Matthew Martin in "All Singing, All Dancing, All Dead"

San Francisco drag superstar Matthew Martin brought his fast pace campy show “All Singing, All Dancing, All Dead” to the Rrazz Room on January 24th.

Martin Matthew has had a long wonderful history of stage and screen credits for many years. He starred in such productions as “Golden Girl Christmas Show”, “Moby Dick the Musical” and various drag musicals. He does the legendary stars like Bette Davis with skill and sensitivity.

To a sell out crowd this special performer played a multitude of representations I “All Singing, All Dancing, All Dead” through sight, sound, movement and dialogue. This talented singer, actor and dancer portrayed Bette Davis, Judy Garland, Peggy Lee and Katherine Hepburn to an appreciative audience.

Matthew Martin entered the stage from back of the club among the cheering fans as Margo Channing from “All About Eve”. He told the fans “Fasten your seat belts; it’s going to be a bumpy road tonight”. Back by the Tom Shaw Trio swinging onstage musicians he sang with his eye fluttering and hand gestures “I Will Survive” and “I Left My Heart in San Francisco seguing into “Being Alive with the “harsh” voice of the renowned star. Guest star Katya Smirnoff Skyy aka J. Conrad Frank entered the stage as the Joan Crawford to banter with “Bette” and then hilariously sung “You and Me” to an appreciative audience.

Matthew showed the serious side of Margo Channing when he showed the anguish of the character with a tender moment of dialogue from “All About Eve”. Starting with “Funny business, a woman’s career” about the things you drop on your way the ladder so you can move faster. This was done with Tom Shaw on piano playing Franz Liszt’s “Liebestraum”.

The accomplished drag queen disappeared behind a screen and came out as Judy Garland when she did her television show in the 60’s. It was all boastfulness and harangue singing a melody of songs including “Day In Day Out’, “Free and Easy and “I Hear Music” with the trio of swinging musicians that included Roberta Drake on drums and Daniel Fabricant on bass. Martin as Judy brought out an old reel to reel tape recorder to deliver a precise attempt at a memoir.
From back of the club came the bombastic Ethel Merman aka Mark Sargent to join “Judy” in a brassy version of “Friendship”, “You’re the Top” and “You’re Just in Love”. The kitschy duo ends this show stopper duet with “It’s Delightful, It’s DeLovely”. These duets brought the fans to their feet cheering for more.

Martin as Judy turned to a more serious and bitchy side of this legendary performer singing first sweetly “The Trolley Song” and then making bitchy remarks to the audience. I knew Judy very well in those days and I can attest to the fact this woman had a terrible bitchy side to her nature. Martin portrayed the woman at her very best and at her very worst. Martin even brought out her daughter Liza aka Heklina . Lisa also told the audience that she was just out of re hab and said in a bitchy manner “I’ve been married to one Queen after another.

Martin retired behind the dressing screen and came out stunningly wearing huge sunglasses and a huge white wig singing an indecipherable version of “I’m a Woman”. However she segues into a great jazz version of “Fever” with Daniel Fabricant doing a superlative job on the bass. Martin channeled the essences of Peggy Lee in “Big Spender” and “I Don’t Know Enough About You”. His rendition of “Is That All There Is” with the audience singing the chorus and snapping their fingers was a high point of the evening.

The talent artist retired once again behind the screen and came out as Katherine Hepburn and delivered an arrogant dialogue from “The Lion in Winter” and reading “A Night Before Christmas” with interruptions about herself to pontificate about winning the Oscars and her lovemaking with Spencer Tracy.

Everyone in the audience expected that Matthew would do his famous rendition of Bette Davis as Miss Baby Jane Hudson and he did not let the fans down. He retired to the screen and came out as the frightful Baby Jane to sing at her worst and maybe her best “I’ve Written a Letter to Daddy” in that horrid Davis voice. One a personal note I was an assistant camera man working on “Baby Jane” and I assisted Ernest Haller in that particular scene where Ms. Davis sang the song over and over and over again until she got it right.(at least 10 times)

Martin came back out as his self and showed the audience his tap dancing skills to “I’ve Got to Hear That Beat” from “Kiss Me Kate”.

The almost two hour sentiment ended with the preview of Martin as Baby Jane and Katya as Joan Crawford in the 2010 film of “Baby Jane” that you can buy on Amazon.