Kudos to Netflix for commissioning this original heartfelt Polish family drama series which as its title hints has a glorious queer theme .
The elegant and well-turned-out Sylvester Bork (Andrzej Seweryn) has three passions in life. His very successful Tailors shop in Paris that he is about to retire from for a new life in the South of France; his well-spoiled yappy little dog that accompanies him everywhere; and his career as veteran drag queen Loretta on the Cabaret Club circuit. He is a star in both of his lives and just watching him transform blows away any disbelief.
However, his well-manicured and organized life is about to change when he receives a letter from his granddaughter back in the small grubby town in Poland that he had escaped from decades ago. In the letter, she asks Sylvester to urgently rescue a sick mother that needs a kidney transplant.
Like many now openly gay older men, it was a past he had long forgotten about and had never ever shared even with his closest queer friends in Paris. But despite first impressions, his parental instincts kicked in, and clutching his elegant matching luggage he is soon looking so out of place on a train and bus to a remote part of Poland.
Wioletta (Maria Peszek) the adult daughter he had never met wants nothing to do with him even though she needs the kidney that he is offering. Izabela (Julia Chetnicka) the schoolgirl granddaughter who had been the one to track him down to save her mother also had her own life complications that she had hidden well up to now.
In the very first part of the series, I couldn’t stop comparing Seweryn’s Sylvester with the tour-de-force performance of the equally legendary actor Udo Kier as a drag queen in Todd Stephen’s Swan Song released last year. Their stories are totally different but their inspiring performances of real drag stars are both sheer joys to watch and neither should be missed.
There are some obvious plot lines in Queen as Sylvester and their daughter find ways to communicate and when there is an explosion at the mine which the whole town surrounds, then the family drama has been set aside to look at the bigger picture.
Queen’s writers Árni Ólafur Ásgeirsson and Kacper Wysocki created such a fine balance about how when Sylvester starts to get involved with the miners in a fundraising show and even brings over his flamboyant choreographer from Paris, his sexuality is never an issue or at the forefront. There is a however a tender moment when he meets up with his very old friend who had broken his heart as a young man.
No spoilers here but the final scenes are totally wonderful and will have you screaming and jumping up and down just like the audience at the Miners Fundraising Show.
Queen is a joyous celebration of family and life and we know you will not be able to stop binge-watching it all in one go as we did.
PS Most of these Polish actors may not be immediately familiar to you even though for example Seweryn’s extremely lengthy resume includes such movies as Schindler’s List. However, you may spot Queer Eye’s Antoni Porowski who has a very brief role as Sylvester’s tailoring assistant
Review : Roger Walker-Dack
Editor in Chief : Queerguru
Member of G.A.L.E.C.A. (Gay & Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association) and NLGJA The Association of LGBT
Journalists. and The Online Film Critics Society. Ex Contributung Editor The Gay Uk & Contributor Edge Media
Former CEO and Menswear Designer of Roger Dack Ltd in the UK
one of the hardest-working journalists in the business' Michael Goff of Towleroad
