Vague Visages’ Queens of Drama review contains minor spoilers. Alexis Langlois’ 2024 movie features Louiza Aura, Gio Ventura and Alma Jodorowsky. Check out the VV home page for more film criticism, movie reviews and film essays.

Queer joy remains in depressingly short supply in mainstream media, with the deplorable “kill your gays” trope still regularly popping up. What a nice surprise it is, then, to experience the unbridled triumph of Queens of Drama, a French dramedy in which nobody perishes tragically (not a spoiler). Instead, the focus is on just how wonderful it is to be queer in all its messy, confusing glory. There’s even a ton of glittery hot pink splashed across the opening credits, ensuring that viewers know this movie is capital-G gay right off the bat, and it only gets wilder and more French from there. Suffice it to say that Queens of Drama is quite the ride, lasting almost two hours but covering an entire lifetime. 

Singer-songwriter and former Eurovision contestant Bilal Hassani gives a winningly unhinged performance in Queens of Drama as Steevy Shady, who is essentially the narrator. The film utilizes the character’s lengthy YouTube video about the protagonists (female musicians on opposing sides of the artistic spectrum who had a fiery, decades-spanning love affair) as a clever framing device. Steevy is a somewhat tragic character given his lifelong obsession with Mimi Madamour (a luminous Louiza Aura), one of the titular queens of drama, but he gradually evolves into a bit of a Perez Hilton. He’s also a dead ringer for Lisa Rinna, thanks to his pumped-up and glossy lips, along with a heavily teased bob, which may or may not be on purpose (the legendary soap star and former Real Housewife’s connection to drag is well-established).

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Queens of Drama’s action kicks off in 2055 (no word on whether Donald Trump is still in power), long after Mimi’s time in the spotlight has ended. Then, Langlois almost immediately flashes back to 2005, when the protagonist was a bright-eyed teenager auditioning for an American Idol-style reality competition show and first crossed paths with Billie Kohler (Gio Ventura, with her character’s emotions all on the surface, like an exposed nerve of a human) — a brash, butch and proudly out lesbian who’s the antithesis to everything the shy and unassuming Mimi represents. When Billie first steps into focus, someone rudely wonders aloud, “Is that a dude or a chick?” She snaps back with, “I’m your worst nightmare.” Unsurprisingly, it’s Mimi who makes it through to the next round, while Billie is dragged out kicking and screaming about the patriarchy.

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But Billie makes her mark on Mimi, who tracks her crush down to a grimy underground gay bar where her disgusted and fellow bubblegum pop-obsessed BFF expresses her disbelief that Mimi could even be attracted to someone like Ventura’s character. She confidently fronts an experimental punk band called Slit, whose proudly vulgar and graphic lyrics shock Mimi into finally owning her identity. Unfortunately, her time with Billie is inevitably cut short when Mimi wins the singing competition and is catapulted into superstardom. When she’s first announced as the victor, the crowd physically pushes Billie further and further away from Mimi, in a neat visual nod to how fame will tear them apart. Although the couple try their best to stay connected, there’s no fighting it.

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It goes without saying that Queens of Drama is campy AF. The movie plays like a load of queer kids got together and threw everything at the screen to see what glittered. It’s a punk rock construction of a loving homage to pop culture. Each scene is constructed to show off the technicolor glory of queer life, even when characters are struggling with their feelings or trying to find their place in an uncaring world. Early on, Mimi makes it clear that she’s used to being told who she is, explaining to Billie that her mother (who’s voiced by up-and-coming French filmmaker Mati Diop) sees her as the next Maria Callas when clearly Mimi is more of a Mariah Carey. Once she makes it big, everybody around her works overtime to make the mixed-race teenager look as much like a prototypical white girl as possible. The styling is obviously a nod to Britney Spears, with Mimi’s pink crop top and white sweatpants ensemble for her debut music video directly aping “…Baby One More Time.”

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Considering that Queens of Drama takes place in 2005, it’s just two years away from Spears’ infamous head-shaving meltdown, which is also explicitly referenced (although Mimi, unlike the real-life pop star herself, still looks stunning while bald). Likewise, Steevy recreates the iconic “Leave Britney Alone!” video. The visual references are on the nose but effective, as director Alexis Langlois (who co-wrote the screenplay with Carlotta Coco and Thomas Colineau) establishes how well she knows and respects this world and its very colorful denizens. Naturally, since this is a story about two performers, there are a handful of musical sequences, each of which is energetically staged and thrums with electricity. Both Mimi and Billie are utterly believable onstage, and in front of the camera, albeit in different ways.

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When Mimi first watches her crush performing live, Billie struts around belting out insanely catchy butch anthems about fucking the patriarchy. But the burgeoning pop star’s biggest hit, abstinence-pusher “Don’t Touch,” is just as much of a banger. Queens of Drama also charmingly plays with surrealism on a couple of key occasions, both of which crucially revolve around music videos. In the first instance, Mimi and Billie have a violent argument in front of a giant Mimi poster as the action slowly transitions into Billie’s breakout music video. In the other, the two women are again fighting but, as they’re drawn back together, the background changes to accommodate another music video. This cleverly dramatizes crucial details while also moving the story forward in a meaningful way.

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Essentially, Queens of Drama is about how lesbians mate for life and get too serious too soon, saying “I love you” and moving in together in a matter of days (IYKYK). Fortunately, the performers are all so lovable, each unique take so eccentric and memorable regardless of the amount of screen time, that it’s impossible not to root for Mimi and Billie to somehow find their way back to each other, even if it means destroying everything they’ve built in the process. Aside from the many spot-on period details (a Nokia cell-phone features rather prominently), Queens of Drama rings emotionally true when it comes to its dissection of how pushing forward with a career you love often comes at the expense of your personal life. Even better, there’s no judgement of either choice since both Mimi and Billie are ultimately successful as singers even though Aura’s character is, obviously, far more willing to play the game. Unapologetically queer, sexy, messy and celebratory all at once, by refusing to conform to mainstream norms and instead leaning into the chaos, Queens of Drama is utterly transcendent.

Queens of Drama released theatrically on April 18, 2025 via Altered Innocence. 

Joey Keogh (@JoeyLDG) is a writer from Dublin, Ireland with an unhealthy appetite for horror movies and Judge Judy. In stark contrast with every other Irish person ever, she’s straight edge. Hello to Jason Isaacs. Thank you for reading film criticism, movie reviews and film reviews at Vague Visages.

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