Hello. Hello. Hello to all of you, unconventional conventions. Welcome back to Rocky Talkie. We're a Rocky horror podcast that talks about anything and everything Rocky Horror related. My name's John and I'm Aaron and joining us on air this week, we've got Sam from the Junior Chamber of Commerce Players. Hello. Oh my God. Thank you for joining us this week. Sam. So much of our community is very familiar with your work with J C C P. You all put on so many great productions, not just a killer Rocky show, but also an amazing shock treatment show that we were just lucky enough to catch plus an annual Reefer Madness show that we know is coming up. We also know that a ton of our community absolutely loves your Charlie Chaplin, Doctor Scott character. We got to see it at the last convention. I know you do it at all of your shows. But for those of our list who may not be in the know, could you tell us a little bit about yourself and your time with this fantastically weird movie? Sure. I'm Sam the Hobo and I am the Irwin Lapse A K president. Of the Junior Chamber of Commerce players, Pittsburgh's official Rocky Horror Shadow cast. I started as a member of the JCC in 2007. And then since then I was vice president for a time and then just a performer and now I'm the president since I think 2018. That's who I am. I do pretty much every character as well as a lot of the crew being in Rocky Horror, this long kind of teaches you everything, I guess. But otherwise, yeah, I'm probably most well known for doing Riffraff Brad and a Charlie Chaplin Dr Scott. But right now our cast is actually talking about rehearsing and promoting Reefer Madness. The movie musical that'll be shown on April 23rd. And then after that, we're doing a hat show, a hat, Rocky horror picture show. Um where we just draw our characters from a hat about 60 minutes before the movie starts. Um So it'll be a lot of crazy fun times. Uh But that's what's going on in the J C C P world right now. Oh my God. Amazing. If anybody is in the Pittsburgh area, you got to go check out J C C P. They're fucking fantastic. Agreed Sam. Thank you so much for joining us today. We are thrilled to have you on the show with us this week. Now, as customary before we get started with the show, we're going to take a moment and ask each other How was your week? Did you do anything fun? What's been going on Aaron? Oh, it's been a busy one. It's been a busy week. Uh Had a lot going on that. I'm stalling to try and remember. Fuck. Did I do this week? Oh, hey, this week's been super excited. Obviously in Rocky land we're gearing up for a ton of performances coming up, but non Rocky land, I'm actually really excited. As soon as we get off this call, uh us and a bunch of people from uh our cast are gonna be going out to the casino out in Queens. We're gonna go lose a bunch of money at video poker. It's gonna be super fun. So, uh if you don't see me for a little while, that's um that's where you can find me. It's because Meg had to sell him. Yeah. No, it's very expensive to get back from Queens these days. Sam, what have you been up to this week? Well, aside from all of our reefer madness rehearsals, um I've also been very busy with work and life things. Uh My fiance and I are planning a wedding. Uh So we just actually booked our efficient and we booked a band and we went and saw the band play uh last week at a distillery in town. Um That was a whole lot of fun. And then with work, I actually just got a promotion. So I've been doing a lot of great work there and trying to get ready for this new job opportunity. Oh, congratulations. Also. Love that for you. Had to make sure the band could play time warp. Uh Maybe we'll see. That was a really, really nice way of saying, shut the fuck up, Aaron. You know, I don't know if my entire family would want to do the time warp altogether. But we'll see. Well, families that time warp together, work together to say that is the defining factor. What about you? What were you up to this week? Uh Nothing too much yet because my weeks are basically filled with working and streaming. However, I'm actually in the process of a lot of really interesting things with streaming. Uh I just applied to be part of what is called the next top streamer, which is essentially American Idol for Put Streamers. It is run by the same company that gave me $250 because I won a contest of theirs. So fingers crossed that they remember me. I find that out on Sunday, whether or not I've made it. So that'll be fun. Video was Chaos Gold. Oh, thank you so much. It will be 5.5 hours to it because I did it all on my phone for some reason. Plan to fix that process. Yeah. Um And I'm also in the process of planning a charity event called The Bachelor where Streamers will be able to go on virtual dates with me and the viewers at the time will then be able to, like, donate money. And the winner of the Bachelor will get all of that money donated to a charity of their choice. So they get the hit on me in front of all of their friends and they could send money to charity when it's for a good cause