Jinkx Monsoon & The Major Tip the Scales in Heart and Humor

The most important thing to know about Jinkx Monsoon & Major Scales Together Again, Again—recently wrapped at the Seattle Rep—is that there is something in this show for all moods, all sensibilities, and all generations. Because of the specific historical and celebrity references as well as the ever-present raunchy humor, it’s probably most appropriate for audiences high school-age and above.

The story transports us to the year 2065, where Planet Earth is a post-apocalyptic, dystopian hell, and the rulers are odd, sponge-like aliens who oversee a Big Brother-style world, and the humans who have somehow survived live in constant fear of being disappeared in the night if they don’t openly demonstrate their fealty to their authoritarian rulers. I couldn’t help but posit if the concept of strange aliens who take over the earth to oppress and eradicate people from existence was simply a humorous ploy at getting a laugh, or if this plot device is an apt metaphor, addressing the real fear that Jinkx Monsoon lives with every day in this country as run by a government that does not fully protect LGBTQIA people’s civil and human rights. Monsoon has spoken often and publicly about her acute awareness and fear of “people in our own country [who] are trying to create laws to make it impossible for people like us to exist.”

Monsoon and The Major require an audience to think a bit beneath the surface for this show and not just take the entertainment at face value. It’s one of the many reasons that I appreciated this production: The intelligence and wit that the entertainers display adds an extra layer of depth to their musical and acting talents as well as to their comedic stylings.

Major Scales, who co-created this show with Monsoon, composed and arranged all the original songs and music—and there is a lot of music in this show, including the hit “Love Me More,” a tune that The Major wrote for Lady Gaga to sing in A Star is Born 2: The Afterbirth. In a breathless retelling of the story, Monsoon shares that the song was performed at The Grammys by Gaga herself. The lyrics, referenced with mixed approval by Monsoon, “mentions the word ‘love’ 72 times” and when they sing the “almost-famous” duet for us, we see that they aren’t kidding!

Jinkx Monsoon, Rachel Glass, and Major Scales at Seattle Rep / The Evergreen Echo

Monsoon’s performance captures a multi-layered, three-dimensional character that is fascinating to watch. She is a showy, glitzy, posturing, narcissistic diva, who speaks endlessly about herself and orders The Major around like he’s her servant; but just beneath the surface we clearly see a vulnerable, fragile woman who is past her prime, has probably subjected her liver to way too much alcohol over the years, is worried that the world has passed her by, and who wonders aloud if she matters anymore or maybe that she can’t pull off the same level of performance prowess that she used to.

The irony of it all is that her performance requires a great deal of athleticism, as well as two full costume changes and a couple of legit powerhouse ballads. Monsoon’s physical comedy chops shine throughout the show (there’s a hilarious sequence where she is trying to achieve fabulous poses on a settee as she’s telling us a story, and her attempts to “work a piece of furniture” gradually disintegrate as the scene progresses). This performance is even more amazing when one thinks about the fact that Monsoon has created a multi-dimensional character almost twice her actual age! You really forget that you’re watching a 30-something actress in the prime of her life as Monsoon disappears before our eyes into the characterization of an aging diva complete with all of the body aches and twinges, neuroses, and euphoric revision of the past as she escapes back to her glory days.

Monsoon utilizes a mélange of physical idiosyncrasies and mannerisms that she employs consistently throughout, giving her character nuance and authenticity, and adding complexity to what deceptively seems at first like your basic, over-the-top, comedic material. She moves seamlessly from fragile and vulnerable to tough and scrappy in the blink of an eye, so the show never lingers in the maudlin or melodramatic. Just when we start to feel the pathos set in enough to know it’s there, we are whisked back into an exhilarated regaling of how many famous celebrities she and The Major have outlived, or one of several hilarious tales of her past sexual conquests (she had relations with Lin Manuel-Miranda and Timothee Chalamet, with whom she “worked” on the set of Dune 4: Oops, I ‘Dune’ It Again, starring both).

Despite the little onstage spats, it’s clear that Monsoon and The Major have a lot of respect for each other (indeed one could not do without the other), and together they can weather any storm—because at the end of the day, they love each other in their own cantankerous ways. Monsoon sums up their resiliency best towards the end of the show: “We are like two old show ponies who refuse to be taken out back and put down.” Another metaphor for the times, giving us all inspiration to know that when the going gets tough, the tough get going…and no matter how creepy the aliens who try to take over our lives (or even to take us out!), we will fight them in every way we know how, through creativity and the power of love. If Jinkx Monsoon and The Major can survive, we all can!