to Remember” (2002). “I made a comedy-forward movie. The fact that it is populated by these drag artists is the most transgressive part of it.”
Filmed in just 19 days and featuring a slew of cameos from celebrities like Sarah Michelle Gellar, Nicole Richie, Jesse Tyler Ferguson and Raven-Symoné, “Stop! That! Train!” is 92 minutes of unapologetic, camp ridiculousness. It follows two employees of commuter train company Stank Rail, Tess (played by drag queen Ginger Minj) and DeeDee (Jujubee, also of “RuPaul’s Drag Race” fame), who dream of traveling the country to, as Tess puts it, “see the Dakotas—both Fanning and Johnson.” When they lose their jobs and then con their way into positions aboard the much fancier Glamazonian Express, they must contend with both needy passengers and catty colleagues. But when the brakes on their cross-country train fail right as they enter a massive tempest known as a “stormaganza,” it’s up to Tess and DeeDee, as well as President of the United States Judy Gagwell (RuPaul), to save the day.
It’s rare for a movie of this type—a Hollywood comedy spoofing no existing IP and starring a bunch of drag artists—to get such a wide, national release. But audiences of all stripes may find enjoyment in the film given the disaster movie genre contains so many familiar tropes that are ripe for parody. (If the train crashes at the end of the line, for example, it will not only kill those on board, but also destroy a nuclear power plant, a home for rescue dogs, the home of actor Laurie Metcalf and a group of Make-A-Wish children.) “We’ve all seen these movies a million times,” said Ginger Minj. “But it has this undercurrent of drag that’s just sprinkled there that I think is easily accessible for a lot of people who aren’t familiar with drag.”
Divine intervention
Drag on film is nothing new. As in the world of theater, it has been featured almost since film was invented, according to Joe E. Jeffreys, a drag historian at the New York University Tisch School of the Arts. In a 1901 silent short distributed by inventor Thomas Edison’s company, for example, the female impersonator Gilbert Sarony dressed up as the titular role in “The Old Maid Having Her Picture Taken.” But drag in commercially successful movies has typically been used as a comedic device in which a big-name male star must crossdress in order to get out of a troublesome situation, Jeffreys explained, as was the case in 1959’s “Some Like It Hot,” 1982’s “Tootsie,” and 1993’s “Mrs. Doubtfire.” Some films in the 1990s also found success by casting typically mostly straight, cisgender men in movies about gay or transgender drag queens, such as in 1994’s “The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert,” 1995’s “To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar” and 1996’s “The Birdcage.”
What’s rarer in big films, according to Jeffreys, is for drag to be used as a tool that requires audiences to suspend disbelief and accept a character’s gender for narrative purposes. While there have been examples of such films succeeding (think Tyler Perry playing Madea in more than a dozen movies), this type of drag is typically reserved for more underground pictures. “Audiences will buy into this type if it is funny and the character does not threaten the status quo,” Jeffreys said. “Once the drag character begins to upset societal norms beyond the sartorial choice that is accepted as part of the suspension of disbelief, like Divine in John Waters’ films, larger audiences may not follow.”
“Stop! That! Train!” is among this latter category of film where drag queens as real people are intended as a fait accompli. Shankman said he imagined his movie taking place in a world in which drag didn’t even exist and these characters simply were. The two lead actors also never spoke about gender while preparing to film, instead concentrating on the relationship between their characters, which they hope audiences find authentic enough to suspend any disbelief they may have about drag. “I think people will be completely shocked and surprised to see that there’s a human element to this,” said Jujubee. “Even though we’re dressed up in drag, you forget that we’re even Jujubee or Ginger Minj. You just fall in love with these characters that are just telling a really beautiful, relatable story.”
In recent years, drag has been positioned as a cultural lightning rod as part of a right-wing political effort to paint drag artists as depraved actors out to pervert gender norms, especially for children. States like Texas and Tennessee have sought to outlaw or restrict public drag performances, while President Donald Trump has banned any drag performers from appearing at the Kennedy Center, likening their shows to “anti-American propaganda.” This year, the American Civil Liberties Union, which has launched a “Drag Defense Fund” in partnership with “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” is tracking at least 19 bills seeking to ban drag across the country, down from a peak of 27 such bills in 2024.
But “Stop! That! Train” may help to disarm some of that conservative political strategy by simply fighting fire with fun. In showcasing the comedy and entertainment skills of drag queens, rather than the lip-syncing talents most people might be familiar with, the movie in effect asks critics of drag what exactly is so scary about a bunch of glamorous clowns. “I think we’re just doing what we’ve always done, but on such a big scale that now people are getting to see the things they’re being fed aren’t necessarily the truth,” Ginger Minj said. “They’re getting let in on our world—on our actual world—a little bit.”
“I know that those people who ‘hate the idea of a drag queen’ will have a good time if they come and see it,” Jujubee said. “They’ll get it.”
In an era when stupidity has become something of a malevolent force wreaking havoc across various institutions, “Stop! That! Train!” is also part of a litany of recent entertainment reclaiming idiocy as something funny. Moviegoers seeking dumb fun have been treated to the new “Scary Movie” film, as well as last year’s “The Naked Gun,” “Spinal Tap II: The End Continues,” and “Fackham Hall.” A sequel to the 1987 Mel Brooks sci-fi parody “Spaceballs” is also due out next year. On Broadway, meanwhile, the inane comedies “Titanique” and “Oh, Mary!” — to say nothing of the gender-bending “Cats: The Jellicle Ball” and “Rocky Horror Show” revival — are among the hottest tickets in town.
Shankman said that in an era that can often feel exhausting and scary, he wants “Stop! That! Train!” to offer audiences a respite from rage for 90 minutes. “Being able to stop and sit in a room with people, let go of everything else, and let this silliness, irony, and stupidity wash over you, this feels very valuable to me right now,” he said.
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