Songs That Inspired the Broadway Star
These days, when she’s not busy casting her spell upon packed Broadway audiences, two-time Drag Race champ Jinkx Monsoon makes playlists. But we’re not talking about a few dozen songs or a couple hours of music — these are Spotify odysseys encompassing hundreds of songs, musical monsoons that you could fall asleep to, wake up and find that you’re not even halfway through. Unlike most playlists, these weren’t created to be shared with the world, but they do serve a purpose. Monsoon – who recently solidified her status as a Broadway force thanks to a show-stealing turn in Pirates! The Penzance Musical, followed by her taking over the lead role in the Tony-winning smash Oh, Mary! — uses these playlists to prepare for acting roles, spinning them while rehearsing and queuing them up before showtime to get in character. Her playlist for Oh, Mary! – which she exclusively shared with Billboard and is allowing us to offer a peek into below – has more than 500 songs, clocks in at over 27 hours and is still being updated by the creatively restless star. These songs are informed by how Jinkx sees the stifled, manic Mary Todd Lincoln, how audiences react to the character and how she herself relates to the role. “What I would say overall about the playlist is that it is volatile,” Monsoon tells Billboard. “Mary is grieving the loss of one relationship while celebrating the beginning of a new relationship, and those are opposite ends of the spectrum. The songs bounce back and forth between heartbreak, breakup songs and falling-in-love for the first time songs.” While Oh, Mary! takes place in the 1860s, most of the songs on her playlist run from the 1920s to present day. (Aside from the fact that recorded music which could be played back didn’t become a thing until the 1870s, Monsoon quips that listening to songs popular during the American Civil War felt “a little too prescient” given what’s going on now.) Even so, this expansive playlist leapfrogs through decades, genres and zip codes, revealing Monsoon’s staggering knowledge of entertainment over the last 150 years and her intense dedication to doing right by the role, her co-stars and the audience. (Unsurprising, Jinkx kills it as Mary. Her performance, which runs through Sept. 28, is a no-notes masterclass in comedy with empathy. Simply put, Oh, Mary! remains the best thing on Broadway.) Jinkx Monsoon in OH, MARY! on Broadway. MurphyMade From Chappell Roan to Laufey to Helen Kane to songs from the cinema (Poor Things, Shock Treatment, Phantom of the Paradise, Bugsy Malone and The Lion King), here are 19 songs from Monsoon’s Oh, Mary! playlist, along with her insights into how they help her unpack and inhabit this indelible character. Jessica Harper, “Old Souls” and “Me of Me” “Jessica Harper’s voice just resonates with me. What’s great with both her characters [in the 1981 film Shock Treatment and 1974’s Phantom of the Paradise] is that she’s being seduced by the life of a performer. ‘Old Souls’ in Phantom reminds me of the moment between Mary’s teacher and Mary when they’re having a very intimate conversation about past lives and reincarnation – which is such a weird conversation to be having in a play that is set in the 1860s. And then (Harper’s) songs in Shock Treatment, she’s grappling with the potential end of her marriage while also being tempted into the life of being a starlet. She sings about feeling like a cat in heat and feeling ready to love herself. And Mary’s horny. She doesn’t even know what all the feelings are, because she’s very sexually repressed, but she is horny, and she doesn’t even know the word horny. She just knows that something’s going on down there that needs tending. There’s a (Shock Treatment) song called ‘Me of Me’ that is just (Harper) singing about how wonderful she is and how ready she is to be a goddess.” Peggy Lee, “Is That All There Is?” “(‘Is That All There Is?’) is a song I resonate with because I don’t think that song is about giving up. Yeah, it sounds a little bit like apathy, but that’s not what it is. To me, it’s realizing that all the things were promised in life that are going to be ‘the thing that changes everything,’ guess what? It’s just another experience. I’ve been there. I was told, ‘If this ever happens, your life is going to change forever.’ And guess what? It happened, and I’m still here, just still muddling through the way I always have been. And you can look at it the way of, ‘So why give a sh-t?’ Or you can look at it like, ‘Isn’t life so beautiful that we just get to have experience after experience until the end?’ And then the idea of saying to God at the end of your life, ‘Is that all you got?’ That’s just a diva move. “Also, Mary has something that I really resonate with — and probably my biggest connection to the character — is she’s so bored. She doesn’t want to be an alcoholic. She wants to be on stage. That’s the only thing that can hold her attention. And I’m not saying I’m that level of bored, but I have an addictive personality. That’s something I’ve dealt with in my life, I’ve been very candid about that, so I relate to Mary in that. I have also found the best place to put that (energy) is into my work — I found a way to really dig into my work, and that work has purpose. I don’t feel like I don’t feel like your average workaholic, I feel like someone who gets a lot out of work. I really just love the idea that Mary knows what she wants in life, and she’s sick of not getting it.” Bette Davis, “I’ve Written a Letter to Daddy” “’I’ve Written a Letter to Daddy’ is like a vaudeville
