By Jonah Wurtzel,
Staff Writer.
In 1975, musical comedy-horror film The Rocky Horror Picture Show released in theaters across America and was met with crickets. Audiences had seemingly no interest in the bizarre events that befall newlywed couple Brad Majors and Janet Weiss when their car breaks down and they tumble into the hands of mad scientist Dr. Frank N. Furter. So, shortly after its release, Rocky was pulled from theaters.
However, a year after the film’s initial commercial failure, New York City’s Waverly Theatre began to hold weekly midnight screenings of the movie. These quickly gained a devoted following and led to widespread appreciation, inspiring other independent arthouse theaters across the nation to host their own routine midnight screenings. By 1979, hundreds of theaters across the country had joined in the practice, and the film became a cultural phenomenon.
Within years, traditions developed around these showings: audiences dress as characters, shout lines and insults at the screen, paint red V’s on the heads of first time attendees—lovingly referred to as “Virgins”—and throw items such as toilet paper and toast at specific points in the film. Most notably, the majority of Rocky screenings feature actors performing the movie in front of the screen.
Thanks to the film and surrounding traditions’ embracing of sexual liberation and androgyny, midnight showings became important gathering places for local queer communities, with the traditional tagline of “don’t dream it, be it” becoming a rallying cry for self-determination. The aforementioned journey of Dr. Furter, a transgender alien, from his home planet in search of acceptance and self-determination has served as a fantastical yet meaningful allegory for the queer experience over the years. Senior Milo Ferguson said, “Rocky Horror has created such an important community that allows for individuality and freedom of expression unlike anywhere [I’ve] ever seen.”
On Oct. 11, Petaluma’s historic Phoenix Theatre hosted a 10 p.m. screening of Rocky with Barely Legal, the Bay Area’s premier Rocky cast, attended by many Panthers. Senior Cory Brown, an avid Rocky lover, calls it the “perfect opportunity to dress up and not feel ashamed,” and praised the judgement-free environment arising from the shared feeling of righteous absurdity. “We’re all freaks getting to be freaks together!” Brown exclaimed.
The Phoenix Theatre hosts The Rocky Horror Picture Show twice a year, so make sure to secure your tickets for the spring show as soon as they go on sale! Bring a mind open to the outrageous, a voice ready to shout and not a single piece of clothing displaying stripes whatsoever (if you know, you know).
