Stop! That! Train!: Is this the most subversive film of 2026?

How silly is Stop! That Train!, the spoof disaster movie from the makers of RuPaul’s Drag Race? Well, the plot pivots on a freak weather phenomenon called a “stormaganza”, and RuPaul herself plays Judy Gagwell, the President of the United States, who ran on the campaign slogan “she fun!” Whenever a character tells someone to “tell it to me straight”, you can bet your popcorn that their next line will be “now, tell it to me gay”. Oh, and The Simple Life‘s Nicole Richie has an extended cameo as a woman who’s travelling by train with a coffin containing her dead mum’s body. You’ll laugh so hard you weep into your pinot.

“Every beat is something familiar from past comedy classics,” says Ginger Minj, who stars in Stop! That! Train opposite fellow Drag Race alum Jujubee. They play Tess and DeeDee, a pair of train stewardesses who swap their jobs at Stank Rail (yes, really) for the altogether classier Glamazonian Express. It’s a great upgrade until the new train pelts full steam ahead into the stormaganza and loses control of its brakes. “But at the same time,” Ginger adds, “there’s this undercurrent of queer joy and madness to our film that makes everything feel fresh and new.” Another Drag Race favourite, Brooke Lynn Hytes, who plays a bitchy train stewardess called Amber, describes Stop! That! Train! as “a very queer fever dream”.

That’s accurate, but we could also compare the film to Pepto-Bismol: a hot pink cure-all for whatever’s bothering you right now. It certainly feels that way for its 90-minute runtime, which hurtles by in a blur of sight gags, song-and-dance numbers and celebrity cameos from the likes of Sarah Michelle Gellar and Lisa Rinna. If a joke doesn’t land, another comes along 30 seconds later to make you forget it. Director Adam Shankman shot the whole thing in 19 days and says he relished the breakneck pace, especially on days when RuPaul was on set. Having previously directed her in the 2020 comedy-drama series AJ and the Queen, Shankman knew full well that Mother Ru doesn’t like to waste time.

“Actually, the challenge of that [tight schedule] was one of the things that got me really excited about this project,” says Shankman, whose previous directing credits include 2001’s Jennifer Lopez rom-com The Wedding Planner and 2007’s blockbuster remake of John Waters‘ Hairspray. “I also enjoyed the challenge of shooting in a very confined space,” Shankman adds, alluding to the fact that the chaos unfolds almost entirely aboard the cramped but campy carriages of the Glamazonian Express. “That means there’s not a lot of camera movement. So when [Nicole Richie says] ’can you help me with my mother?‘, it’s like, ’boom‘! The camera goes straight to her casket.”

“This film is important because we as drag artists are getting to act and share our art. We’re not the butt of the jokes – we’re the people telling them” – Jujubee

From the start, Shankman saw Stop! That Train! as a modern-day update of iconic Hollywood spoofs like 1980’s Airplane! and 1991’s Hot Shots! For this reason, he gave every cast member, many of them Drag Race alumni, the same basic note: “This kind of disaster satire simply doesn’t work if you’re not playing everything absolutely dead serious.” Because Ginger Minj and Jujubee portray the film’s central duo, whose friendship is tested as they desperately try to halt the runaway train, it was especially important for their performances to feel rooted in real emotion. “We play Tess and DeeDee so grounded and human, while everybody else is almost doing a caricature of their character, and I think that’s what makes it so funny,” says Jujubee. Ginger Minj, who’s on the same Zoom call as her co-star, adds: “Everybody else was playing the movie like Airplane! or The Naked Gun. We were playing it like Thelma & Louise.”​

Although the film is populated by beloved Drag Race stars – fan favourite Latrice Royale shines in multiple roles – the screenplay by Christina Friel and Connor Wright never mentions that anyone on screen is a drag queen. “Jujubee and I made a conscious decision with Adam that we were never going to discuss our characters’ gender, even off camera,” Ginger says. “We didn’t want to know, like, ‘are they in drag or are they cis women?’ They’re just Tess and DeeDee.” For Shankman, this creative decision was vital to the film’s success as a disaster spoof with potentially broad appeal. “If the joke was that they’re in drag, then it would be the entire joke of the film, and everything would suddenly become very ‘twee camp’,” he says.

In a way, this approach has echoes of both Hairspray movies, in which it’s never mentioned that Baltimore housewife Edna Turnblad is played by a man in drag (Divine in John Waters’ 1988 original; John Travolta in the Shankman-directed remake). In Stop! That! Train!, it helps the film function as a sort of big gay Trojan horse. When Shankman signed up to direct, the first thing he said was “This film’s existence is political. No one [in the story] needs to get on a soapbox and yell about queer rights”. For the director, the overall goal was for movie-goers from across the gender and sexuality spectrum to “laugh at the stupidest shit imaginable for 90 minutes”. Only later, Shankman hoped, would they clock they’d just been entertained by a company of “very funny and talented” drag performers.

Stop! That! Train! has already struck a blow for LGBTQ+ visibility by opening in US cinemas in June, then in British and Irish cinemas last weekend – it feels significant that the film hasn’t been funnelled straight to streaming. “I’m from Florida, one of the states where drag has really been under scrutiny,” Ginger says, lamenting the spate of proposed “drag bans” seeking to limit where drag shows can take place and who can attend them. “So it was incredible to see our film open in my hometown of Leesburg, which is super-Republican, then see so many people come out to see it.” Jujubee nods in agreement, then adds proudly: “You know, this film is important because we as drag artists are getting to act and share our art,” she says. “We’re not the butt of the jokes – we’re the people telling them.”

Stop! That Train! is in UK & Irish cinemas now