July 14, 2008
Southern Decadance
In the vast expanse between Desperate Housewives, Queer as Folk and Mama’s Family lies the Texas-size kitschfest Sordid Lives: The Series, debuting on Logo July 23. This manic satire/soap opera could only have come from the mind of one man: Del Shores, whose Lone Star-state childhood amidst crazy, big-haired Texas women was the basis for the series and, before it, the film and traveling stage show of the same name.
Boasting more gay favorites than a Bravo reality reunion, Sordid Lives features Olivia Newton-John as a singing barfly sprung from prison; Rue McClanahan as the waddling matriarch romancing a legless man decades her junior; Leslie Jordan in drag, channeling the First Lady of Country, Tammy Wynette; and the lesser-known but wildly funny Beth Grant (No Country for Old Men) as the valium-snarfing, chain-smoking confidante.
Sordid Lives can try too hard to be zany, and the comic timing occasionally misfires, but Shores’ love for his crackpot characters and his shameless celebration of all that is tacky (think Ab Fab in a trailer park) make the series a worthy guilty pleasure, bless his heart.
Sordid Lives: The Series premieres July 23 at 10 PM on Logo.
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