Running from the mob can be an adrenaline rush.
Then again, for longtime friends and aspiring cabaret stars Connie and Carla, it turns out to be a drag.
In her new comedy, Nia Vardalos attempts to do for female impersonators what she did for Greek Americans in My Big Fat Greek Wedding. She's determined to explore the fun and funny side of a specialized community.
As an actor and a writer, Vardalos has the Midas touch.
There was not much original or earth-shattering in Greek Wedding and neither is there in Connie and Carla, but she has the uncanny ability to put the sparkle on the mundane.
Given that she's entering the world of drag queens and show tunes, she can't have enough glitter and mock glamour. Subtlety never rears its cautious head. This is slapstick tomfoolery at is beguiling best.
Connie (Vardalos) and Carla (Toni Collette) are diehard musical theatre performers.
One night after their gig at an airport lounge, belting out Broadway staples, the girls are witnessed witnessing a mob hit. The mob boss immediately puts a hit out on these canaries before they can become stool pigeons.
When the same thing happened to Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis in Some Like It Hot, the guys donned drag and joined a girls' band.
Not to be outdone, Connie and Carla slather on the makeup, find the most flamboyant gowns and biggest wigs to pose as drag queens.
You'd be very right to conclude that Some Like It Hot takes a quick detour and ends up at La Cage Aux Folles and that Connie and Carla become the Victor/Victoria version of Thelma and Louise.
Vardalos and Collette are at their most hysterical when they are at their most outrageous and irreverent, as when they do their version of I Don't Know How to Love Him from Jesus Christ Superstar.
The production numbers are all appropriately tacky, especially when the duo get a chorus line of real drag queens.
David Duchovny has the Marilyn Monroe role as the befuddled straight man who finds himself inexplicably and unnervingly attracted to Connie. It's a performance as funny as anything Vardalos and Collette deliver with all their over-the-top antics.
It's through Duchovny, as Jeff, that Vardalos introduces the film's message of tolerance and acceptance because Jeff is trying to come to terms with his brother, Robert (Stephen Spinella), and his gay lifestyle.
Debbie Reynolds makes a delightful cameo appearance as herself and instantly gets into the swing of things.
One of the film's best running jokes has the goon (Boris McGiver) assigned to kill Connie and Carla develop a love for musical theatre. The same is bound to happen to even the most cynical viewer as Vardalos and her co-stars work their irresistible and insistent magic.
(This film is rated PG)
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