She said, ‘Mr O’Brien, I wrote you this letter.’ I said, ‘I knew it was you. You think I ripped off your fucking story, and you’re fucking wrong. Both of us should be down on our knees, you to Bram Stoker and me to Mary Shelley, as it happens. Both of us have ripped our stories off from someone else. Nothing is created in a vacuum. No one that thinks they are original has any sense of history. (O’Brien cited in Michaels & Evans 2002, p. 40.)

To me, it was just like doing the crossword or making a
collage. I just wrote some songs that I liked. I wrote some gags that I liked. I put in some B-movie dialogue and situations. I was just having a ball.
(O’Brien cited in Michaels & Evans 2002, p. 42.)

Those blood-red lips; the luscious, lilting melody; that sensual, seductive voice - “Science fiction, double feature” – this is the opening song - this is Richard O’Brien’s The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) – “and this is how the message ran”. This opening song does give the message. It provides the map by which one can navigate this text. It contains not merely allusions, but direct reference, to other texts. O’Brien’s first wife, Kimi Wong (cited in Michaels & Evans 2002, p. 55) says that one night they sat together with a pile of movie books and “that’s when he wrote ‘Science Fiction’”.

It is this intertextuality that plants the seed for the birth of a genre – and that genre is ‘punk’. The lyrical and visual appropriation that constructs this text enables it to convey a cultural significance that struck a chord, while Ziggy played guitar, Johnny sang “God Save the Queen”, and Marc pronounced “No, you won’t fool the children of the revolution”. While John Lennon was busy declaring a more popular status than Jesus Christ, the punk movement was unequivocally aligning itself with a new Satan, and opening the gateway to a ‘transsexual Transylvania’ that was, unbeknownst to even Hollywood, soon to become a box-office phenomenon (Hall 2003). This chord was to reverberate for many years to come.

Boztas (2004) has called Rocky Horror a “science fiction/horror/teen-romance pastiche” and if, as O’Shaughnessy and Stadler (2002, p. 315) claim, “A pastiche is an imitation of a style or various styles, and it is often affectionate and humorous about its sources”, then indeed, this text is, perhaps, the queen of pastiche. But Rocky does not merely imitate other styles, it quite blatantly makes reference to, and borrows from, other texts, creating a woven tapestry of intertextuality that provides the audience with the clues to an understanding of the “mother – and, in its twisted sexual ambiguity, the father – of all cult films” (Dollar 2004).

Michaels and Evans (2002, p. 11) claim that Rocky Horror “was and is and will always be a theatrical event. It was never, is never and never will be merely a musical. Neither was it just a play or a play with music”. They relate it to the science fiction classic, A Clockwork Orange (1971), and the equally classic musical, Cabaret (1972), which “immortalized the image of corsets and tawdry laddered stockings” (Michaels & Evans, 2002, p. 18). They go further to say that the main elements of Rocky Horror are “fashion and style; sexuality and fetishism; music; celebrity and stardom” (Michaels & Evans 2002, p. 19). These elements, along with the numerous instances of intertextuality, or appropriation, that occur throughout this text provide a syntax that, when considered in combination with the semantic elements of costume, set design, lighting, choreography and even ‘attitude’ permit a generic classification of Rocky Horror as ‘punk’. This text was an important part of the gestation that led to the birth of that genre. In the inimitable style of Sid Vicious, who certainly ‘did it his way’, punk is a genre that appropriates, re-constructs, and coughs up the phlegm of mainstream society. Rocky Horror “seizes characters with 1950s values, shoves them through the social upheaval of the 1960s, and spits them out into the fallout of 1970s confusion”, and much of that confusion was due to the emergence of punk culture (Hall 2003).

The opening shot of those lascivious lips is the first appropriated image. Patricia Quinn, the owner of those lips, (cited in Michaels & Evans 2002, p. 256) claims that director, Jim Sharman, was inspired by a Man Ray poster called Lips Over Hollywood – “a mouth with red lipstick, in a blue sky, above the Hollywood sign”. The song, Science Fiction, actually sung by writer, Richard O’Brien, is, in itself, a list of B-grade science fiction and horror films, characters and actors (Appendix 1). The scene has been set. The audience is about to witness a parody of these earlier texts set to the beat of a new generation.

