For generations, the Price family has made very sensible, conservative shoes for men. But to save the business from imminent bankruptcy, young Charlie Price turns to an unlikely new creative consultant: a fabulous drag performer whose innovative style and wild designs are a breath of fresh air in the stuffy old factory.
Making its debut back in 2006, this award-winning Broadway production has come a long way in helping society recognize that a lot of our ill-thinking ideology gets in the way of community progress. While seemingly taking a risk even in 2006, director Julian Jarrod did the world a favor by bringing this production, based on a true story, to life. The relationship between Drag Queen Lola (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and 5th-generation shoemaker Charlie Price (Joel Edgerton) slowly forms and then change one company’s and one man’s entire perception about their ability to transform their self-worth and their livelihood by trusting each other complicity.
When the film opens, Charlie and Lola have an unlikely meeting in a dark alley. As Charlie walks by, he decides to jump in and save a man being beaten up by the local thugs strictly because of his status as a Drag Queen. While he sustains physical harm, Lola is more heartbroken by the fact that the heel has been broken on his favorite pair of sexy red boots, and he doesn’t know how he will be able to replace him. While Charlie wants to be one and done with the relationship, he is soon drawn back when he offers to fix Lola’s boots. The irony is that Charlie has made a profound statement about not wanting to stay in the family shoe business. He and his wife Nicola (Jemina Rooper) are planning to move from Northampton, England, to another place where Charlie can fulfill his marketing dreams. At the same time, Nicola can begin a new career. No sooner than Charlie and Nicola arrive at the new place and begin to celebrate, Charlie receives news that his father, who ran the shoe company, has passed away. It is expected that Charlie will take over the production of shoes. While Charlie and his wife are deeply disturbed by this expectation, Charlie slowly comes around and takes over, not realizing the company is on the brink of bankruptcy because the shoe style is no longer in demand. After lots of introspection, Charlie has to lay off several employees and devise a plan that will allow him to bring back all the employees sometime soon. Slowly, Charlie and Lola begin to collaborate, and it is decided that the shoe factory will expand to build a new line of colorful, sexy boots so that Drag Queens like Lola will have a place they can depend on for strong and durable footwear. To get the plan up and rolling, Charlie asks one of the former workers, Lauren (Sarah-Jane Potts), if she will come back and help to get the ball rolling.
Once Charlie gets the ball rolling again with a new product, he and Lauren slowly begin to develop a plan to roll out an impressive line of “Kinky Boots.” With a few hiccups and a whole lot of new-era conversions, Charlie and Lola, who was his designing partner, are not only able to give new life to the family business, but they are also able to come to terms with their feelings of unfulfillment that were brought on by each of their fathers’ strict and calculated upbringings. The two, who had both run away from who they indeed were on the inside, find new modes of acceptance within their own space and in their own time. “Kinky Boots,” while being on full display as the gateway to the future, was more than a step in the right direction…they were also influential in showing us the actual crime is not being diverse and forward-thinking!
Now available on Blu-ray
