Rocky Horror Picture Show is a beloved classic among musical theatre fans. The acclaimed comedic horror hybrid production was first shown in 1973 as a play inspired by 1930s and 1950s subversive LGBTQ performance art such as The Madness of Lady Bright, by Lanford Wilson, and The Haunted Host, by Robert Patrick. These pieces challenged a heteronormative era before civil rights gave nonbinary and sexually ambiguous individuals a voice and even before they gave them a name. Rocky Horror is representative of an expanding LGBTQ platform and normalization of nonbinary sexuality within American society.
The Stonewall Riots of Manhattan, New York City led by Marsha “Pay it no mind” Johnson is considered by some the catalyst for LGBTQ American civil rights. This movement occurred June 28, 1969 only a few years before 20th Century fox, a mainstream production company, released the renowned Rocky Horror capturing America’s attention. It is the longest-running theatrical release in film history, still in limited release four decades after its premiere. The films massive success is not coincidental. Rocky Horror is a work of art, perfectly reflective of a moment in time, encapsulating the burgeoning tension between hegemonic society and its growing number of outspoken and unabashed dissenters.
One dissenter, known as Laura Mulvey, published her piece Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema in 1975 making her voice perfectly clear. This female theorist uses psychoanalysis to critique patriarchally driven film. Her argument essentially is that psychoanalysis is a political weapon to make subconscious and detrimental narratives conscious. Mise-en-scène of traditional cinema takes on a heteronormative lens, objectifying and dominating female characters through male voyeurism. This type of narrative is prominent due to the power dynamics between majority and minority groups. The majority groups in society have dictated media since its creation, leaving minorities either underrepresented or misrepresented. However, Rocky Horror is an example of a film that completely contrasts the tropes of heteronormativity, providing a cinematic antithesis to mainstream media. At times, Rocky Horror even utilizes satire to provoke the audience to recognize these patriarchal cinematic tropes, far exceeding its time period.
The mainstream representation of LGBTQ individuals validated and normalized nonbinary lifestyles, giving the Civil Rights Movement a new dimension and gravitas in political and social defacto progression. One could claim Rocky Horror has been a “space making” film, serving as a precedent to promote similar pieces, but also expanding the liminal spaces within society for others within the interstices to come out from the depths of societal abjection and into the light of inclusion.
The shows massive cult following is an example of how the film has validated many individuals and their identities, as well as how it has pushed the metaphorical and ideological boundaries of our patriarchal hierarchy to make room for these people to exist. However, there is still a great deal of work to be done in order to create a more egalitarian society, which is why I’m waiting for our next Rocky Horror moment.