I liked the sequel … 
In the mid- to late 70s I used to watch it at the Roxy in Toronto – a theatre that ended up showing it and pretty much little else. It’s being turned into a Tim’s. A plaque is being installed next month. The shows there were wild and brilliant – the show was the audience, singing, dancing, interjecting, kitted out in their finest and participating at full energy!
I attended the University of Toronto’s Film Society’s screening of it in the early 80s on campus. I was the only person in the audience participating, and was booed for disturbing them while they studied the movie.
What a contrast in audiences – something that blossomed out of the sewer over on the Danforth, verses stereotypical stultified Torontonians sitting with sticks up their asses.
I had a minor involvement. I did the lead sheets for the finished soundtrack product for publishing copyright purposes, so I was familiar with the music before it was released. That is all, but I found the tunes to be clever and certainly not mainstream pop like most of what crossed my desk in those days. The music had more in common with 3-chord rock than sophisticated jazz, so it was quick & easy to write down.
And I had to do the music without knowledge of any visuals or benefit of a book or script, so I could only guess what was going on. Having seen RHPC at the Tiffany Theater on Sunset helped.
If you’re a fan of the movie, but haven’t seen the stage production it was based on (The Rocky Horror Show), then you owe it to yourself to go see it. A few years back I caught a showing of it at the Paper Wing Theater in Monterey, California, and I had a blast. Also, I evidently knew a few call-outs that I learned in Texas that they hadn’t heard on that part of the coast yet, as I managed to make Frank bust out laughing at one point.
Slut!
You left out
“had never heard of it, caught it on TV the second Thanksgiving I was in the US, found it funny, heard about the whole ‘watch it in a group’ one year later, never bothered do that because I have the strange and unusual idea that midnight is a good time to be asleep.” Even if viewings had been available at a time I’d found acceptable, I think that “going to watch a movie” and “going to be part of a scripted happening which happens to involve a movie” are two different activities.
I don’t think of it so much as “a musical” as “a wacky comedy which happens to include people singing”. A vehicle for fun rather than one for music, if you will.
See, i’ve never seen the play. I think I would be bothered by people yelling stuff out of the audience at the actors on the stage.
I’ve told this story before but I saw RHPS once at the base theater when I was stationed in England 1980 or so. Base theater was being managed that evening by an off duty NCO who had no clue about RHPS. Just another flick to him. Place was packed and everybody loaded for bear. Absolutely nuts. The guy stopped the movie like three times to come out and reprimand us for our outrageous behavior. I think somebody educated him cause he finally gave up. Totally have to see it in public. Two thumbs up!
Hell, when I saw it, even the band playing the music was heckling the cast. 
There were some hilarious moments with the band too (they basically were part of the cast, for all intents and purposes). At the point where Riff Raff announces that Dr. Scott is in the Zen Room, the band cues in with the opening notes to “Turning Japanese” by the Vapors.
Followed by the entire cast stopping to give the band a death glare, at which point, if you were watching the show instead of the band, you’d notice they were all wearing “rice picker” hats. After a few moments of silence. The band quietly took the hats off and went back to playing the music they were supposed to be playing.
Hah, when I was stationed in Kansas they did a Halloween showing of Rocky Horror Picture Show. Sadly, only about a dozen people showed up, and only two of us (me and a friend from the Maintenance Group) knew the audience participation stuff. Folks were confused when I jumped on stage to clean Lips’ teeth, but they figured out pretty quickly that it was part of the show and the two of us kept the rest rolling for the duration.
At one point, I may have almost drunkenly fallen off the stage, but I caught myself and thus avoided what the Air Force calls an “Alcohol Related Incident”
I saw it in college – on Halloween, at midnight. It was very well done by people really into it, and I liked the audience participation stuff, but half-way through the audience participation seemed to die down and I got bored, fell asleep actually.
I voted - Meh.
When I was in high school (late 70s through early 80s), RHPS was the darling of the theater kids crowd. I was sort of part of that crowd (not really in the middle of it, but I had a small part in one of the plays and a couple of my friends were theater geeks) and it was all they talked about. Constantly. I wanted so desperately to see it, but my parents were fairly strict (I doubt they had any objection to the content–it was just that the only place it was playing was in a bad part of a town about 30 miles away and Mom wasn’t going to let me go there at midnight to watch a movie) so I didn’t get to. Instead, I bought everything I could find about it–the soundtrack, the movie book, another book describing the fan phenomenon–and I pored over them, memorizing every line of the songs, all the audience-participation stuff…all so I could converse intelligently about the movie with the rest of the crowd. I fell in love with the movie without ever having seen it.
I didn’t actually get to see it until I was in college, and I still loved it. It was so cool to finally get to see the thing I’d been so obsessed with.
As a side note, I’m rather shy and usually don’t like to stand out in a crowd…but I could almost see myself playing Frank in a live cast. I love his songs, the outfit, the whole bit. I doubt I’d be brave enough to do it, but I think it would be a lot of fun.
Which book?
Don’t dream it…
I’ve seen the play, and acted in the play (just our local cast at a convention but we did the whole thing live), and it’s just as fun as the movie, from both sides of the stage, even with people yelling.
Rocky has dialogue. There are also a couple more songs, one of which you might catch if they run the extended version on TV (Superheroes; can’t find the scene). The other was a song done by Brad (linky).
And I liked the sequel too. Well, the songs at least.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show Book, by Bill Henkin (I was just reading through it the other day, so I had it handy).
Hah, I’ve got Shock Treatment on DVD. I watch it every so often.
You’re not lookin’ at the King of anything…
You’re lookin’ at an Ace!
It’s an absolute travesty that ‘Super Heroes’ was cut from the original version of the film (although I seem to recall it was only cut in North America?). It’s one of my favourite songs from the musical and it ends the main story perfectly, leading into the final reprise of ‘Science Fiction’. Thankfully it’s pretty much back in the film where it should be all over the world thanks to DVD. Brad’s song ‘Once In A While’, on the other hand, is good as a deleted scene/soundtrack extra but I reckon it would slow down the pacing of the film even further if it were included.
They also cut Brad’s verse from ‘Over At The Frankenstein Place’ in the film. I’m not sure what the reasoning behind that was, it’s a good verse.
Risk it!
Oh, please do.
Even if you hate it, it’s an experience.
I was sexually questioning, feeling like an outsider, lonely, geeky…and it helped. The people you meet might be straight (or might not, for that matter) but they won’t be narrow.
I’m not by any stretch of the imagination adventurous or outgoing. I certainly don’t get naked in front of people. I don’t wear skirts that hit above the knee. But I love those early horror films, the Universal monsters, Hammer Studios…and I dig the music (I love Shock Treatment too.)
See it with friends, see it alone…get the cd or download a few tracks and fall in love with the music, the way you might a regular musical.
Not sure how I missed this thread. I love Rocky Horror. Time Warp is still one of my favorite songs. The first time I saw it was Halloween and that year I had dressed as a very convincing transvestite, so it was pretty much perfect.