Alex Grelle in “The Grelley Duvall Show” 2024/Photo: Sarah Elizabeth Larson
I might as well say it up front: Alex Grelle is living my childhood dream. Via his drag persona Grelley Duvall and ever-evolving stage extravaganza “The Grelley Duvall Show,” Grelle has brought to life the fantasies of a kid who spent a good portion of her formative years in her bedroom, headphones in, lip-synching in the mirror to pop tunes and mentally inserting herself into her favorite movies. A musical revue with a kick-ass live band, Fly Girl-fierce dancing, a dozen costume changes, and more cultural references than you can shake a shimmy at? It’s a nineties theater kid’s interior world come to life.
Over the last fifteen-plus years, Grelle has created a form of drag parody that transcends tribute, working with a cadre of Chicago’s most imaginative performing artists to create multimedia productions of such explosive creativity that the show keeps growing into larger containers. More than a decade ago, Grelley Duvall—a pun on Shelley Duvall and Grelle’s “The Shining” bit (he’s also a dead-ringer in costume)—was a regular at Salonathon, the experimental performance series hosted Monday nights at Beauty Bar. Salonathon founder Jane Beachy asked Grelle to be one of the performers in a stint at the new Steppenwolf 1700 theater, for which he added a live music trio. A booker for the Hideout caught that show and soon Grelle was expanding the production to fill the Hideout stage. Last year, the show repeatedly sold out the downstairs theater at the Chopin and packed the Empty Bottle for Grelle’s funny, tender, at times surreal tribute to Princess Diana. The new iteration, entitled “Best Actress,” will enjoy a run at the Chopin’s upstairs theater March 19-April 12, the largest room Grelle has played since a stint at Theater on the Lake.
When I ask Grelle how he’s approaching the new venue, he says he is thinking about how the entire performance will be much more visible to the audience—unobstructed by pillars, like in the Chopin basement, or by other attendees as it was at the Hideout. “It’s lighting a fire under my ass and motivating me about this iteration.”
Hollywood has always served as a prime source of inspiration for Grelle’s productions, which are stuffed with movie references that range from the iconic to the deep cut (I can’t help but wonder during the show in the Chopin basement how many of the twenty-somethings in the audience are getting the reference to Julianne Moore’s soul-and-bush-bearing breakdown from Robert Altman’s 1993 “Short Cuts”). The new production comes fresh on the heels of Oscar season and will bring years of planning to fruition.
“I’ve been writing ideas for this show since pandemic lockdown,” Grelle says. “The scene is a televised Oscars ceremony, and the category that is every gay man’s favorite: Best Actress. That race and that history of that award is a really good movie guide for the last twenty-five years of my life. It’s not only those nominated but a culmination of the films that have shaped me as an artist.”
Grelle worked with longtime collaborator Jesse Morgan Young on the script, enlisting Lookingglass ensemble member Kasey Foster to direct, “Fly Honey Show” co-founder Erin Kilmurray and Kasey Alfonso to choreograph, and power-pop band Aunt Kelly on music. Lolly Extract is designing puppet co-stars for the show; puppeteer Madigan Burke, dancers Kara Brody, Darling Shear, Patrick Stengle and the comically brilliant Mary Williamson round out the cast. “[Morgan Young and I] thought about who could hit these characters and we got everyone we wanted, which has never happened before,” Grelle says.
Powerhouse ensembles are the exuberant body of each “Grelley Duvall Show,” but the titular triple threat queen is its throbbing heart. Grelle is a magnetic performer, invoking any screen idol with not only a switch of wig, but a finely tuned tilt of chin or eye. He has effortless comic timing, can sing pretty much anything, and kicks it step for step with some of Chicago’s fieriest dancers. Moreover, his writing encompasses joy, humor, defiance, tenderness and naked (in more than one sense) vulnerability: It’s full-spectrum emotionally gratifying theater, signed and sealed in a love letter to pop culture.
“I feel lucky to have everyone involved,” Grelle says. “I custom-write for the pool of talent I’m familiar with in Chicago. I think Chicago is the best place for so many mediums of artists.” Truly, “Grelley Duvall” is one of those shows that feel like it could only happen in Chicago, where experimentation, hard work and collaborative spirit are in equal abundance. And the big room at the Chopin promises to be a space where Grelle and Co. can stretch out and take the show to new heights. “I slowly but surely realized I’m trying to do a big pop concert,” he muses. “The spectacle for this one is through the roof.”
“Grelley Duvall Best Actress” at the Chopin Theatre, 1543 West Division. Through April 12, Thursdays-Saturdays at 8pm, Sundays at 6pm. Tickets are $35 ($25 industry), available at chopintheatre.com.
