Editor’s Pick: Paige Turner at Crazy Aunt Helen’s

Paige Turner returns to Crazy Aunt Helen's with "an all-live sung slumber party" full of mayhem and campy foolishness.

By Doug Rule on October 6, 2022 @ruleonwriting

In 2006, New York stage actor Daniel Frank Kelley created new work for himself simply by painting his face and putting on a dress, wig, and heels.

In the process, he created a new persona for himself — Paige Turner, a singing drag queen fictitiously spawned by Pee Wee Herman and Barbie, raised by clowns, and named in a play-on-words homage to a specific task Kelley once performed in class.

As he tells the story, “One day in musical theater class, the pianist dropped his music and said, ‘I need a page turner.’ And I said, ‘I’ll be your Paige Turner!'”

Turner was a creator and original host of So You Think You Can Drag, a live drag reality competition held in New York City. Her act, writes Broadway World, feels like “a cross between Debra Messing and Elle Woods, with a little retro flair and a whole lot of musical theater.”

Turner gained attention outside of New York for her YouTube musical parodies, most famously spoofing Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe” and The Muppets’ “Rainbow Connection,” which she renamed “Grindr Connection.”

Turner returns to Crazy Aunt Helen’s with her show Tucking Myself In, “an all-live sung slumber party” full of mayhem and camp foolishness, including song parodies of everything from Hairspray to Taylor Swift.

Saturday, Oct. 8, at 8 p.m. at Crazy Aunt Helen’s, 713 8th St. SE. Tickets are $25, plus a minimum of $25 in food and beverage purchases.

Visit www.crazyaunthelens.com or call 202-750-8140.