VIEW FILM STILLS: Hairspray

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What a Drag! More Famous Movie Crossdressers

Among other things, the musical Hairspray is yet another testament to the prodigious talents of songwriter Marc Shaiman, whose contributions to making South Park: Bigger Longer and Uncut play like an honest-to-God musical only sharpened that movie's satirical wit. Shaiman, here working with co-lyricist Scott Wittman, has, among other things, a knack for creating pastiches that don't play as such; that is, the songs generously partake of the pop-music conventions and innovations of the movie's period, but you don't really hear that as such unless you're actively trying to. They all play as really lively show tunes, and there are a lot of them in this less-than-two-hour movie; they're so purely pleasurable that they effectively cushion the movie, allowing everything else to float on them.

Director Shankman also did the choreography for the picture, yet given the number of cuts and overhead shots he uses during the dance numbers, one almost suspects he didn't have much confidence in the moves — but again, this is only going to be noted by those who have a business in noting such things. What will likely be noted by many non-professional viewers is the initial weakness of Travolta's performance. Padded in a fat suit, he's a formidable spectacle, but he seems to be unaware of the fact that the character he's playing is a woman, not a man in drag. That is, he employs drag-queen mannerisms rather than those of a female impersonator. This is a distinction (a very fine distinction to some, I understand) that Divine appreciated to the bone, as does Harvey Fierstein, who played Edna in the Broadway production. As the movie progresses and Edna emerges from her shell, Travolta's dancing and singing are game and engaging enough to make his early missteps forgivable.

The remainder of the cast does nothing requiring forgiveness. Blonsky is zaftig sunshine, Bynes irresistible in her moves from prim to perky, Pfeiffer hilariously and gorgeously bitchy, Latifah inspiring. It's great to see Walken in song-and-dance mode again, and who knew that Marsden, so often a thankless franchise second-banana (see Superman Returns and the X-Men films), possessed such vim and vigor, not to mention a singing voice? Like Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, a movie with which it otherwise has nothing in common, Hairspray proves that summer movie fun needn't be witless and/or soulless.

— Glenn Kenny