User reviews

For the people that haven't seen RuPaul's Drag Race this might seem like an odd title. And honestly that goes for the rest of the movie, cause 99.99.99% of this movie is reference humour, either to RPDR or other camp gay culture. By the way an acting challenge is a type of challenge in every RPDR season where the competing drag queens have to act in a campy and comedic short, some of these can be funny and some of these are not funny. This movie falls in-between the two (although relatively better scripted than any of those challenges).

So, in The Bitch Who Stole Christmas we follow Olivia, a girl who's been working every Christmas since a child is ordered by her boss(adoptive mother) Hannah to report about a crown that is given out every year to a winner in the Christmas loving town of Tuckahoe. When she arrives to Tuckahoe she quickly befriends the town's outsiders to enter the competition and get that crown.

Let's start with some of the positives. I think this is such a fun idea to make, a more queer and campy twist to the usual Christmas time movies that we get. The drag queens casted are phenomenal and fun, I love that Jaymes Mansfield gets a fairly major role and some other queens get a more deserving shine on the spotlight. Ru is also deliciously campy despite some of the problems of her presence in the script (I'll get to it later). Also there's some fun celeb cameos.

And now to our negatives which seem to outweigh some of the positives. Let's start with what the viewer sees in the movie, Michelle Visage narrating in a Christmas cabin. I love Michelle Visage, she can be funny and has some really great charisma but it was unclear as to why she was a narrator? Was she a citizen of Tuckahoe? Why does she know about this story? If this was perhaps a part of a Christmas anthology with some connections to the story then it would've been passable but I would've loved to see more of a connection that the narrator has to the story.

And now let's talk about plot... for a relatively simple premise they sure didn't spend a lot of time trying to make the plot make sense, I didn't understand why it was so important for Olivia to write about a crown in Tuckahoe, they could've made that so much more clear. And the boss, Hannah, seems to change motives mid-plot which was so confusing. Everything could've been made much clearer.

Speaking of clearer, let's talk about Tuckahoe, for those of you who don't watch RPDR Tuckahoe is a fictive place that's generally (but not always) used as a setting for these acting challenges (the name is a play on the act of hiding your d**k through duck tape which is called tucking). And what first hits me when I get to revisit this place is why not go all out with it? Why not make every citizen a drag queen? That would've been so much more fun plus more drag queens get casted! It was very unclear why that town was special in the movie (Christmas loving?). For me personally it was a very big missed opportunity in cementing this place and building upon its campy lore. I was kind of disappointed to see there were a myriad of regular non drag queen people living on Tuckahoe... why? Maybe it's expensive to hire RuPaul drag queens just to be in the background but my idea still stands I think, they should've made Tuckahoe a drag queen only place.

Speaking of only drag queens I think that it is such a shame and missed opportunity to cast a regular girl actor as the leading role for this movie, don't get me wrong I think she does an ok job but goddammit I want to see at least a queer person at the helm of this movie, considering this is an RPDR-type of fare there should've been a drag queen casted as the main role instead. There's so many RPDR drag queens who could've carried the movie excellently and made it more fun. It seems like they casted the role of Olivia to appeal to the more casual non-queer demographic of RPDR watchers but I honestly think it was so ill-fitting. I want to see drag queens not regular people.

Which leads me to the next criticism, even if it is very much a RPDR-type of fare the drag queens in this movie are SEVERELY under-utilised, and I mean it. It's such a shame that "The Broads" in the movie (consisting of Ginger Minj, Peppermint, Jan and Brooke Lynn Hytes) are just not used particularly well, despite each of them having such charisma (which somehow appeared despite them being so under-utilised). They still made me laugh but I wish they would've been used more and got developed more as characters. None of them really get their own small narrative or use in the story (see Paddington movie, that does this with each of its main secondary characters that despite having simple plot motivations and everything, feels much more satisfying to watch cause it's all connected). Also Brooke Lynn's Russian accent... I understand what they were going for, but in the oeuvre of RPDR drag queens that particular character is mainly attributed to Katya... maybe it was a riff on Katya? Maybe not? Either way they could've made it stand out more and made it more "Brooke Lynn Hytes"- I mean she's so funny and has such a glowing charisma and personality, just watch her host Canada's Drag Race which makes her a phenomenal queen, so to see her do a Katya impression is a bit of (again) a missed opportunity.

RuPaul... from the poster of the movie and the marketing that I saw (last year tho when it was a Paramount + exclusive) it seems that she was gonna have a much bigger role than what we get to see here. Instead we see a weirdly detached and green-screened villain-type of character that just doesn't feel like she's a part of the movie at all. And RuPaul is FUN! She has shown that she can carry acting chops into the deliciously camp territory which she does here but she just does not have any presence in the movie, it's like they deliberately wrote her role so that she would have as little to do as possible... perhaps to give space to the other drag queens? I WISH! This movie doesn't have a drag queen main character. Instead we get regular girl and RuPaul appearing sometimes on a green screen.

