If RuPaul’s Drag Race has taught us anything, it is that there is apparently no concept so ridiculous that it cannot be improved with several drag queens, an unnecessarily elaborate costume and RuPaul appearing somewhere in the middle of it.
And now we have Stop! That! Train!.
The gloriously silly action comedy is now streaming on Netflix in the US, with international availability varying. Directed by Hairspray director Adam Shankman, the film stars Ginger Minj and Jujubee as Tess and DeeDee, two train stewardesses who leave the considerably less glamorous Stank Rail for the luxury Glamazonian Express. Unfortunately, a catastrophic weather event called Stormaganza is about to turn their glamorous new career into a very gay disaster movie.
Joining them aboard are Brooke Lynn Hytes, Symone and Marcia Marcia Marcia as the considerably snootier first-class attendants, with appearances from Latrice Royale, Monét X Change and Angeria Paris VanMicheals. And presiding over the whole thing is RuPaul as President Judy Gagwell, because apparently even the Oval Office has finally succumbed to the franchise.
It is fabulously ridiculous in exactly the way you would expect from the people who once gave us Wigloose: The Rusical. Except this time somebody gave them a feature-film budget and an actual train.
If that sounds completely ridiculous, the trailer will not reassure you.
The real fun, however, may be spotting just how many familiar faces have been squeezed aboard. Sarah Michelle Gellar turns up, as do Nicole Richie, Raven-Symoné, Michelle Visage, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Charo, Joel McHale, Lisa Rinna, Missi Pyle, June Diane Raphael, Matt Rogers and enough others to make the film occasionally feel like somebody accidentally invited the entire Drag Race guest-judge contact list to the same carriage.
And obviously RuPaul has managed to get a RuPaul song into the soundtrack.
The end credits feature “Party Train”, because Ru has been milking that discography since approximately the beginning of time. In fairness, have you seen the outfits? The money has to come from somewhere.
There are runaway trains, ridiculous characters, celebrity cameos, drag queens trying to save the day and a President called Judy Gagwell.
Nobody involved appears to have mistaken this for serious cinema.
Thank God.
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