Topp Twins: Untouchable Girls

Let's see if we've got all the MIMs ("minority odentification markers") collected that we'll need to talk about Jools and Linda Topp: they're lesbian twin New Zealander country and western singer-comedians. Oh, and: they yodel.

"On paper they should not work," an interviewee for Untouchable Girls, Leanne Pooley's documentary about The Topp twins, says. "But they totally deliver to the audience."

That, they do--and what audiences: large crowds of all ages and persuasions. The Topp twins have a history as protest performers--they never met a cause they didn't like, from GLBT equality, to anti-apartheid rallies, to the anti-nuke movement--but they play to blue collar conservatives just as successfully as to activists.

On stage, Jools and Linda Topp are as likely to don male drag, or a variety of other costumes, as they are to sport their guitars. Their songs are bouncy and funny, and they carry a political sting--but the key thing is that they are entertaining, mixing sketch humor and comic characters together with their singing. (They even had a TV program, which ran from 1996-2000.)

The Topps have a farming background (they are New Zealanders, after all), so when they're not touring, they're at their horse ranch. All in all, they lead well-rounded lives; their parents proclaim their pride in the twins (though they also discuss what a shock it was to discover they had lesbian daughters), the horses love them (to the point of gathering around Jools during a bout with breast cancer to impart their healing energy), and at least one emcee regards them as "cultural icons [and] a national treasure," so all things considered, they've done all right.