Which leads me to the next question, who is this film even for? The main demographic is obviously RPDR fans but to me it appears they want to have a wider appeal as well which makes the movie not commit to what it truly is, camp. They should've gone all the way honestly. No matter the demographics. Which is confusing to me because of the type of humour it does, it relies way too much on reference and "aware/self aware"-humour which can be too on the nose and confusing for someone who perhaps doesn't watch drag race. Some of the references might fly over peoples heads, but it's so confusing how they made the movie try to be wider-appealing but at the same time be for RPDR fans which doesn't work at all- they should've committed to one line, not both.

All in all, this was an okay watch, it got some laughs out of me and I'll probably watch it again with some friends or something (that watch RPDR). But it's such a missed opportunity in so many ways that I can't with an honest heart give a high rating, but at the same time I wish they could do more films like these. They don't have to be oscar-worthy plots but they can be funny and campy, we LGBTQs need that, especially in such a lonely and trying time as Christmas.

7/10 - RuPaul and many of her queens from all seasons of Drag Race make for a fun Christmas TV movie that will certainly elicit some laughs and offers some nice counterprogramming for those who think Hallmark and Lifetime movies are a little too saccharine.

It is reminiscent of some of my friends. But Andy Ridings is the best part of the whole movie. He was deadpan funny and loved every time he found an excuse to remove his shirt. It's typical hunk in a comedy move. All the queens are great and love the movie. It needs to be on all streaming platforms. The costumes are fantastic, the musical numbers are hilarious. Kudos to the writers and directors. The cast is perfect for such a silly romp. Drag Race kept something going and brought it to the big screen in a great way. RuPaul as always slays the the runway and is evilly delicious. Cracked me up with the whole story.

3 is the best I could score this.

• 1 star for Michelle Visage. <3
• Another star for the countless Drag Queen cameos, some of which are actually fun... (Mayhem Miller, Chad Michaels...)
• And lastly one for the fans who will undoubtedly tune in, wether they enjoy this or not.

It's poorly shot and directed, unoriginal, grossly redundant and overall pretty damn boring. But if you're a Drag race super fan, like myself, seeing Peppermint and co. On the big screen is always better than not. Even if some of them (looking at you, my beloved GotMik)... should probably never pursue a career in acting... so tune in if you got a mound of dishes to do and prefer to multi-task. Otherwise you're not missing anything.

1 star purely because even RuPaul couldn't be bothered to turn up on set for this... "movie". Krysta Rodriguez does her best with what she's given. It's camp and horrible but also so bad it's good?

Lots of drag race puns and good to see Ru letting other racers shine.

A must watch for all drag race superfans.

If you've ever seen a hallmark Christmas movie this film takes the plot from several of those films and mocks it.

The acting and comedy styles of Ginger, Brook-lyn, Peppermint and Jan are fantastic.

Fan of the show but this is just god awful.

Green-screened in Rupaul, unfunny script.

Could they not get ANY good writers to work on it? It was painful to watch. In fact, I couldn't get through it all it got turned off half way through.

Loved this festive and fun holiday movie. Cameos if Drag Race alumni were so good! The jokes were fun, naughty and had me laughing. The music was great too! So fun!

As a diehard drag race fan, i had to check this out. And due to all the drag race cameos (latrice royale, raven, brooke lynn, mayhem, etc), it's a worthwhile watch just for that alone.

But a lot of this film doesn't hold up. In fact the plot is pretty terrible and in a film all about queerness and queer people, the main plotline centres around two straight people falling in love. Hmmm...

if you like campy flicks (think jinkx and dela's christmas special, but worse), you might like this. Is it a must watch? No. But should you stream it anyway to support the queens? I say it's worth it.

It's silly and camp but the sheer laziness of Rupaul to not even turn up to set...wow. I'm sure they could have found some time to be in the seem scene as someone, it's constantly just over the shoulder shots because Ru isn't actually there, it's so distracting.

The writing is sort of drag race acting challenge, however I did actually laugh once or twice so that's an improvement from the acting challenges. I think that they had funny parts in here.

I also think the writers had also seen a fair share of hallmark movies. That was probably my favourite part. They just tore apart all the tropes from hallmarks Christmas movies.

Terrible is a compliment.

This so called movie sucks big time.

Total waste of time and actors.

Everything, literally, is off.

Go watch To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar.

Stupid, campy fun that doesn't take itself seriously at all. Genuinely funny moments and Jaymes Mansfield was a massive highlight!

Wild that RuPaul was entirely green screened in.

