TheaterMania responds to the ”Kinky Boots”/Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade Twitter backlash.
Each year, the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade telecast features performances from some of the year’s favorite Broadway shows, and Thursday’s broadcast was no exception. Musical numbers included segments from Matilda, Pippin, Motown, and the Tony Award-winning Best Musical Kinky Boots. Kinky Boots is based on a 2005 movie of the same name and tells the story of a young man who saves his father’s boot factory by enlisting the help of a fabulous drag queen to design sturdy heels for men, so of course, many of the performers are dressed in drag.
Several Twitter users disapproved of the appearance of drag queens in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade performance, and a backlash ensued.
Our take on the controversy?
5 Reasons It’s Better to Be a Drag Queen Than a Homophobe This Holiday Season:
1. You can let your kids watch Mrs. Doubtfire worry free.
2. You have a better chance of meeting the Muppets.
3. You get to wear more clothes than the Radio City Rockettes at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
4. You’ll spend less time on Twitter and more time with your family.
@realDonaldTrump @Macys Won’t shop at Macy’s since they shoved KINKY BOOTS in our face for Thanksgiving Day Parade.
— Andy Sulskis (@Kingnorthwoods) November 30, 2013
Really? I loved the movie BUT do the transvestites of Kinky Boots really belong in the Macy Thanksgiving day parade?
— Steve MUDFLAP McGrew (@stevemcgrew) November 28, 2013
Kinky boots aka cross dressing on thanksgiving? Fat men in knee highs? I’m confused. #MacysThanksgivingDayParade
— Bailey Vaughn (@msbvaughn) November 28, 2013
“what did you do for thanksgiving Tyler?”
“watched transsexuals sing about kinky boots”
— Hesher Chambers (@srebmahc) November 28, 2013
@nbc watching thanksgiving parade with small children and kinky boots performance comes on , equality is important but not @ cost of decency
— Angel M Valenzuela (@mikesmith076) November 28, 2013
Did Macy’s really think it appropriate to have a cast of drag queens perform “Kinky Boots” in the Thanksgiving Day Parade?
— Nina Terzian (@NLTNFL) November 28, 2013
macys thanksgiving parade kinky boots, Seriously? I thought this was Family entertainment
— Nick Nicholas (@Nick_Nicholas) November 28, 2013
What does Kinky Boots have to do with Thanksgiving and family @MacysDayParade? Nothing #epicfail
— Daniel (@TXJDM) November 28, 2013
5. Shopping at Macy’s on Black Friday is more fun when you’re wearing thigh-high leather boots. (You never know when you’ll need to use that heel as a weapon against aggressive bargain shoppers.)
For tickets to Broadway’s Kinky Boots, click here.