Via Wicked Local

Tragic is the best way to describe Courtney Act’s attempt to roller skate into “The Girl from Oz,” a live drag musical comedy. It’s tragic because, unlike Courtney, it is neither beautiful nor graceful. It is, however, a great Australian pastime.

The “Oz” here is short for “Australia,” Courtney’s native country. But fear not, die hard Judy Garland fans — there’s bedazzled gingham, thigh-high red boots and allusions to fellow “RuPaul’s Drag Race” contestant Bianca Del Rio as the Wicked Witch of the West to keep you satisfied.

The night is a highly informative tour-de-force story of Australia brought to — as Courtney respectfully calls it — ’Merica. She begins by leading the audience in an Aborigine call that can’t be put into words. Next she pays homage to Provincetown with a “Down Under” parody that takes lyrical inspiration from her fellow queens, salt water taffy, and things to do with hairy bears that are unsuitable for print. She also pays homage to Sia’s bangs, the Hemsworth brothers and a childhood foray in asphyxiation (the show is sort of family-friendly).

If you’ve witnessed Courtney barking in her Australian flag dress, you know that she’s jaw-dropping, double-take gorgeous. If you’re looking for a pageant queen, she’s your girl. And if you’re looking for a messy queen, look elsewhere.

But her beauty doesn’t overshadow her talent — she can seriously hold a tune. With Broadway pipes and a mean falsetto, let’s just say she didn’t make it as a semi-finalist on “Australian Idol” for naught. Her best performance is the slowed-down “Lana Del Rey, Fifty Shades of Grey” version of “Stayin’ Alive” — it is sensual, powerful and gives new meaning to a forgotten classic, if not new meaning to life itself.

Courtney is a multi-hyphenate: singer-dancer-comedian and, most important, songwriter. She performs a hauntingly beautiful rendition of “Body Parts,” her own composition, which features fellow Aussie Olivia Newton-John’s “Let’s Get Physical,” in addition to aerobic thrusting.

Besides Courtney herself, some of the greatest gifts Australia has given ’Merica are its sorrowful ballads. Lucky for us, this is Courtney’s forte. The sheer heartache that stems from this land is a bit baffling even to a native, but Courtney handles it with as much lightheartedness and grace as she can in those roller skates.

But she’s quick to warn against the bad advice oft found in these ballads, going so far as to cry aloud during “Don’t Cry Out Loud.” She also schools the audience on Australian history, slang, celebrities you didn’t know were Australian, and more about spiders than you’d ever want to know (“They’ll eat your face off”).

If you’re able to look past her perfect face or hear over the thunderous applause to the heart of Courtney’s performance, her charm lies in her Shirley Temple-esque feigned ignorance after every bear-themed double entendre. She’s a queen, that’s for sure, but she also revels in her artifice and clumsiness. (She divulges that she’s wearing tape used to hold tiles on the sides of buildings as part of her elaborate corset.) This grounds her in humanity and represents the charisma behind the “RuPaul’s Drag Race” C-word acronym (she’s got the uniqueness, nerve, and talent too, of course). Though Courtney may have gotten third place on “Drag Race,” she won the crowd at the Art House. Because as long as Courtney’s there, there’s no place like Oz.