At this stage of history, drag—by which I mean men dressing up as women for the delight of other men, none of whom have erotic interest in actual women—has survived more permutations than Czechoslovakia and Joan Rivers's face combined. Drag has been hailed as political protest and denounced as politically incorrect sexism, performed by sentimental reactionaries and by avant-garde visionaries; the term "drag queen" covers everyone from old-school lip-synchers to gender-fucking performance artists to that guy who impersonates Britney on America's Got Talent. But one fact of drag has remained unchanged from Shakespeare to Tootsie to Tyler Perry: A guy in a dress, like a monkey on roller skates or nuns on a log flume, can be deeply entertaining.

Le Faux—the two-year-old, late-night drag show hosted by Julia's on Broadway—features a bunch of guys in dresses. These guys aren't just female impersonators but celebrity- female impersonators. You'll see Madonna and Cher and Kylie, and if you're worried about knowing who's who, don't be—at Le Faux, impersonators are introduced by video footage of their guiding stars, an odd choice that both aggrandizes and diminishes the live performances to come.

About those performances: They're given in Julia's surprisingly roomy and attractive cabaret space, and sitting down in a club on Broadway for a real-live drag show feels oh-so-right. Unfortunately, the show on offer is a dud. Money has been spent on costumes, work has gone into the stagings, but none of the impersonators are good enough to trompe our l'oeils or inventive enough to spoof their stars. The result is something I never thought possible: a drag show entirely devoid of wit.