The next sequence of the film, a wedding scene, contains a shot that gives an indication of the moral message that underlies the text. Riff Raff (O’Brien) and Magenta (Quinn) are posed in a re-presentation of the Grant Wood painting, American Gothic (1930). This painting has been considered “a satire on the intolerance and rigidity … of rural life”, though Wood presented it as an epitome of “the Puritan ethic and virtues that he believed dignified the Midwestern character” (Art Institute of Chicago 1999). The significance of Riff Raff posed as the patriarch in this scene is brought to light at the end of the film, when he casts off his charade as the drug-dealing butler to reveal himself as the bringer of justice, the ultimate decision-maker. Riff Raff shoots the sinful Frank N Furter with a ray-gun shaped like the pitchfork so central an icon of the Wood painting (Appendix 2). This three-pronged phallus could also be read as representative of the trident of Neptune – a reading that also supports the concept of the patriarchal retributive justice meted out on the cross-dressing, bi-sexual Frank.

But before one reaches this nemesis, one must do the ‘time warp’ – a voyeuristic romp from the moment Brad and Janet arrive at the Frankenstein House. As they approach the house, a bolt of lightning reveals the face of Riff Raff in the window, in a shot reminiscent of Anthony Perkins watching as Janet Leigh approaches the Bates Motel in Hitchcock’s Psycho (1960). (Appendix 3) And as Janet Leigh is welcomed into the motel, so are Brad and Janet welcomed into Frank’s lair. But unlike the austere décor of that motel, this hospice is the venue for a ‘Halloween hoe-down’ that is patronised by the Transylvanians, who, rather than space-tripped from a distant planet, may well have just tripped from the sidewalk of 1970s King’s Road, Chelsea, the stomping ground of Malcolm McLaren, Vivienne Westwood and David Bowie (Michaels & Evans 2002, p. 14). Just as Baz Luhrmann presents the bohemians of 19th and early 20th century Paris as the children of the revolution in Moulin Rouge! (2001), another text that presents life as a cabaret, the Transylvanians are the children of a revolution that would be led by the likes of McLaren, Westwood, Bowie, Bolan, Vicious and Cobain. Quinn (cited in Michaels & Evans 2002, p. 140) actually credits Rocky Horror for starting punk with “the ripped stocking, the leather jackets with all the badges”, the costumes of the Transylvanians. The costuming is an important element of this text. It is the fabric that holds it together, so much so that it is now a major component of midnight screenings of the film where the audience, dressing as the characters, becomes a part of the show. Life is a cabaret, and so too is punk culture with its fishnet stockings, black jackets, coloured hair and safety-pin earrings.

But it is not just appearances that constitute punk culture. Music, too, plays an important role. Where Moulin Rouge! takes the music of the 1970s and 80s and posits it back in the past, Rocky Horror has taken ‘old-fashioned’ rock’n’roll and placed it in the future. Musical director, Richard Hartley, (cited in Michaels & Evans 2002, p. 257) claims that O’Brien’s ideas, as well as his arrangements came “from all my favourite records from when I was a kid. Both Richard and I share the same rock’n’roll heritage”. Hartley (cited in Michaels & Evans 2002, pp. 257-258) compares Don’t Dream It (1975) to Somewhere over the Rainbow (1939); Sweet Transvestite (1975) to Honky Tonk Women (1969); and, Sword of Damocles (1975) to Ginny Come Lately (1962). The heritage that forms the foundation for this musical seduction quite possibly explains this text’s longevity. And rock’n’roll has certainly been usurped by punk bands from the Sex Pistols to Nirvana and beyond. The familiarity an audience may have with the music, as well as other recognised iconography, is apart of the pleasure an audience may gain from a text so rich in intertextual references. It is this familiarity or recognition of the familiar that can allow an audience to become more involved in a text (O’Shaughnessy and Stadler 2002, p. 113).

The demise of Eddie – the biker, the rock’n’roller – who is eventually served up as dinner (though not presented as Meat Loaf), could well represent the appropriation of rock’n’roll for the construction of a new culture – a musical ‘slice’n’dice’. That Frank’s castle is called the ‘Frankenstein House’ gives the audience a clear indication of what might transpire, even before Eddie appears on the scene. Eddie has been held captive by Frank as a source of parts for the creation of Rocky. When Eddie tries to escape, Frank disposes of him by way of chainsaw and cannibalism – fairly distinct elements of horror. Indeed, the dismemberment of the punk Eddie for the creation of the ‘perfect’ Rocky is straight from the great milestone of the horror genre, Shelley’s Frankenstein (1831).

