The film 'The Rocky Horror Picture Show' celebrates its 45th anniversary this year!

Never before had the words 'I'm a sweet transvestite,' delightfully sounding from the cinema screen, been received by the audience with such joy.

Origins

Like all good things, the story of the film 'The Rocky Horror Picture Show' began with a poor guy passionately in love with theater and cinema. Picture this – London, the seventies, unemployed actor Richard O'Brien spends winter evenings writing a script for a stage show. Just to amuse himself. In this script, he gathers elements of genres and styles that he really likes in one way or another: a touch of rock 'n' roll, a pinch of science fiction, and many declarations of love for B-movies.

A little later, the script falls into the hands of director Jim Sharman, with whom Richard had worked before and who was just looking to stage something for a new experimental space on the top floor of the Royal Court Theatre. Richard starts looking for 'muscular performers,' so he hangs around a gym on Paddington Street, where he one day runs into his acquaintance, Tim Curry.

The rest is legend. The stage show achieved enough popularity to quickly secure the 1,000-seat Belasco Theatre on Broadway, and from there, producers managed to negotiate a film adaptation, which Sharman also directed.

Let's Talk About the Film

Perhaps this was the cornerstone of the film – its creators, brought together by a twist of fate, genuinely enjoyed the process. O'Brien later admitted that each of his characters exudes an almost childlike immaturity, and this silliness and playfulness initially didn't make much of an impression on critics and audiences.

But before we talk about the film's cult status, let me first finish with the 'Did you know that' section:

• Brad, one of the main characters, was almost played by Steve Martin?
• Susan Sarandon suffered severe pneumonia right on set?
• Tim Curry originally planned a strong German accent and platinum hair color for the role of Frank-N-Furter?
• The skeleton in the clock, which appears several times on screen, is actually real?
• Filming took place at Oakley Court, a mansion where several Hammer studio films had previously been shot?
• Frank-N-Furter's makeup was designed by Pierre La Roche, who was also responsible for David Bowie's famous stage look as Ziggy Stardust?
• Richard O'Brien was not only the author of the musical but also played Riff Raff, one of the aliens from the planet Transylvania?

How 'Rocky Horror' Gained Cult Status

So, we left off with the film being a failure on all fronts. Audiences didn't appreciate its outrageousness, critics saw nothing behind the kitsch. It seemed that the story of 'The Rocky Horror Picture Show' should have ended there, but life is an unpredictable thing and always makes its own adjustments. The producers decided to try their luck with midnight screenings of the film to somehow recoup their money. This decision proved fateful.

After a few screenings, audiences began returning and shouting lines along with the characters on screen. Then they started coming in costumes, throwing rice during the wedding scene, and spraying each other with water from plastic bottles. Viewings of 'The Show' began to resemble a ritual – and in part, that's what it was, as new viewers were also made to go through an 'initiation rite.' The film turned into a cultural phenomenon and suddenly gained such popularity that it still holds the record as the longest-running theatrical release and was even added to the National Film Registry for preservation in the Library of Congress.

Can You Step into the Same River Twice?

The film, as well as the original musical, remains surrounded by a certain mystery to this day. It has been adapted for television several times, each time with mixed success. The American show 'Glee' devoted an entire episode to the musical but was criticized – primarily for being afraid to seriously discuss the themes raised in the original and even censoring the word 'transsexual.' A similar fate befell the TV film 'The Rocky Horror Picture Show: Let's Do the Time Warp Again' starring 'Orange Is the New Black' star Laverne Cox as Frank-N-Furter. Critics noted that the new attempt to revisit 'The Show' placed too much emphasis on the strangeness and absurdity of the material but ignored its fun and kitsch.

Afterword

Thus comes to an end the unusual story of an unusual musical film. And all that's left for us is to get moving and go sing 'Let's do the time warp again!' along with the cheerful inhabitants of the castle of the mad Dr. Frank-N-Furter.

On October 31, screenings will take place in Moscow and St. Petersburg thanks to the #ARTPOKAZ group – you can learn more here.