"Lipstick Massacre" is an original murder-mystery comedy written by Michael Steck, best known to Rochester audiences as drag queen Pandora Boxx. It's a frothy pastiche of several genres, including bawdy drag comedy, over-the-top soap opera, and the high camp found in the films of directors like John Waters and Charles Busch. Those inspirations lend themselves to humor, and Steck certainly finds it; parts of the play are riotously funny, and wickedly smart (a seething tap dancer hoofing it to the theme from "Sanford & Son" has to involve some form of genius). Unfortunately, parts of the show fall flat, and when the whole endeavor runs nearly three hours, those bum notes become harder to conceal than an aggressive 5 o' clock shadow.

"Massacre" is set in the small town of Flushing Hallow, and centers around Daphne Von Haussenpfeffer (played by Steck in his Pandora Boxx persona), a spoiled, ruthlessly ambitious local commercial star eager to cement her place at the top of the local talent heap. When one of her main rivals is found murdered by lipstick (don't try to figure out the mechanics; even the play repeatedly winks at the absurdity of it), Daphne becomes one of the prime suspects - but hardly the only one. By the end of Act I, it's clear that most of the residents of Flushing Hallow have a motive for killing at least one of the rapidly growing number of victims, and the audience itself has to assist Detective C. Linguist (Stephen Cena, employing a different accent in every scene in a shoutout to notable literary crime solvers) and Nancy Drew aficionado Cooki McDoogle (Maggie Griffin-Smith, seemingly possessed by the spirit of Amanda Bynes) in fingering the culprit (the play has several endings, depending on audience interaction).

Steck is clearly a pop-culture junkie, and his characters and subplots pay homage to various staples of stage and screen, especially soap opera - it's no coincidence that the theme songs to both "Dynasty" and "Dallas" play at different points in the show. There's a ball-busting matriarch who's been married so many times she's lost track of her surnames; the black-sheep adopted son scheming for revenge; a nun with a secret; at least two sets of surprise twins; an even greater number of mistaken identifies; a pesky recurring bout of narcolepsy; and of course, a sanitarium. The set-ups themselves are comical, as is the setting in the vaguely tragic world of local commercial stardom, but Steck's strong comedic impulses often take things to the next level. If you like your humor dishy, sassy, and dirty, this is the show for you. It takes a bold playwright to attempt a delayed punchline set over the length of the play, and Steck succeeds with several of them.

However, a sharp wit can be a double-edged sword. If you prove, as Steck does, that you can craft some sparkling comic gems, audiences are also more likely to pick up on the less polished lines as well. And in "Lipstick Massacre" Steck ultimately ends up competing with himself. Were David Hasselhoff references ever really funny? They're certainly not now. When you set the bar high, even with lowbrow humor, dated or clunky lines stick out.

A strong cast can smooth out even the roughest patches, and for the most part "Lipstick Massacre" has a fantastic group of actors bringing it to life. There are some noticeable standouts: Ed Popil is the local drag diva Kasha Davis, and as Kasha he portrays Lavinia Constance Quinn Latimore Von Haussenpfeffer Godfrey Davenport, the aforementioned big mama. Popil got riotous applause for simply walking onstage opening night (the packed house was, shall we say, made up of connoisseurs of the Rochester drag scene). But he earned every bit of it as the show went on, not once slipping out of character or faltering on his lines, commanding the stage with a presence - and outfits - that would make his idol, Tina Turner, proud. Dan McCarthy, also in drag as Lavinia's mother, seemed to be synthesizing Patsy from "Absolutely Fabulous" with Estelle Parsons' Bev from "Roseanne"; he was absolutely hysterical, milking laughs out of even the most obvious jokes (the owl gag, twice).

For pure gusto, I have to give a nod to Jamal Abdunnasir in the dual (technically quadruple) roles of rockhead lothario Dank Dangler and scumbag cowpoke Tex Texan. His Dangler is impressive, but Abdunnasir's Tex is a comic bonanza, strutting about the stage like a rooster, tail and chest puffed out, tongue a-waggin', howling, panting, and crowing. There was zero vanity in the performance, and I admired his commitment.

However, there is a big problem with the show: it is way too long. To steal a line from Polonius, brevity is the soul of wit, and there's nothing brief about a nearly three-hour play. Three hours is not a comedy; three hours is a "Lord of the Rings" movie. Toward the end of the show one of the characters breaks the fourth wall to mention that there are only a few scenes left, and the gentlemen in front of me both turned to each other and grumbled, "Only a few?"

The running time is understandable; this is Steck's baby, and he has obviously worked hard on it and all of the jokes, characters, and scenes within. But all writers have to play Sophie's choice with their words at some point, and another hard edit could improve the play greatly. There are several scenes and even characters that are almost wholly extraneous - the stereotypically shysty fortune teller Tangina could be removed completely with very little disruption to the plot, and Godfrey and his multiple subplots could be polished significantly (although he's crucial to the proceedings, especially for the pointed barbs he occasionally gets in on his family).

"Lipstick Massacre"

Through November 14

Presented by Method Machine

MuCCC, 142 Atlantic Ave.

$10-$20 | MuCCC.org, methodmachine.org