your ego. Exactly. So we have a lot of really, uh, I have a lot of other really cool things that are in the process of being planned, but those are just a few snippets of what's going on in John's life. Self promotion. Follow me on Twitch twitch dot TV slash. Hi, John and dad. Right. Everyone. Now that that's out of the way. Uh I am so pumped to dive into my very first rocky talkie segment that would be global news first up in global news. We have some updates on a project that we have been waiting for forever. We've mentioned this documentary before on the show and we're excited to see some movement now that the Panetti bread has calmed down and sorry, folks. This isn't Rocky horror, save my life. If you're still holding your breath on that one. Well, try not to pass out best of luck. This segment is all about another documentary one created by fans over in the UK and announced to the Community Radar in 2014, almost eight years ago. Andre Zerr and their team began production on a very ambitious Rocky doc titled the Rocky Horror Phenomenon. And this documentary purports to cover everything Rocky from shadow cast performers to the original movie cast, to everything in between the film has already interviewed a bunch of stars including Jim Sharman, Christian lover Combe, the stage legend Riff Raff that we talked about last week. Now Campbell, as well as just so many others, we truly cannot wait to see the final film because we know it's gonna be killer for now. The production team is still doing some work on the movie by trolling the groups on social media to ask the community some questions. That's right. A few recent posts from Andres ask a bunch of shadow casting specific questions he's particularly interested in. How often do you perform each year? What's the average number of attendees at your shows? How many regulars come to your shows? And what percent of your audience is, people who aren't seeing a shadow cast for the first time. Andres and everyone working on the Rocky Horror phenomenon are primarily interested in the total number of people involved in Rocky Horror across the world, whether that be a cast member who performs each week, month or year and all audience members going to see those shows with some regularity and specifically, they are interested in your pre COVID numbers though, if your audience attendance or cast size has gone up or stayed level for the past two years. I'm pretty sure they'd want to hear about that too. So send it on in. So if you have any relevant info, be sure to send it in, you can message Andres and the page for the film on Facebook will post the link to his questions in our show notes. And of course, if you're interested in learning more about the movie, we'll have the site up for you in our show notes too. Definitely check them out and consider helping you out with some sweet, sweet knowledge, Bobs if you can, Andre and his team are doing some amazing work and I'm sure that they would appreciate your support. I mean, I'm really looking forward to this one, Megan. I just love Rocky documentaries and we are definitely due for a new one. I mean, just the other night and by the other night, I mean, last night, me and I sat and rewatched a regular Frankie fan for the, I don't know, 900 1000th time. It's just, it's just such a cool snapshot of the community from, I don't know what, 20 years ago now. Like, I absolutely love that bit. Like it's cringy. It's totally like, not what Rocky is anymore, but I absolutely love it. What about you guys? You got a favorite Rocky Doc? Oh, Aaron, I'm a normal fucking person. All right. Good answer. Actually, I think some of my favorite little Rocky documentaries are the different newscasts that they do around Halloween time about the history of Rocky Horror in whatever city you're in. I love how they try to put a five minute segment to encompass all of Rocky Horror while having a show go on. That is clearly not showing what they want to show. So you got this strange reporter person who has never seen Rocky Horror trying to explain what Rocky Horror is in five, five minutes or less. And I think that's my favorite type of documentary. So in New York City, we get messages like once every two or three months of like college students at N Y U or the new school or some other like really fancy art centric school who always wanted to do documentaries on Rocky. Uh and those are always so much fun because the kids that come in that record us to talk about Rocky treat us like we're celebrities and it's so weird because like we are all just the most. I I shouldn't say that we're regular people because we are certainly not because we dress up and make fun of a movie. But it's always such a nice refreshing take to see somebody who like Sam said, doesn't know anything about Rocky Horror, but at this point, at least wants to learn about it and the context behind it and the community behind it. So I always love getting interviewed by like the Children that go to N Y U and stuff. I cannot imagine how many film professors at N Y U and the new school and