Let's do the Time Warp AGAIN... LIVE!

OK, OK! So I heartily admit that through my senior year in high school and years afterward I was one of the screaming minions in the weekly habit of standing in front of a movie screen chanting "Lips, lips, we want lips".

Rocky Horror Picture Show was an eye-opening experience for this young dyke... and I loved it! All around were people very much like me who didn't really fit into society's idea of normal... and they didn't care, just like me! We had a great band of players and costumers who dedicated hours to "getting it right" and just having fun doing it.

There were pre-movie toasts to the uninitiated "VIRGINS", and in our theatre we had a guy who would do "Spiderman on Acid" before the show. (Basically he would run from one side of the theatre to the other as fast as he could and try to jump on the opposite wall... always landing with a splat and then falling to the floor while scraping his fingernails.) Oh well, we were a diverse group.

The "Rocky Horror Picture show," starring Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon, Barry Bostwick and Meatloaf, has grossed $140 million in domestic box office over the years, mostly from the pockets of youthful audience members who have shown up for midnight screenings over the past three decades.

When I first started attending the audience "par-tis-i-pation" experience, the theatre allowed us to throw toast, rice, toilet paper and newspapers at will as long as we cleaned it up before leaving. Unfortunately a management change caused some problems in my senior year. They didn't like the idea of the show and almost canceled it. After much negotiation they continued to play it but with the proviso that we wouldn't do things like throw stuff or use water guns. Dammit.

On the weekend of my senior prom I had rented a tux complete with purple cummerbund and bow tie of course... so why not use it the second night to go to Rocky! After my graduation a group of my "outside of school" friends gave me a party to celebrate, complete with cap and gown, right before the showing of Rocky. One of my favorite things to do after the show was to fill the back end of my truck with friends and go skinny-dipping at a lake in Towanda, Kansas of all places. My gosh, I wonder why we never got caught.

When I made a new friend, I took them to Rocky to try to figure out if they were "cool" or not. One co-worker actually freaked out and never really talked with me again... ok, she was uncool. I didn't care if they preferred not to memorize long lists of script and sub-text script... I just wanted to see if they were open-minded enough to not freak when seeing a man in heels, corset, and torn up fishnets singing about giving yourself over to absolute pleasure.

Not long after moving to Berlin in 2005 I began to see posters advertising the LIVE Rocky Horror Show. OMG! I HAD to be there! I told N. and her parents that I would like to see it and soon it was a family affair. M&FIL bought us tickets (thanks folks) and the day approached when we would get to see Frank n Furter and crew.

When we arrived at the venue I was a bit disappointed, no one had dressed up. Oh well. I had brought some toilet paper and a water gun just in case my fellow audience members decided to par-tis-i-pate as others have done around the world for decades. Much to my delight, as each person walked into the seating area they received a special "packet"! It had TP, a water gun (whoops, no water... what?) a few pages of Bild, and a firecracker "popper" thing which would explode with bits of paper at the appropriate party moment. All of this came with an information sheet which explained when to use the items... COOL!

I was completely blown away when I discovered that our seats were in the BACK ROW! Um... OK, so being far away from the action is one thing, but in Rocky Horror Picture Show there is a call-back shout during the song "Science Fiction Double Feature". ("Where's the best place to fuck?" "In the back row..." "FUCK THE BACK ROW!!") In over 200 viewings of RH, I NEVER sat in the back row... it just wasn't done!

Although my Parents in Law are pretty cool, I'm afraid they might not have passed my high school coolness qualification. They remained quiet and reserved throughout the show, something I've since learned is very much a German trait. They only joined in the clapping with the music when the rest of the crowd was in hysterics. When I handed him the toilet paper to throw, FIL threw the entire roll instead of holding onto the trailing end... and of course it hit an unsuspecting guy in the back of the head. Well, at least there was no trail leading back to FIL.

But then it was within months of their only daughter not only coming out as gay, but also marrying that crazy American. Long story, they didn't know ANYTHING until about five days before our wedding date. This was after six years of "friendship". They were treating me very nicely by buying us tickets to this wild show, and they even managed to have large smiles on their face at the pause. Maybe they had already passed the "cool test" eh?

My Sweet N. has let me know that she is simply not excited about seeing Rocky live on stage again... but of course I'm ready to go buy tickets today. Would anyone else like to go with me?

Don't dream it, be it.

The Neo-maxie-zoom-dweebies at MTV have decided to remake the Rocky Horror Picture Show. It simply seems like an act of stupidity. The first one sucked as far as the movie experience goes... why on earth would you try to remake it?... Money I suppose.