A gay couple's son is engaged to a conservative senator's daughter.

2.5/4 (Okay).

It's occasionally funny, and handled surprisingly well for the mid 90's. Except for Hank Azaria. What the heck is wrong with Hank Azaria. ( )

Armand Goldman owns a popular drag nightclub in South Miami Beach. His long-time lover Albert stars there as Starina. "Their" son Val (actually Armand's by his one heterosexual fling, twenty years before) comes home to announce his engagement to Barbara Keely, daughter of Kevin Keely, US Senator, and vice president of the Committee for Moral Order. The Senator and family descend upon South Beach to meet Val and his father and "mother..." and what ensues is comic chaos.

In Mike Nichols's hilarious remake of the 1978 French comedy LA CAGE AUX FOLLES, Robin Williams stars as Armand Goldman, a gay cabaret owner who lives in Miami's South Beach with his partner, Albert (Nathan Lane), the club's star performer. Armand and Albert must try in vain to pass as a typical couple when the prospective in-laws of Armand's son, Val (Dan Futterman), come for dinner. While accepting their alternative lifestyle personally, Val demands that they tone it down for his girlfriend's (Calista Flockhart) parents--who happen to be a political couple running on a family values platform. Lane's hilarious attempts to "play it straight" and Hank Azaria's brilliantly flamboyant houseboy, Agador, are the highlights of the film, which also features a beautifully understated Williams as the more "normal" of the pair. Gene Hackman and Dianne Wiest are delightfully square as the future in-laws.

The great improvisational comedy team of Mike Nichols and Elaine May reunited to (respectively) direct and write this update of the French comedy La Cage Aux Folles. Robin Williams stars as a gay Miami nightclub owner who is forced to play it straight and ask his drag-queen partner (Nathan Lane) to hide out when Williams's son invites his prospective--and highly conservative--in-laws and fiancée to a meet-and-greet dinner party. Gene Hackman and Dianne Wiest play the straight-laced senator and his wife, and Calista Flockhart (from television's Ally McBeal) plays their daughter in a culture-clash with outrageous consequences. May's witty screenplay incorporates some pointed observations about the political landscape of the 1990s and takes a sensitive approach to the comedy's underlying drama. Topping off the action is Hank Azaria in a scene-stealing role as Williams's and Lane's flamboyant housekeeper, "Agador Spartacus." --Jeff Shannon