Every family has its Christmas traditions.
Ryan Stamey and Anthony Brummett are brothers, and here are a few of theirs: Slip into sparkly dresses and six-inch heels (talk about gay apparel), sashay into venues like Neighborhood Theatre, where they’ll be next month, and perform raunchy carols for rowdy audiences filled with Christmas spirits -— like vodka, rum, tequila and gin.
They’re better known as their drag personas Robyn O’Ladies and Charlotte Douglas, and they created and star in the annual drag Christmas show “Yule Y’all,” now in its 10th year.
The show combines live singing, sketch comedy and lots of jokes only Charlotte residents would understand.
And while the brothers say they never pay attention to reviews — after all, the Nativity got only one star — “Yule, Y’all!” has become a local holiday hit.
They joined WFAE’s Nick de la Canal to talk about the show’s origins and what it means to have created a holiday tradition for so many Charlotteans.
Nick de la Canal: Whose idea was it to put together a Christmas show, and what was the first year like?
Anthony Brummett: I think it was my idea.
Ryan Stamey: I think it was.
Brummett: I had just won the amateur drag show for Stonewall Sports. And right before going on stage, I was like, “My name is Charlotte Douglas. That's what it is.” I wanted to do something local.
And I won — so, hair flip! And after that, I kind of just wanted to keep doing it. And so we were at karaoke at Petra's, and we're like, “Do we want to do a drag Christmas show?” And that's really what started it all.
De la Canal: And Petra's is this small, popular bar in the Plaza Midwood neighborhood. What was the first year like?
Stamey: We didn't know who was going to come, what it was gonna be like, and we were like, “Should we just do $5 at the door for charity?” And it was World AIDS Day, I think, so we gave it to RAIN.
Brummett: And I can still feel the energy in that room, too, because it was packed and standing room only. It got really hot in there because it's so small, but everyone was so close to the stage and so happy to be there.
That's why we just did a donation at the door, because we were really doing it, I think, for fun.
And then seeing how it went off, we're like, “Oh, we could have charged more for this!”
De la Canal: And you are both real-life brothers. I mean, it's already rare to have one drag queen in the family, but to have two. I mean —
Brummett: Three, actually, if you count Jason, our other brother. He does a little video segment on our show every year, too.
De la Canal: Really?
Brummett: Yes.
De la Canal: So growing up, was Christmas a big production in your house? Like, what were the holidays like when you were kids?
Stamey: I mean, there was the typical getup on Christmas, you know, open presents. When you've got four kids in a family, everything's a production.
But also, I played piano growing up, so there was a lot of getting around the piano, singing some Christmas songs for Mom, and always Christmas music going.
Brummett: Singing is definitely a big memory for me for Christmas. Christmas Eve night was our biggest night because we went to go see our grandmothers — our Grandma Smith, who is a huge influence for us growing up and really feels like Christmas to us.
De la Canal: You've both talked a lot about growing up in the church, and your shows borrow from that world — music, spectacle, call and response. Do you think growing up in church actually prepared you, in some ways, to become drag queens?
Stamey: Absolutely.
Brummett: Yes, absolutely.
Stamey: One hundred percent. I mean, look at all the televangelists' wives and women on TV. They're all drag queens! Tammy Faye was a drag queen.
Brummett: Yeah, for any listeners who know who Vestal Goodman was — hello!
Stamey: That's where we learned performance, though. We both sang in the choir. We sang solos at church, did church plays.
Brummett: Absolutely. I do think the majority of my performance career before that was singing in church and learning to sing in the choir and being the gayest one there. So they would always put me in the play. That's kind of how that worked out. And I was putting on my mom's heels at that point, too. So ...
De la Canal: In your shows, you also make a lot of Charlotte jokes. You've gone after Elevation Church, the Truist Tower sign, the Metropolitan parking deck. Even WFAE. Last year, Charlotte said she donated to public radio, while Robyn donated to a public restroom.
Charlotte Douglas: (archival audio from “Yule, Y'all!”) “Because during the layover, I heard the loudest W-F-A-R-T I've ever heard in my life!”
De la Canal: How do you come up with these jokes? Are you writing all year long?
Stamey: Yeah.
Brummett: Truly. Ryan, his brain is always going, though. I feel like he has an endless well of great ideas.
But I think when it comes to being hyperlocal, it's truly our lens as brothers and how we experience Charlotte that really sets our show apart. Because I think it's easy to make jokes about the Metropolitan parking deck, but how you make the joke and where it goes is really what makes it the sharp joke that we try to get to.
De la Canal: I also want to say you two are genuinely wonderful singers. And unlike a lot of drag shows, you're singing live, often in harmony. What is it about performing together as siblings that makes this partnership work?
Stamey: We just get each other, and we just love singing with each other. And there's something about that sibling harmony.
Brummett: Oh, you can't beat it. You can't beat it.
And growing up, even with all four of us — all four of my siblings — we all sang together and harmonized together. And there's certain times you hit that harmony that's just like, you can't beat it.
De la Canal: After 10 years, this show has become a Christmas tradition for so many people in Charlotte. What does that mean to you?
Brummett: It's been a little wild.
Thinking back to that first year and thinking about 10 years this year and how far we've come and how it has just snowballed into a tradition for us and for so many people, I think that we've proven a lot to ourselves, year over year, to see how the show grows and how many people just love it and bring more and more people. And it's grown by word of mouth, really.
I think every year there's still a small piece of us that's like, “Are people going to show up?” And then it's like, they do, and it just grows and grows.
And I think that it's just been a wild ride to see how it's organically grown just because of people's love for the show.
Stamey: Even after 10 years, I don't think I've gotten used to seeing literal hundreds of people enjoying something that you've written.
It's a cool feeling because I've done a lot of theater and read other people's writing, other people's scripts, but getting to perform your own material and see the reaction is just its own thing. It's so cool.
“Yule, Y’all!” celebrates its 10th anniversary with performances Dec. 4 and 5 at Neighborhood Theatre in NoDa. Doors open at 7 p.m., with the show beginning at 8 p.m.