But just as the original Frankenstein’s creation was not perfect, neither is Rocky. He becomes confused by Frank’s lust and the knowledge of how he came to be. As Rocky panics and climbs the RKO tower, just as King Kong scaled the Empire State Building, Frank’s world, his dreams, collapse. Riff Raff and Magenta don the garb of the clean and crisp, the avengers of good against evil. Riff Raff tells Frank to “say goodbye to all this, and hello to oblivion”. This line reflects an attitude that is a key element in punk culture – the destruction of beauty and perfection – torn clothes, ragged hairstyles, brutal body piercings, and the belief that the world has reached the point of oblivion. Frank has attempted to create the perfect being, just as he has also attempted to create the perfect world for his cross-dressing, transsexual perversions, but has only managed to destroy that world. Frank’s oblivion even transforms Brad and Janet from the virginal, engaged to wed, ‘squeaky-clean’ couple into a man and woman confused by their sexual enlightenment brought about by the darkness of Frank’s lusty indiscrimination. Just as tales of “tinkering with human beings by the divine or the occult is centuries old”, O’Brien has tinkered with Shelley’s novel to produce, not oblivion, but a visual, aural, even sensual, spectacle that is certainly “a more than significant ancestor in the family tree of punk” (Michaels & Evans 2002, pp. 327, 15).

In the punk tradition that was, perhaps, begun by this text, Rocky Horror has appropriated the elements of several genres and the iconography of several texts, and placed them into an intertextual time warp that was to play a crucial part in the ongoing growth and development of popular culture. By way of a semiotic invitro fertilisation, Rocky Horror has spawned a culture that has given birth to a new generation that has grown into the adolescence of contemporary society. This is the cultural significance that underlies the intertextuality within a creature that was created by a cross-dressing young man who frequented King’s Road, Chelsea, and had a love of B-grade horror and science fiction. “It’s just a jump to the left”.

References:

Rocky Horror Opening Song - Science Fiction Double Feature
Richard O’Brien 1975

Michael Rennie was ill the Day the Earth Stood Still, but he told us where we stand.
And Flash Gordon was there in silver underwear, Claude Rains was the Invisible Man.
Then something went wrong for Fay Wray and King Kong.
They got caught in a celluloid jam.
Then at a deadly pace, It Came From…Outer Space.
And this is how the message ran:

Chorus:
Science fiction, double feature, Doctor X will build a creature.
See androids fighting Brad and Janet, Anne Francis stars in Forbidden Planet
Wuh uh uh oh o-o-oh
At the late night, double feature, picture show.

I knew Leo G. Carrol was over a barrel when Tarantula took to the hills.
And I really got hot when I saw Jeanette Scott fight a triffid that spits poison and kills.
Dana Andrews said Prunes gave him the runes and passing them used lots of skills.
But When Worlds Collide, said George Pal to his bride,
“I’m gonna give you some terrible thrills,”
Like a…

Chorus:
Science fiction, double feature, Doctor X will build a creature.
See androids fighting Brad and Janet, Anne Francis stars in Forbidden Planet
Wuh uh uh oh o-o-oh
At the late night, double feature, picture show.
I wanna go, Wuh oh o-o-oh
To the late night, double feature, picture show.
By RKO, Wuh oh o-o-oh
To the late night, double feature, picture show.
In the back row, Oh oh o-o-oh
To the late night, double feature, picture show!

Science Fiction, Double Feature. Frank has built and Lost his creature.
Darkness has conquered Brad and Janet.
The servants gone to a distant planet.
Wo, oh, oh, oh.
At the late night, double feature,
Picture show.
I want to go, oh, oh, oh.
To the late night, double feature,
Picture show.

American Gothic Grant Wood 1930	Magenta and Riff Raff during the wedding scene
Riff Raff and Magenta during final scene Sharman, J 1975, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, 20th Century Fox

“There’s a light over at the Frankenstein’s House” Riff Raff at the window Sharman, J 1975, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, 20th Century Fox

Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) watches as Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) arrives at the Bates Motel Hitchcock, A 1960, Psycho, Paramount Pictures

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