Review: AT THE WAKE OF A DEAD DRAG QUEEN at Santa Fe Playhouse

Santa Fe Playhouse has described their 2026 season as “a battleground, a sanctuary and a mirror exploring power in all its forms: who holds it, who resists it and how it’s reclaimed.”  Their current offering, At the Wake of a Dead Drag Queen by Terry Guest, explores a marginalized community, drag queens in the early 2000s in rural Georgia, and how they use their art form to create their own power. The play is a one-act, two-person production that shines a light on Blackness, queer identity, chosen family, and the art of drag. It is loosely based on the playwright's uncle who passed away from AIDS.

The star and narrator is Courtney Berringers (Malcom Morgan-Petty), a black drag queen who has recently died (no spoiler alert here, she tells us she’s dead one minute into the show and it’s literally the title); she invites the audience into her self-produced wake. The action moves between the afterlife and flashbacks, as the play focuses on Courtney's life in rural Georgia in the early 2000s. As played by Morgan-Petty, Courtney is at once strong, powerful, vulnerable and flawed. In one scene she can go from the star of the show to insecure and unhappy, a complete contradiction of emotions and levels.

Courtney is joined onstage by friend, lover and confidante Vickie Versailles (Garrick Sigl), a new drag queen on the scene, who obviously worships Courtney and wants to learn from her as she commands the stage. Vickie is self-proclaimed rural poor white trash and despite her humble beginnings, she possesses big dreams and the desire to leave her past behind.

Their relationship starts as a one-night stand but then deepens into a friendship where Vickie (birth name Hunter) yearns for Courtney (birth name Anthony) to break down the walls she has to relationships and real emotions.

In flashbacks we see where these walls began, in Anthony’s childhood where he was belittled and made to feel less-than by his parents, classmates and society in general. We see that drag became an escape for a young person trying to fit in somewhere. Morgan-Petty does a wonderful job of capturing the people in his past who shaped him into the sometimes fierce, sometimes fragile Courtney.

Hunter had a similar upbringing, with an unaccepting family and a sense of being born in the wrong place at the wrong time. Sigl gives Hunter/Vickie something that Anthony/Courtney seems to lack – the ability to dream bigger and the drive to try to rise above his fate. His portrayal of a homeless man from his past is a highlight of the play.

Drag Queen has amazing costumes by Nicole Clockel – they manage to be glamorous and glitzy but definitely look like they were made on a budget – as it should be for a drag club in rural Georgia. The set design, a main runway with dressing areas on each side, and staircases leading to the audience for closer interaction, is a bold and beautiful choice by Set Designer Alex Whittenberg. Lighting Designer Fabian Garcia does a wonderful job of creating a scheme that has stark differences between “onstage” and “backstage” moments. Director Damian Lockhart makes full use of the small and intimate space and gives both actors room to explore and engage with the audience.

The thing that stayed with me after this show was the ease and natural ebb and flow of conversation the two actors had; both Malcom-Petty and Sigl had volumes of script to memorize, but both took the words from the page and embodied them. The audience is invited into their inner world, which at times seems like an invasion of privacy, as if we are voyeurs. This made the entire production engrossing; the audience is invested in both these people and their stories.

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