abroad have seen a fucking documentary about Rocky Horror at this point. I'm pretty sure some of them could repeat our community party lines back to us. Anyway, we cannot wait for this film's release. We promise to keep all of our listeners posted as we learn more about it. And moving on in global news this week, we have a very special birthday. Oh, Captain, my Captain Richard o'brien's 80th birth day was this past week on March 25th. And it's a good thing too because we don't talk nearly enough about Richard. We don't talk about Richard. No, no, no, born Richard Timothy Smith on March 25th, 1942 in Cheltenham England at the age of 10, his family moved to New Zealand. Tell Tarana, maybe your guess is as good as mine. Tarana, New Zealand, where his accountant father had spontaneously purchased a sheep farm. Got I hate when I wake up and buy a sheep farm. It happens to the best of us. O'brien returned to England at the a of 22 having learned how to ride horses a skill which gained him his first big break into the film industry as a stuntman in carry on cowboy. He entered the film world as Richard o'brien as there was already a popular actor named Richard Smith. Did you know how to ride sheep? Well, you can't talk about riding the sheep. That's after performing in several stage productions, as well as the traveling production of Hair, which he does not have. And then the stage production of Hair, which again, he does not have in London o'brien met Rocky director Jim Sharman in the summer of 1972. Then after casting o'brien and Sam Shepherd's the unseen hand in London production of Jesus Christ, superstar Sharman o'brien collaborated on the Rocky horror show. Sharman was even the one who suggested changing the name from, they came from Denton High to something a little more snappy. And thus the Rocky Horror Show opened at the theater upstairs in June of 1973. Around this time o'brien and his first wife, Kimmy Wong, who appears in the film released pop singles under the name Kimmy and Ritz. After the Rock Horr pitcher show was released in 1975. O'brien continued to have a successful, prolific career working as a writer, actor, musician, television presenter, as well as many industry jobs. Notably in 1985 he wrote his One Man review, disgracefully yours and a CD of the song entitled Absolute o'brien was released in 1998. A musical adaptation was produced in 2006 and 2007 with two different theaters adapting it into a musical. Have either of you seen that? No disgracefully yours or? Absolutely Brian. Oh, disgracefully yours is a bop. Check it out, is it? Yeah. All Right. I've, I've always seen the, the, the pink CD, right, like with a pink cover and whatever. But I've never actually sat down and listened to it. I'm gonna have to give that a go. I be disgracefully yours. It's real fun. After a period of few movies o'brien became the host of the popular British game show, The Crystal Maze. In 1990. He left this host after the fourth season in 1993 the show was then canceled two seasons later unable to stay afloat without the sardonic charm of o'brien or the show just got old and lived well past its prime. Uh Yeah. Or the show couldn't survive without o'brien. Sprinkling his magical gay sardonic charm juice all over the show. Fuck you. Did you get a new word of the day calendar? Sardonic? It got revived. Bitch. Yeah. Seriously. In 1974 o'brien was nominated for a Grammy Award for best score for the Rocky Horror Show. In 19 89 he was nominated for best writer at the Independent Spirit Awards. And this time for the Rocky Horror Picture Show film adaptation. In 1999 he was nominated for best supporting actor for his work in Dark City. And in 2001, he was nominated for a Tony Award for revival. In 1998 Richard won the Berlin International Film Festival Award special Teddy for the Rocky Horr Picture Show. And in 2000, he won the Galactic Spectrum Award, which is a once a year award that is given to works of science fiction, fantasy and horror that explore LGBT topics in a positive way. Of course, these are just some of the many, many highlights from an absolutely dazzling career that spans over five decades. O'brien currently lives in New Zealand with his third wife, Sabrina Graff. It's been a fantastic 1st 80. Here's to the next 80 and speaking of being one year closer to death come unity news, man, you thought you thought I was just going to leave it at calm. We wouldn't do that to you. We wouldn't leave calm everywhere. Exactly. Because if you're that type of person, please don't talk to me. Invest in some socks guys. Shout out to everyone listening right now. Who's wearing socks? Couldn't be me. I am first up in community news this week, we were graced with the fun little nugget of R K O K four news. Now it's been teased quite a bit on social media over the past few weeks, but we're still very excited to see it confirmed. Fred and Harley are going to be printing their adorable coffin pins to sell at con. Yeah. Yes. Oh, I'm excited for these. I've seen a couple of iterations of the design floating around. I know we got