When a very hungover Stacey wakes up from a night of blacking out after downing eighteen shots of Jägermeister, she finds herself Off-Broadway, on stage before a live audience, in a 1940s Golden Age musical, with no idea of how she got there or how to get out. So she uses what she learned from her BFA in Theater and her dreams of having a career in show biz in The Big Gay Jamboree, an original time-traveling high-camp musical take-off on the 2021-23 Apple+ TV send-up series Schmigadoon and a parody of theater itself, starring and co-created by Marla Mindelle (book, music, and lyrics), with Jonathn Parks-Ramage (book) and Philip Drennen (music and lyrics). But it turns out to be as much about relationships, sex, and gay pride, and issues of racism, misogyny, and homophobia (and the low salaries of actors!), as it is about being trapped in an old-time small-town musical on what’s supposed to be her wedding day, with a surprise ending you’ll never see coming. Marla Mindelle and members of the cast. Photo by Matthew Murphy. Along with the riotously funny and raunchy Mindelle (e.g., the ‘40s musical is set in the western town of Bareback, Idaho; sexual innuendos clearly intended), the all-in, all-gay supporting cast (Alex Moffat, Paris Nix, Constantine Rousouli, and Natalie Walker) and ensemble (Brad Greer, Amanda Lee, Jillian Mueller, Olivia Puckett, Melvin Tunstall, and John Yi), under the uproarious fast-paced direction of Connor Gallagher, who also provided the hilarious and salacious choreography, embraces the zany humor with unbridled relish, singing, dancing, and delivering the non-stop over-the-top laughs that kept everyone (including me) at the sold-out performance I attended (and I’m sure at every performance) screaming and cheering. Those include such sidesplitting segments of audience participation as the instructional number set to the tune of “Do Re Mi,” teaching a lesson in the popular gay vocabulary of our current times, then having the house sing along to the definitions, and Stacey pulling a random person out of his seat (don’t worry, she did check his pronouns) and up onto the stage (more than once), with the quick-witted Mindelle improvising a laugh-out-loud bit with a cell phone (no spoiler here; you’ll have to see it, or even be in it). It’s also fun to recognize the sources referenced in the parody and its show tunes, from Oklahoma! and The Sound of Music to Some Like It Hot, Into the Woods, and others. Marla Mindelle, Paris Nix, and ensemble. Photo by Matthew Murphy. The sensational featured cast portrays characters from Stacey’s actual life (Moffat as her very wealthy, connected, and noncommittal fiancé Keith, whom, flashbacks show, she met while waitressing at a chain restaurant and now isn’t sure she wants to marry) and the vintage musical into which she’s been transported. Among the highlights are Nix as Clarence, to whom she feels an attraction, bringing down the house with his powerful lead vocal and range on a “Gospel Song,” backed by an impassioned four-person choir; Walker’s slutty Flora, one of Stacey’s fictional sisters with rhyming names, channeling a, well, slutty Marilyn Monroe; and Rousouli in the role of the previously closeted and now liberated Bert, progressively stripping down from his stage costume and performing an impressively flexible, acrobatic, and flaming solo burlesque dance routine. They’re all accompanied by a top-notch five-piece orchestra – Ryan McCausland on drums/percussion, Michael Olatuja on electric and acoustic bass, Greg Riley on reeds, and Kelly Thomas and music director and conductor Adam Laird on keyboards – with arrangements and music supervision by David Dabbon, orchestrations by Kris Kukul, and music coordination by Tomoko Akaboshi. Constantine Rousouli. Photo by Matthew Murphy. An array of defining period-style costumes by Sarah Cubbage, hair and wigs by Leah J. Loukas, and make-up by Katie Gell capture the different eras, themed song-and-dance numbers, and transformations of the characters. Evocative lighting by Brian Tovar and spectacular animated projections by Aaron Rhyne that meld with a changing set by dots, including a turntable on which Stacey initially has some satirical trouble balancing, signal the shifts from Stacey’s present-day reality to her memories and the theatrical world into which she’s been inexplicably cast (though the sound by Justin Stasiw, or bad acoustics in the theater, with many of the loudest-sung lyrics and closing lines of the songs being unintelligible, are in need of adjustment). Photo by Matthew Murphy. Can Stacey sing her way out? Will she fulfill her ambition of appearing in the reality TV franchise The Real Housewives (but “NOT of DUBAI!”)? Is it all just a dream? Or has someone covertly devised it with a very specific purpose in mind? Whatever (or as Stacey would say, “What the fuck?”). All I know is that, like Mindelle’s smash hit Titanique, playing Off-Broadway since 2022, The Big Gay Jamboree has all the makings of a cult classic. If you love to laugh, this is one cult you should join. Running Time: Approximately one hour and 40 minutes, without intermission. The Big Gay Jamboree plays through Sunday, January 19, 2025, at the Orpheum Theatre, 126 Second Avenue, NYC. For tickets (priced at $54.79-109.61, including fees), call 1-800-653-8000, or go online.