In the 1975 musical comedy horror "The Rocky Horror Picture Show," a recently engaged couple, Janet Weiss (Susan Sarandon) and Brad Majors (Barry Bostwick), seeks help at a nearby castle after their car breaks down on a dark, rainy night. The castle belongs to Dr. Frank-N-Furter, a mad scientist and flamboyant "transvestite" (his words) who's in the middle of throwing a lively celebration called the Annual Transylvanian Convention. Dr. Frank-N-Furter invites the couple to spend the night and shows them his "favorite obsession," his creation of Rocky Horror (Peter Hinwood), an artificially made muscle-bound man with blond hair and gold undies. Trapped in the castle, the naïve couple's relationship is tested by Dr. Frank-N-Furter's antics. The movie is a parodic homage to the sci-fi and campy horror films that came before it.
In his breakout movie role, Tim Curry plays Dr. Frank-N-Furter. Almost a half-century later, "The Rocky Horror Picture Show" remains one of Curry's most memorable performances and a midnight movie staple that still plays in some local theaters. But the one person who won't be in the crowd singing and dancing along to the cult classic is Curry — and not because he once got thrown out of an after dark showing of the movie. "I can't really relate to the film very well," he told Interview Magazine in 2015. "I still feel sick when I see it."
Tim Curry Is Iffy On The Glam Makeup
"The Rocky Horror Picture Show" is based on the stage musical penned by Richard O'Brien, who also co-wrote the screenplay. Tim Curry first portrayed Dr. Frank-N-Furter during 1973 to 74 productions of the play in London and Los Angeles before reprising the role in the feature film adaptation. For the movie, the producers hired Pierre Laroche, the makeup artist who worked for David Bowie and Mick Jagger and helped pioneer the androgynous glam rock look. "He kind of adapted the makeup that was already in my case and did a very kind of high fashion version of it," Tim Curry told Interview Magazine. Even today, he's not sold on the glam version of Dr. Frank-N-Furter.
The '70s is way before my time, so I didn't see the first stage productions of the play, but I found some black-and-white photos online. It's hard for me to distinguish any real differences between the two depictions of Dr. Frank-N-Furter. Perhaps, I need to step my cosmetology game up. Curry did, however, mange to find a silver lining. Actor Bruce Campbell worked with him on the 1995 sci-fi adventure action movie "Congo." In a 2022 tweet, he shared what Curry told him what he liked about "The Rocky Horror Picture Show." He said:
"[Curry] said one of the coolest things was that [The Rocky Horror Picture Show] saved a number of small indie theaters from going under, because they knew that two nights a week Rocky was going to do big business."
It's remarkable the movie is still helping small theaters stay afloat after all these years.
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