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Column: Rocky Horror delivers a zany, sexy good time

The Sudbury Theatre Centre ended last season with Avenue Q, a quirky, naughty show that was like Sesame Street for grownups. It begins the 2014-2015 season with one of the campiest theatrical offerings ever, The Rocky Horror Show.
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Sudbury Theatre Centre's Rocky Horror Show delivers a zany, sexy good time. Photo by Heidi Ulrichsen.
The Sudbury Theatre Centre ended last season with Avenue Q, a quirky, naughty show that was like Sesame Street for grownups. It begins the 2014-2015 season with one of the campiest theatrical offerings ever, The Rocky Horror Show.

Take notice: This is not theatre for the timid. But it is a lot of fun.

Richard O’Brien wrote The Rocky Horror Show to pay tribute to cheesy horror and B-grade science fiction movies of the 1950s and 1960s, Annette Funicello and Frankie Avalon flicks and even those Charles Atlas ads in old comic books.

The movie version is a cult phenomenon that involves major audience participation. STC is actually encouraging some level of participation, particularly the callbacks from the audience. However, the theatre is staging two 10 p.m. late shows, during which throwing stuff — another staple of the movie participation — will be allowed, but please throw your rice in the air, not at the stage. (See Heidi Ulrichsen's piece at NorthernLife.ca for details on audience participation).

The plot involves engaged couple Brad and Janet getting a flat tire in a rainstorm and seeking help at a nearby castle. What follows involves an alien mad scientist transvestite, a hunchback, a revived dead man, a zombie biker and assorted zaniness.

Dr. Frank N. Furter is a seductively corruptive influence on innocent Brad and Janet, but blows his cool when the couple gets in the way of plans for his re-animated dead lover, Rocky Horror. With songs like “Sweet Transvestite,” “Hot Patootie” and “Touch-A Touch Me,” this is a very sexual show, so you might want to leave the kids at home.

David Lopez is outstanding as Frank, with a terrific voice and all the flamboyant stage presence the role requires. It’s also astonishing how well he can walk in spike-heeled shoes!

Daniel Abrahamson and Steffi DiDomenicantonio are perfect choices as the clean-cut, all-American Brad and Janet, deeply conflicted by the temptations of the flesh.

The whole cast is excellent, including the chorus-like Phantoms who dance, sing and vamp at full throttle. But I also need to commend the live band who deliver the score with punch and total professionalism.

This show depends heavily on every production element: choreography, costumes, set design, lighting and sound — and each department delivers full value.

STC has a new artistic director in Caleb Marshall after David Savoy’s departure last year for health reasons, but The Rocky Horror Show features guest director Kelly Straughan (who can scarcely be called a “guest” since she grew up at STC and her mother, Judi Straughan, is its long-serving education co-ordinator).

The proof of Straughan’s success with Rocky Horror is that her work is invisible — the show appears to just come together as an organic whole. That’s what sends an audience home from the theatre gushing rather than critiquing.

And maybe with a whole new appreciation of fishnet stockings.

The Rocky Horror Show plays at the Sudbury Theatre Centre through October 18th. The box office number is 705-674-8381 x21 or go online to www.sudburytheatre.ca.

Scott Overton is the author of the thriller Dead Air. He writes theatre reviews for Northern Life.

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