Let's Talk About Kirstie Alley's Most Underrated Role

"I'd like to take you back 17 years when a peanut farmer was in the White House, a group-a boys callin' themselves Queen topped the record charts and Gladys Leeman was Gladys Wood and she was Mount Rose American Teen Princess!"

I wasn't even old enough to tie my own shoes the first time I competed in a beauty pageant. Now, it's crucial in a post-"Toddlers and Tiaras" world to emphasize that the pageant circuit I grew up in was far less "spray tans and Go-Go juice," and a lot more like the film "Drop Dead Gorgeous." Directed by Michael Park Jann from a brilliant script by Lona Williams, the mockumentary "Drop Dead Gorgeous" was a financial and critical flop, but has developed a die-hard cult following over the years. The film follows underdog Amber Atkins (Kirsten Dunst), small-town socialite Becky Leeman (Denise Richards), as well as the contestants and showrunners of the Mount Rose American Teen Princess Pageant.

The film boasts one of the most impressive comedic ensemble casts in history, featuring Ellen Barkin, Allison Janney, Brittany Murphy, Alexandra Holden, Will Sasso, Mindy Sterling, Matt Malloy, Sam McMurray, Michael McShane, Nora Dunn, Mo Gaffney, Thomas Lennon, and the debut performance of Amy Adams. Every character is firing on all cylinders, but one performance, in particular, is played with such perfection, it's difficult to separate the character from the real-life person who played her. In a stroke of casting genius, the late Kirstie Alley plays Gladys Leeman, former Mount Rose American Teen Princess, current pageant director, wife of the most successful businessman in a small town, and a mother willing to kill off competitors to ensure her daughter Becky takes home the crown.

Gladys Leeman is a woman that anyone who grew up in a small Midwestern town knows all too well. She's a busybody who genuinely thinks she's better than everyone else, but has never left her small town knowing full well that her big fish status is the only thing keeping her alive. She still operates under the social hierarchy of high school politics, and lives vicariously through her daughter. As Loretta rightfully says, "You're talkin' about the richest family in a small town. It's front page news when one of 'em takes a s***." As Buzzfeed reported during the oral history of "Drop Dead Gorgeous," Gladys was originally supposed to be played by Sigourney Weaver. As much as I love Weaver, this was the role Kirstie Alley was born to play ... for better or worse.

"The Sigourney Weaver version of Gladys would have been a little more composed," director Michael Patrick Jann said. "The way Kirstie played her was like Gladys would have liked to be [Sigourney Weaver] but couldn't be. She was too bananas to maintain a façade of any sort, which was cool." Given Alley's off-screen (and online) behavior in recent years, the lines between Gladys and Kirstie have blurred quite a bit, which has strangely added a meta-read to the performance.

Lona Williams told Buzzfeed that Alley had not only refused to work with the dialect coach to perfect the Minnesotan accent, but she also had her wardrobe sent to the Scientology Celebrity Centre in Hollywood to try them on there instead of at a fitting with the costume designer. Co-star Mike Malloy remembered Alley arriving on set and immediately declaring "she's just quit smoking, she's on a diet, and she's got her period, and she's not f****** kidding."

Gladys Leeman had arrived.

At this point in her career, Kirstie Alley had made a name for herself as a relatable comedy lead, with roles in "Cheers," "Look Who's Talking," "For Richer or Poorer," and even the Olsen Twins vehicle, "It Takes Two." There were, of course, a handful of exceptions, but by and large, Kirstie Alley was the adult version of a "girl-next-door" type, and America loved her for it. Gladys Leeman was a departure for her because while the role is undeniably funny, the humor is downright bleak.

Gladys Leeman is a homophobic, transphobic, classist, ableist, racist, tradwife, sociopath, and the effortless nature in which Kirstie Alley played her is only terrifying in hindsight. Women aren't often afforded the opportunity to play quality, hilarious antagonists in comedies outside of one-note jokes, and Alley played one of the absolute best. Whether it's her speech about "big city, no bra wearin', hairy-legged, women's libbers" or the agonizing cry of "the swan ate my baby!" after her daughter literally blows up on a parade float, Alley's comedic timing is undeniable.

When dealing with any complicated celebrity's work, there are always those who will cry to "separate the art from the artist" as a means to justify supporting a problematic figure. In arguably Kirstie Alley's greatest performance, that separation is next to impossible considering how similar fact is to fiction. And yet, despite knowing this all to be true, I still can't help but be absolutely captivated by Alley's fantastic delivery. "Drop Dead Gorgeous" is a messy masterpiece, and without the perfect villainy of Kirstie Alley's Gladys Leeman, there's no way the film would have worked as well.

"You know that sometimes it's hard to understand God's great plan ... but the show must go on."