The Rocky Horror Picture Show Jim Sharman

Origins

The Rocky Horror Picture Show helped shape conditions of cult film's transition from art-house to grindhouse style.[66] The film developed a cult following in 1976 at the Waverly Theatre in New York, which developed into a standardized ritual. According to J. Hoberman, author of Midnight Movies, it was after five months into the film's midnight run when lines began to be shouted by the audience. Louis Farese Jr., a normally quiet teacher, upon seeing the character Janet place a newspaper over her head to protect herself from rain, yelled, "Buy an umbrella, you cheap bitch." Originally, Louis and other Rocky Horror pioneers, including Amy Lazarus, Theresa Krakauskas, and Bill O'Brian, did this to entertain each other, each week trying to come up with something new to make each other laugh. This quickly caught on with other theatre-goers and thus began this self-proclaimed "counter point dialogue", which became standard practice and was repeated nearly verbatim at each screening.[11] Performance groups became a staple at Rocky Horror screenings due in part to the prominent New York City fan cast.[41] The New York City cast was originally run by former schoolteacher and stand-up comic Sal Piro and his friend Dori Hartley, the latter of whom portrayed Dr. Frank N. Furter and was one of several performers, including Will Kohler as Brad Majors, Nora Poses as Janet, and Lilias Piro as Magenta, in a flexible rotating cast.[67] The performances of the audience were scripted and actively discouraged improvising, being conformist in a similar way to the repressed characters.[68]

On Halloween in 1976, people attended in costume and talked back to the screen, and by mid-1978, Rocky Horror was playing in over 50 locations on Fridays and Saturdays at midnight. Newsletters were published by local performance groups, and fans gathered for Rocky Horror conventions.[42] By the end of 1979, there were twice-weekly showings at over 230 theatres.[42] The National Fan Club was established in 1977 and later merged with the International Fan Club. The fan publication The Transylvanian printed a number of issues, and a semi-regular poster magazine was published as well as an official magazine.[66]

Performance groups in the Los Angeles area originated at the Fox Theatre in 1977, where Michael Wolfson won a look-alike contest as Frank N. Furter, and won another at the Tiffany Theater on Sunset Boulevard. Wolfson's group eventually performed in all of the L.A. area theatres screening Rocky Horror, including the Balboa Theater in Balboa, The Cove at Hermosa Beach, and The Sands in Glendale. He was invited to perform at the Sombrero Playhouse in Phoenix, Arizona. At the Tiffany Theatre, the audience performance cast had the theatre's full cooperation; the local performers entered early and without charge. The fan playing Frank for this theatre was a transgender performer, D. Garret Gafford, who was out of work in 1978 and trying to raise the funds for a gender reassignment while spending the weekends performing at the Tiffany.[41][69] Presently, the live action rendition of The Rocky Horror Picture Show is available for attendance in various locations in Los Angeles, typically Saturday nights at midnight.

By 1978, Rocky Horror had moved from an earlier San Francisco location to the Strand Theatre located near the Tenderloin on Market Street.[70] The performance group there, Double Feature/Celluloid Jam, was the first to act out and perform almost the entire film, unlike the New York cast at that time. The Strand cast was put together from former members of an early Berkeley group, disbanded due to less than enthusiastic management. Frank N. Furter was portrayed by Marni Scofidio, who, in 1979, attracted many of the older performers from Berkeley. Other members included Mishell Erickson as Columbia, her twin sister Denise Erickson as Magenta, Kathy Dolan as Janet, and Linda "Lou" Woods as Riff Raff. The Strand group performed at two large science fiction conventions in Los Angeles and San Francisco, were offered a spot at The Mabuhay, a local punk club, and performed for children's television of Argentina.[41]

Legacy

Annual Rocky Horror conventions are held in varying locations, lasting days. Tucson, Arizona has been host a number of times, including 1999 with "El Fishnet Fiesta", and "Queens of the Desert" held in 2006.[71] Vera Dika wrote that, to the fans, Rocky Horror is ritualistic and comparable to a religious event, with a compulsive, repeated cycle of going home and coming back to see the film each weekend.[11] The audience call-backs are similar to responses in church during a mass.[11] Many theatre troupes exist across the United States that produce shadow-cast performances where the actors play each part in the film in full costume, with props, as the movie plays on the big screen in a movie theatre.[72][73] O'Brien's Orchestra, formerly known as the Queerios (based in Austin, Texas), is the longest running shadow-cast in Texas.[74]

The film has a global following and remains popular.[75] Subcultures such as Rocky Horror have also found a place on the Internet.[76] Audience participation scripts for many cities are available for download from the internet.[29] The internet has a number of Rocky Horror fan-run websites with various quizzes and information, specializing in different content, allowing fans to participate at a unique level.[34]

LGBT influence

Members of the LGBT community composed a large part of the Rocky Horror cult following: they identified with the embrace of sexual liberation and androgyny, and attended show after show, slowly forming a community. Judith A. Peraino compares Brad and Janet's initiation into Frank N. Furter's world to the self-discovery of 'queer identity', and to the traditional initiation of 'virgins' in the shadow screenings.[77] June Thomas describes the midnight screenings in Newark, Delaware as a 'very queer scene,' which increased visibility for the LGBT community: "The folks standing in line outside the State in fishnets and makeup every Saturday night undoubtedly widened the sphere of possibilities for gender expression on Main Street."[78][79]

The Rocky Horror Picture Show remains a cultural phenomenon in both the U.S. and U.K.[80][81] Cult film participants are often people on the fringe of society who find connection and community at the screenings,[82] although the film attracts fans of differing backgrounds all over the world.[83]

"Bisexuality, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and Me", by Elizabeth Reba Weise, is part of the publication, Bi Any Other Name: Bisexual People Speak Out (1991), an anthology edited by Loraine Hutchins and Lani Kaʻahumanu[84][85] about the history of the modern bisexual rights movement that is one of the first publications of bisexual literature.[86]

Cultural influence

The Rocky Horror Picture Show has been featured in a number of other feature films and television series over the years. Episodes of The Simpsons, The Venture Bros., Tuca & Bertie, The Boondocks, Glee, The Drew Carey Show, That '70s Show, Deutschland 86, and American Dad! spotlight Rocky Horror, as do films such as Vice Squad (1982), Halloween II (2009), and The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012).[39] The 1980 film Fame featured the audience reciting their callback lines to the screen and dancing the Time Warp,[87] the dance from the stage show and film, which has become a novelty dance at parties.[88] Director Rob Zombie cited Rocky Horror as a major influence on his film House of 1000 Corpses (2003),[89] while the film's fan culture of cosplaying and audience participation during screenings laid the groundwork for the similarly influential cult following surrounding Tommy Wiseau's The Room (2003).[90][91] Rocky Horror also inspired John McPhail's zombie musical Anna and the Apocalypse (2018).[92]