a first look at them when the four show Ensemble Pin was on Kickstarter, but seeing it presented all by its adorable self is just so very, very cool for the of our listeners who might not have gotten a chance to see it yet. The pin is objectively the most adorable of all the pins that arch o has released. The tiny little time work coffin has a little bit of a twist requires audience participation. Much like the real coffins that we will all one day inhabit. This version is on hinges with a lid that you can open and shut. Unlike the real deal though, this lid latches closed with a magnet and that's a little dark and much like the actual pine boxes that will one day be our forever homes. The lid on this bad boy flips over to reveal the spies, poopies skeleton who's a spooky boy. You are, you are, are you ok? We all cope with our mortality in different ways. Ain't that right? Viewers? Oh shit, John, you finally watch shock treatment. Oh my God. I can't wait to talk to you all about shock treatment and how amazing it is. And let's just just like my breadstick. These bones will turn any frank jacket in to 1/4 of July fireworks display. That's right folks. The teeny weeny skeleton glows in the dark. I uh I want to make a teensy wey joke here, but I, I feel like John's already having having a time. So this little reminder of our slow descent into eternal oblivion is currently available for purchase on a K O Army's Etsy page for the low, low cost of only $15. That's a steal at only 1, 2/100 of a frank jacket. But if you'd rather buy the thing from a genuine bona fide member of the R K O Army, you can always wait to, you know, drunkenly stumble into Fred's Hotel at 7 30 Saturday morning and offered to trade him eight crumpled dollar bills that are very, very sweaty for some reason, the last four sips of whatever's in the cup that you're holding at that current time. And a Columbia bow tie you found on the floor, get it, get it bone, bona fide bone. It's, it's a skeleton bone. My penis is teeny weenie bone moving on next up. We've got all kinds of good stuff coming from down south this week. A and the first thing we want to get hype for is theater Coven Productions announcement that they're going to be bringing the Rocky Horror Freak Show Noir to their home in Baltimore back around Halloween theater coven productions founded and run by the remarkably talented Tavon Vison started a production of Rocky Horror Freak, a Noir in Los Angeles. This was a circus sideshow themed shadow cast where Franken Furter played a creepy yet sultry ringleader and the rest of the castle's inhabitants were cast as his ragtag band of circus folk production was such a success that the group has decided to bring it to the stage in their hometown. This will be a live all black all sexy shadow cast performance featuring a whole bunch of fabulous show acts by local performers, Mecca Verdell and Kamau Theater Coven's social media game is absolutely on point. And they've been filling up our timelines with stupidly hot photos of their LA show. So we're here for it. This show looks like it was such a good time and we're thrilled that they're going to be bringing it to the east coast right now. There are three performance date scheduled June 17th and 18th at eight PM and June 19th at four PM. A uh a children's matinee. If you will, the show will be held at the Mount Zion Church of Baltimore, which I just fucking love. I think the idea of doing Rocky in a church is brilliant. So come on out and enjoy this modern twist on a cult classic. Sure to be the salaciously unconventional, bewitchingly charming and will fill you to the brim with Antica. Say it you would like that, wouldn't you? Theater coven encourages all its guests to dress up in their best Rocky costumes and vehemently discourages anyone from throwing anything because come on. It is a church. After all. If you're interested in checking out this show, we've got all the Ds for you and our show nuts. Ha. Fuck you. Damn it. All right. You Persian brains. It's time for Sam asks a question and yes, John, that means we're having a sack snack this week. Yeah. Sack of D's nuts. The last thing, a steaming hot cup of Earl Gray Seas before getting splashed on harder than a high school student playing Fortnite. The fuck. It's a teabag joke, John. So open up wide boys because I've got a huge sack snack for you. I need an adult. Don't look at me and speaking of high school students, I want to talk about entry points. Oh no, no, no, no, no, Sam. I think we might have to actually both perverts Rocky Horror. Entry points and entry point, entry points into the immunity. Their, their first exposure to Rocky Horror. Oh oh, thank Christ. OK. So you're talking about the things that new cast members might talk about was their like big thing that made them aware of Rocky that, that, that eventual like the catalyst that got them to go to Rocky or to join a cast or any of that I joined cast to hook up with a hot piece of ass. I mean that that's a given. I I have a feeling that Sam's talking on a bit bigger scale. Ok. Hell