Rocky Horror x 3

Last week, Fox TV aired a remake of the classic cult film The Rocky Horror Picture Show. [I'm assuming if you're bothering to read this, you don't need a recap of the original movie.] In antic-------ipation of its broadcast, lots of folks took to social media to blast this show before having seen it. I was tempted to do so as well, but I waited and watched it instead, more or less assuming I'd be hate-watching. Well, it wasn't bad enough to hate, but it wasn't good enough to take to one's heart.

There were many mistakes and missteps along the way, and the biggest one was to scrub the material PG-rated clean--technically Fox rated the show TV-14 but that was wishful thinking on their part as there was very little here to raise the ire of 21st century moralists. No f-bombs, no gory cannibalism, no slips of nipples, and no skimpy gold Speedo on Rocky (though his baggy gold shorts did highlight his ass rather nicely from time to time). Worst of all, no Frank running his finger slowly down Rocky's stomach.

Giving the transsexual Laverne Cox the lead as Frank N. Furter was a mistake as well--Frank was not a transsexual, he was a transvestite, something very different. As a performer, she tried very hard and she can certainly hold an audience's attention, but since she presents as a woman and we only know she's gender-non-conformist by knowing Cox's life story, most of the subversive danger of Frank's pansexuality was dissipated. She also tried too hard to ape Tim Curry's original performance, and oddly, when she most succeeded is when she seemed most artificial.

The other performers were fair to middling--no one was a disaster but the only truly bright spots were Reeve Carney as Riff Raff and Ryan McCartan as Brad. The whole thing felt a little like a really good amateur production--they were all trying to achieve something they all seemed to know they never quite would. The production too slavishly reproduced the movie to its detriment, though I did enjoy the opening song; instead of the lips, they went back to the original stage production and it was sung by a theater usherette.

Speaking of which, after watching this, we watched a recording of a live performance of the Rocky Horror Show, the stage production, done last year in London. I'd never seen the stage show before, and it was fun even though it was performed in a fairly small space. The lead, David Bedella (pictured above with Ben Forster as Brad), did a great job of evoking Tim Curry without impersonating him, and most of the R-rated hijinks were present; especially rewarding was the return of Rocky's short shorts. The next night, we watched the original movie, still a glorious camp fest after all these years. And now I've been walking around for days singing "Michael Rennie was ill the day the earth stood still..." and "Let's do the time warp again!" So thanks for the Fox production for putting those songs back in my head.