Before "Rocky Horror" was a picture show it was a stage musical in 1973 that paid homage to sci-fi and horror films with its sexy reimagining of the Frankenstein story. OB Playhouse is remounting its sold-out production of "The Rocky Horror Show" with a slightly different twist.
Michael Mizerany is best known as a choreographer with a flair for sexy cabaret dance shows. That makes him a perfect choice for tackling "The Rocky Horror Show" not just once, but twice for OB Playhouse.
"I didn't change any of the staging or the dances, but half the cast is new," said director and choreographer Mizerany. "So in that aspect, it's a different show because they bring different elements and talents."
But there is something new in the look of the show.
"Usually it's done in a glam rock style and there's part of that in there," Mizerany explained. "But we went more like an S&M leather aspect of it. So it's very much about the leather, and the bras and jockstraps, and the thongs and the chain skirts and the riding crop and the flogger. So it's much more of that is in the production."
One of the returning performers is Hunter Brown who once again stars as the square Brad who, with his fiancée Janet, end up at the home of a sweet transvestite named Frank-N-Furter (played by Joey Kirkpatrick, one of the newcomers to the show).
"It's really fun to get in that mindset of being from just like regular Small Town Americana and then being drawn into this world of just insanity and craziness," Brown said.
Brad and Janet open the play displaying the most conventional values and aspirations of mainstream middle-class America. But Frank-N-Furter slowly and playfully uncovers some of their repressed desires.
"I feel like the both of the characters start getting more and more comfortable with everything as it goes on, just kind of getting pulled into everything," Mizerany said, "and they're finding out things about themselves that they didn't know or that were repressed and so they sort of start to change how they look at themselves and their sexuality."
The play was famously made into a film in 1975 with Tim Curry as Frank-N-Furter, and Barry Bostwick and Susan Sarandon as Brad and Janet. Mizerany remembers the impact of seeing that film as a teenager.
"I remember going to see the movie the first time and I'm watching it and I'm like, OK, it starts out with Brad and Janet hooking up, and I'm like OK. And then when Brad and Frank hook up and people are cheering, I'm like, 'Oh, it's OK to actually be be gay. And people are not going to judge you," Mizerany said. "I was raised a Catholic in a Catholic school and I was just taught: No, no, no! But then you're like other people in the outside world say it's OK."
Brown was too young to experience the film when it first opened but he appreciates the changes his character of Brad goes through.
"It's not about him changing into something he wasn't," Brown said. "It's about all of these walls that he's had coming down."
And those walls come down through one of the show’s most iconic songs, "The Time Warp."
"To me, the Time Warp is like an initiation," Mizerany said. "They do [The Time Warp] four times. But it's not until Columbia grabs Brad and Janet and makes them do it that their initiation is complete."
And Mizerany has a slightly different take on "The Time Warp" than the film did.
"So it's a little bit more intricate, a little bit more complex than normal," Mizerany said. "But all the aspects of having to jump to the left. You have to jump to the left because lyrics say you have to jump to the left."
Performers and fans have been doing the time warp for decades because the issues the play addresses so irreverently have not gone away.
"The issues of sexuality, of accepting yourself as you are, of body image have not gone away," Mizerany said. "Our cast is all shapes and sizes and they're all beautiful. I don't go, 'Oh I'm going to cover you up.' I'm not going to do that. We're all beautiful and we're all different and I think those aspects still resonate. I think people are still struggling with identity and so when they go and see this, they see it's all right."
Brown added, "I think it's just a good blend of crazy spectacle and just like a good time. But it's like the show itself isn't that deep, but it's just cool to see all these different people just being free onstage and just like the message of [the song] 'Don't dream it, be it,' I just think it's such a powerful message."
"That’s a better answer," Mizerany said. "Be yourself, embrace who you are, your irreverence, your uniqueness."
You can embrace the sexy irreverence of this "The Rocky Horror Show" through March 1 at the OB Playhouse.