Just so bad. I love all the drag queens in this movie but just poorly written and acted. Comes across as very amateurish. Skip this . I wish I had . 2 hours I can never get back.

Overall, it was a pretty great movie. I love all the cameos in the movie. It has great storyline. Everything that happened was fun and funny. If you're looking for a movie during Christmas/if you're a drag race fan you definitely need to watch this Movie! The acting was on point. It has so many funny and iconic scenes.

Green Screening Ru Paul, she looked enormous when presented out of nowhere. The fans of the RPDR girls deserve better movie. I guess they got some singing, some showed some acting chops. It was nice to see new blood getting movie shine. Needless to say, go to their live shows, the ones where act out their versions of screen plays. The one I paid to see got cancelled, sad face.

Even for a campy drag queen Christmas movie, this was rough. Never mind the predictable storyline, the mediocre acting and terrible set design - those are all things I sort of expected - it is hard to watch. I can't really believe I sat through all of it. Towards the end, it got a little better, mostly thanks to Jaymes Mansfield, Jan and Peppermint.

I have to talk about the set design. Maybe it was because it was shot during COVID but it is the worst I've seen in a long time. The sets at my high school production were better. I love drag race and I love all the queens in this film but don't watch it if you don't have anything else to while watching it.

The B!tch Who Stole Christmas (2021) -

This was another parody of the typical made for TV Christmas film, but while 'A Clusterfunke Christmas' (2021) had a certain appeal with its mimickry and direct ripping off of the Hallmark, Etc standard storylines and film making methods, this one went a bit too far for my tastes and even Big Russ (Andy Ridings) with his hot body on display every time he was on screen, wasn't enough to keep me watching this incredibly predictable farce.

I have yet to watch one single episode of 'RuPaul's Drag Race', because I just can't stand how false it all appears to be. As such, I believe that this film was made for fans of that show and therefore not aimed at me, so if you are a fan of Ru then you should probably say "Yasss Queen" and watch this one, but I won't bother trying again.

Unscored as unfinished.

Someone wrote about this "movie": terrible is a compliment.

I wish the voting was all the way down to -10. Amateurish script, trashy predictable jokes, hallmark clichés, amateurish acting which is understandable since there are no professional actors in it the cast. It is a pity. I mean it's a pity to spend any time on this chef d'oevre. Couldn't sit it through.

It seems many people did not get that this movie is making fun of hallmark movies. People call it terrible and say it is like a hallmark movie and yes it supposed to be like that making fun of these movies. I had a lot of fun and laughed a lot. Great cast and a lot of jokes.

Right, well I stumbled upon this 2021 movie "The B.... Who Stole Christmas" here in 2023, and despite it being somewhat off the season, then I still opted to sit down and watch the movie.

I had never heard about this movie prior to sitting down to watch it, but seeing the movie had RuPaul on the cast list, I must admit that I wasn't exactly harboring much of any grand expectations to director Don Scardino. But still, the movie got a fair chance and the benefit of the doubt.

This movie has a lot of drag queens on the cast list, which was interesting enough in itself. The acting performances were so-so, some were good and some left for something to be desired.

The storyline in "The B.... Who Stole Christmas", however, was a pretty straight forward one, bordering on being somewhat generic. If you think a standard generic Christmas movie, but with a drag queen twist, then you have "The B.... Who Stole Christmas". So writers Christina Friel and Connor Wright didn't really churn out something impressive here.

Was it a watchable movie? Sure. But was it a good or memorable movie? Hardly so. Sure, I managed to sit through the entire movie, but I was only mildly entertained. This is definitely not going to be a Christmas classic. Nor is it a movie that I will ever return to watch a second time.

I am sure that fans of the drag queens and that whole scene will definitely enjoy this movie way more than I did as a casual viewer.

My rating of "The B.... Who Stole Christmas" lands on a four out of ten stars.

A lot of fun, and some really well written jokes. Kudos to the writing team. There was a lot of top tier 'Naked Gun' level of running gags. The cast was great fun, too.

The way this riffs on traditional holiday romance movies (particularly Hallmark) is incredibly smart and funny. How well and how often it subverted the usual tropes of those movies made me laugh out loud from start to end.

Acting from the drag queens is better than what you'd usually expect. All the leads are great, over playing their roles perfectly.

I only take a couple of stars off for how terribly RuPaul is inserted into the "action". If you can't be there on set with everyone, just cast another queen in the role.

Holiday camp at its finest! RuPaul looks amazing. Brooklyn Heights is hilarious. Jaymes Manfield shines. Jan gets to BELT a tune. Laganga falls from the sky. I'll take this over a traditional cookie cutter hallmark movie anyday.

"The B**** Who Stole Christmas" is a brain off comedy. It features a lot of characters with personalities, so it will appeal to a certain set of viewers.