Sexy Baby
Written by David Cerda and Scott Lamberty
Directed by Derek Czaplewski
at Mary’s Attic, 5400 N. Clark (map)
thru June 16 | tickets: $15-$22 | more info
Check for half-price tickets
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Reveling in the (garish and crass) world of girl pageants
Hell in a Handbag Productions presents
Sexy Baby
Review by Clint May
Hell in a Handbag productions continues its 10-year run of skewering pop culture with Sexy Baby—a docu-musical surrounding the lives of pageant toddlers and their mothers. It has all the requisite Handbag tropes—men in drag, high kitch and low camp. Over the top and proud of it, Sexy Baby is mostly a dark comedy parody of the TLC reality (horror?) show “Toddlers & Tiaras”. What becomes of the children in a hyperworld of perfection surrounded by dubious coaches and overwrought mothers? Some love it, some become monsters because of it. Recent works from Hell in a Handbag have skewered Christmas, B-movies and the classics. While the world of pageantry seems an obvious choice for a troupe of their skillset, it’s disappointing just for that reason. Pageants, especially those that involve children, are already caricatures of reality. To make a caricature of a caricature is to spread thin the humor that can be mined from situations wherein the participants of the original are already grotesques. Hell in a Handbag has done better going after subject matter that wasn’t already a joke. Still, they give it their all and earn some guffaws and groaners with a willfully tasteless look at a terrifying mini-world.
As a musical, Sexy Baby is more or less entertaining, with some numbers more clever than others. Artistic Director David Cerda plays the Sexy Baby competition headmistress Candy Secks with his usual Mommy Dearest severity mingled with a touch of Dixie Carter. Video components add to the documentary feel with faux interviews with former winners and judges discussing the nature of the supposed purity of intent for an obviously tawdry topic. Baby offers nothing that The Simpsons and It’s Always Sunny in Philadephia or Best of Show and Drop Dead Gorgeous haven’t already said about the insanity of a world that exists so far outside normalcy that making fun of them is functionally superfluous. Again I qualify that by saying that the entire cast is having fun throwing their heart into the production and prop up a weak/overdone conceit with some humor that is a bit more repulsive than usual (making fun of the turmoil of children is always tricky, even if those kids are actually grown men in drag).
 
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I’m a fan of John Waters, and – watching his hilarious stand up act “This Filthy World” not three days ago – I grinned at his acknowledgment that being a success with critics would actually be something of a detrimental occurrence for him. The program provided at Sexy Baby contains the “obligatory note” and in it is a little jab to critics from Mr. Cerda stating that he wouldn’t be “caught dead with [us] in any other circumstances [outside theater].” This excludes the particular critic reading it, but of course, he assures. I too am acutely aware that this sort of production is critic-proof to a certain extent, with a built in audience of camp-lovers enjoying every minute and rebuffing anyone’s arguments and analysis as going too far uptown on a downtown subject. It’s everything you want and expect from a Hell in a Handbag production, and if you don’t know what to expect this is a good primer. Sexy Baby revels in the garish and crass in a proud tradition of thumbing its nose at the sacred and serious. Next time it just needs to remember to target things that are seen as such.
Rating: ★★½
Sexy Baby continues through June 16th at Mary’s Attic, 5400 N. Clark (map), with performances Thursdays-Saturdays at 7:30pm. Tickets are $15-$22, and are available by phone (800-838-3006) or online at BrownPaperTickets.com (check for half-price tickets at Goldstar.com). More information at HandbagProductions.org. (Running time: 1 hour 45 minutes, includes one intermission)
All photos by Rick Aguilar Studios
