The Birdcage (1996): It Took Twenty Years to Get Here
Beth and Michelle step into The Birdcage, Mike Nichols’ glorious collision of drag, family, politics, sweet-and-sour peasant soup, and Hank Azaria dancing without shoes. They celebrate Robin Williams’ extraordinary restraint, Nathan Lane’s larger-than-life vulnerability, Agador Spartacus’ scene-stealing devotion, and a comedy dense enough to reveal something new each time it is watched.
The episode argues that the conservative senator is not the film’s most painful antagonist. That role belongs to Val, who asks the two men who raised him to hide their Jewishness, their gayness, their home…
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