A ROCKY START

The actor Richard O Brien conceived of what was to become the musical The Rocky Horror Show in 1965. It was largely the fruit of his having grown up watching old horror films on television in a time-warp (provincial New Zealand). In 1972 he had been lined up to play King Herod in the musical Jesus Christ Superstar. However, the producer Robert Stigwood decided that he was wrong for the role. The Kiwi's response to this setback was to turn his idea into a script.

Early the following year the director Jim Sharman mounted a production of Sam Shephard's The Unseen Hand at The Royal Court. He cast O Sullivan as Willie the Space Freak. The actor showed the director a copy of what he had written. It had the working title They Came From Denton High. Mr Sharman was taken by the material, which was retitled The Rocky Horror Show. He told the actor to write two more songs and add another ten pages of dialogue and then persuaded the theatre's management to give the musical a three-week run in its 60-seat The Theatre Upstairs venue.

Tim Curry was cast as Frank-N-Furter. He decided on the character's accent after he had sat on a bus and overheard two Knightsbridge ladies talking about a nice hyce . His costume grew out of a corset that the actor had worn in a production of Jean Genet's play The Maids (1947). O Sullivan played Riff Raff.

In summer 1973 the show opened in the The Theatre Upstairs. The actress Coral Browne had been starring in a production of Edward Bond's The Sea in The Theatre Upstairs. Her husband Vincent Price attended the opening night. Just before the curtain went up, O Brien was looking out into the audience when there was a flash of lightning. The American horror actor was sitting below a skylight and so was spotlighted momentarily. O Brien took this elucidation to be a good omen. The Show was a success and soon developed a following. The production transferred first to the Classic Cinema at No. 148 The King s Road and then to The Essoldo picture house at No. 279 (The Kings Road Theatre).

The movie version was shot at Bray Studios, where the Hammer horror films had been made. Upon its release, failed to make much of an impact at the box-office. However, a year later in the United States a cinema started to run late night screenings of it, people started dressing up as the characters when they went to watch it, and thus the cult was born.

Location: The Royal Court Theatre, Sloane Square, SW1W 8AS (purple, red)

Website: www.rockyhorror.co.uk

David Backhouse 2024