"Virgin" No More

Sorry for the potentially click-baity title, but this post is just about watching The Rocky Horror Picture Show for the first time ever this weekend.

I know, I know - I should have seen it much, much earlier, and in a theatre. Audrey and I had plans to see it at The Princess shortly before moving to Toronto in the mid-1990s but that never came to be for some reason, and neither of us can recall why.

Even after the advent of home video, there was a long while (ar at least it felt long at the time) where you could only see Rocky Horror on a big-screen, and there were many advocates who believed this was the only way to see it - at a midnight showing full of over-engaged fans in full costume, interacting with the film's outrageously hokey dialogue and throwing toast and rice at the screen. Watching it in the comfort of my own home, bereft of participatory guidance and with no one pointing at us and shouting "Virgin! Virgin!" as first-timers felt a little bit like cheating, honestly.

But I feel like the ship has sailed for a plump, middle-aged suburbanite joining in on what the film's star Tim Curry calls "a rite of passage for teenagers," and besides, there is a global pandemic on. Thus a Friday night immediately before Hallowe'en seemed like a good opportunity for Audrey, Fenya, Bobby and I to watch one of cult cinema's most infamous movies.

Overall, we quite liked it. Audrey's sole descriptor of the piece was "Weird!" but even she had to admit how catchy the show's tunes are. Tim Curry is absolutely astonishing, bold and captivating as the corsetted and androgynous Dr., Frank N. Furter, while Susan Sarandon and Barry Bostwick are compelling and earnest as two midwestern "straights" drawn into a crazed world of mad-science and free love.

The film is largely the brainchild of Richard O'Brien who, in addition to playing skulleted handyman Riff Raff, also wrote the script and the music for the original stage play to keep himself one busy while looking for work as an actor. His love for 1950s sci-fi and B-movies is homaged throughout the lyrics, dialogue and even props of the film. 

But beyond the tribute and nostalgia and farce, there is a deeper message about being open-minded to new experiences and true to one's self, to give"yourself over to absolute pleasure." Beyond mere hedonism, it is no surprise that the mantra "don't dream it, be it" (lifted by O'Brien from a magazine's bodybuilding ad) resonated so powerfully with so many people in what would become an early community for LBGTQ+ people.

Despite a general slackening of uptightedness in many quarters over the 45 years since the film was released, there are still some surprisingly louche moments, such as when Frank separately seduces both the heroine and hero in turn. Beyond the opportunity for great dialogue i.e. Janet: "What have you done to Brad?" Frank: "Nothing. Why, do you think I should?", the mind positively reels at the idea of mainstream audiences watching this in the mid-1970s. June Thomas, in her article "How The Rocky Horror Picture Show Smashed Open America's Closets," asserts that this movie "may have helped more people come out of the closet than any other work of art." A bold statement for a bold movie!

But as interesting as RHPS may be in terms of its role in loosening sexual mores, it can stand on its own merits as well as any cult classic can. From the decidedly lo-fi sets and effects, through the director's willingness to reject a larger budget in favour of hiring more performers from the stage show (as opposed to Mick Jagger, Marianne Faithful and other rock stars of the day), this film leans into its campiness with an earnestness that is strangely charming and charmingly strange.