Astor Theatre, Saturday 7th September 2024

Having only seen the stage production of this show last year with Jason Donovan as Frank N Furter and Myf Warhurst as the narrator I wanted to finally see a screening with a group of people as there were a lot of restrictions for the musical due to it being in an old theatre like no throwing anything at all and no getting up to dance.

The Astor Theatre has always had screenings of Rocky Horror but not sure who they had before or it was just the audience who did all the extra stuff in the past. As with a lot of these sorts of screenings it is advised you have seen the movie beforehand or you will miss the performers on stage and be watching the movie instead.

I had heard of this group taking over running the screenings at the Astor Theatre quite a while ago but I always seem to have something on which is not hard to do in Melbourne as it is quite common to have two or three things on per night that I want to go to.

There is a whole bunch of traditions and different things in the screening of the movie that have built up over the years since its release and they did ask the audience to throw things in the air rather than directly at the performers. Someone supposedly threw a whole loaf of bread recently.

People did go to a lot of trouble with their costumes and it seemed Frank N Furter was one of the more popular ones especially with the male presenting audience members.

I was surprised with the age range as there were quite a few people who have obviously have been seeing Rocky Horror for several decades now and still even dressed up with their walkers and got to sit down the front.

I had won the raffle due to buying my ticket before the show and got a t-shirt and double pass to another screening at the Astor Theatre. They apologised for only having XL but I will find someone I can give the t-shirt to easily.

I thought the cast was interesting and diverse and the movie is probably the easiest to play around with the gender and presentation of characters as that is its’ entire stated purpose. They did have an advisory at the start that the movie was made in the 1970s so things have changed. I got this from looking up old Truth Newspaper articles from the 1970s and 1980s too.

I did end up talking to Ira Luxuria about my raffle prize and she went and got the tickets for me. She didn’t need to do that. They were selling the showbags for the props audience members could use during the show and also t-shirts and stickers.

I did end up seeing someone I knew there but they got there late and had to stand up the back. I think there were more people upstairs too, but they wanted to stay downstairs to be closer to the action. If you stand right up the back part of the screen is cut off but you could got near the back row for dancing and what not.

I did get up and dance two times during the Timewarp, it is quite a bit different doing it than when I used to do it at Anna’s Go Go Academy we don’t really get the instruction in the movie. It kind of just happens once and then at the end.

The cast was all great and there were some things that were not even in the stage production that had a larger budget like the motorcycle coming in the side door and you could smell it for a while afterwards.

Quite a lot more nudity in this version also, the cast had to change at the side of the stage out of necessity and there was not really much in the way of privacy. The very first scene with the lips in the intro there is a bare butt that I think some of the cast threw popcorn at.

This is one you are going to come with a group for as it is more fun and they encourage you to go to the bar before and during the show to add to the experience. I did talk to some people on the tram afterwards and they said this was their first theatre experience in Australia.

I would recommend this one if you are a fan of the movie and stage show and want to see a different version to both of them. There are more of these “immersive” experiences happening around the place, one particular in Perth but this one seems to be dedicated to the one movie and not so much a special event so you get people going as returning visitors as they enjoy it and add to the experience the next time

Rating: 5/5

Link:

https://www.facebook.com/thepelvicthrusts

Cast:

Normie Daniels as Janet Weiss

Bambi Leggs as Brad Majors

Commander Q as Columbia

Dee Tee Effie as Eddie/Dr Scott

Pomme De Terror as Rocky Horror

Keely Wins as Riff Raff

Izzy Bellissima as Magenta

Stella Del Lure as The Transylvanian

Ira Luxuria as Frank N Furter

The Loose Moose as our beloved Stage Manager