As Halloween had come to a close, The Rocky Horror Picture Show was played at the Vogue. Students and residents from all around Sackville and maybe even New Brunswick all gathered outside on a cold wintery night to watch the 1975 classic. People went to the extent of dressing as the characters of the show with unique eyeliner and crazy black wigs.
The story started with a wedding scene, while rice was thrown up in the air by the crowd within the great Sackvillian cinema. Rice had filled people’s hair and scattered all across the floors. It was then the introduction of the two main characters, Janet and Brad. Chants of “asshole” and “slut” boomed across the ancient theatre walls. This film is very interactive, and there was more to come. Brad was inspired by his friend being married and out of nowhere, decides to propose to Janet, to which she says yes.
Music rattled the speakers and dancing had erupted around the church, with Brad delighted that he will be married. All this positivity and all of this sunshine quickly turned into a massive rainstorm. Both Brad and Janet were in a car and presumably going off for their honeymoon. They are then stuck, and their vehicle breaks down but conveniently they are near a castle. They get out of the car and adventure towards the castle, with Janet holding up a newspaper to cover up her beautiful hair and the audience does as well. The castle seems haunted.
Both Brad and Janet enter what you could call this world of mystery, weirdness and all-in-all ambiguity. This confused and perplexed civilization was the Annual Transylvanian Convention led by Dr. Frank. N. Furter a self-proclaimed “sweet transvestite from Transsexual, Transylvania.” Both the main characters and the audience were all in amazement.
The Time Warp is then played and the majority of the audience is at the front dancing away and mimicking all the moves that are part of the sequence. Throughout the film, the narrator was trying to explain what was going on. The Vogue audience was having none of it, and boos and screams filled the theatre to silence him. When the Time Warp finishes, both the main characters experience all sorts of pandemonium within the convention: the unveiling of the very muscley Rocky Horror creation, the killing of the ex-delivery boy Frank (played by Meat Loaf), a meal with everyone in the movie (which then corresponded to toast being thrown about in the cinema) and many more.
These were just a few notable things that had happened during the film. A good Friday night spent in downtown Sackville and a continued tradition for many of the residents and students.
As a first-timer to this film and to this tradition, I left the Vogue in absolute shock. Till this day I am still trying to figure out what I watched. However, it was a great film and the experience in the Vogue will be stuck in my mind for years to come.
Apologies to all of those who had to clean up the cinema that night.