yes. OK. This is my kind of snack. So my first sit here with this kind of snack with a side of kombucha, kombucha lips on my dick. So my first rocky piece of ass. Hey guys, producer Meg here. This was just, I mean you all know John, sorry and that's why it's called a Dirty Baker's Dozen boom sack snack, baby. Oh, ok. Never mind. I, I think we can go a little bit bigger than that. Yeah. Just a bit bigger than these nuts sack stack. Yeah, John, go sit in time out. My real dad. Oh, Sam. Ok. You've been on J C C P forever. Both as a cast member and as leadership. What's the stuff that like over the years people have said this is what drew me into Rocky. It's Rocky. You come for the movie and you stay for the community, but that's first little push. That could be a lot of things, you know. Um It could be fame, it could be perks, it could be glee, it could be the remake, it could be shock treatment, it could be so many different things. Um But I think the most important thing is that sense of involvement in doing something fun with a group of new and weirdo friends. It's, it's a different thing with Rocky because you don't necessarily have to be super talented. You just have to be consistent and try hard. You can use it for a chance to perform more to do different things with your performances, like branching out or just being really good at one specific thing. And that's kind of welcome in all points I think. And also it's a way to connect to people from all around the world, not just in your local town. I think some of the best parts about Rocky Horror is that you can go to any major city and probably guest perform with the cast there. Absolutely. It's certainly one of the things I love the most about it and, you know, having a further conversation on, you know, the mushy stuff in the Rocky Horror community, I feel like, you know, it's a cliche when we say it, but Rocky is for people who don't fit in. It's actually true. At least in my time on N Y C I have seen people who have joined Rocky, who you could tell were well liked in high school, well liked in college, well liked in grade school never had, you know, bullying issues. They were as normal as you could possibly think of a person and what ends up happening to them. They don't end up dealing with the community because this was a community that was created for people who are of an alternative lifestyle, whatever that lifestyle may be. And those are the ones who end up finding such prosperous and long careers as opposed to, you know, the popular one except me. I was always popular and now I'm popular again in just a different circle. So I'm an exception to this role. It's one of the places where being a weirdo is actually kind of celebrated and welcome. And please give us your weird ideas and let's make this show as weird as possible. I love that most theater productions will not allow you to do such things. Oh, yeah. I mean, if you're, if you're just joining a local community theater production, I mean, it's still run like, theater, right? Like your director is telling you what to do. No, no, no, you can't wear that. You got to do this. Like, it's still that kind of thing. But Rocky. Rocky is where you can just let your creative freedoms run wild kind of thing. And there's something really neat about having kind of a clubhouse for weirdos. Like your theater tends to be the place you spend a lot of time at or people's, you know, rehearsal spaces, it's your little area, it's your safe space. Exactly. And I mean, that's, that's what we need more of in the world for sure. And it, it, it's part of that, that really, like drew me into Rocky, you know, not just the wider community but also that it's something that has such a rich history, such a, a deep past. Um I mean, and also it, it's one of those fandoms that really rewards obsession, right? You know, that now this isn't quite such a big thing, right? Pop culture awareness and just geek dumb has kind of gone mainstream, but that wasn't always a thing, right? Like, think back of the way that, like Trekkies were perceived for the, you know, eighties and nineties and stuff, they were all push up glasses nerds and whatever. But, but Rocky embraces that lets me let my freak flag fly and you know, nobody's gonna give me shit that I have to collect all of the frank pins except you guys because you're mean. Yeah, I will 100% give you shit for that. Another thing that um that I personally have a mantra against is that I'm, I'm a big musical theater person. I love theater. I love being in it. But I also think that theater can be extremely inaccessible to just the majority of people. And I think Rocky kind of really dispels that because, you know, at its root, Rocky shadow casting is community theater. You know, it's something that people sign on for. We don't get paid for, we just do it because we like it. And while Rocky to, I think to master Rocky shadow casting, there's a level of talent and dedication that you need, but anybody can do it. You know, as long as you have the time and dedication and the want to do it. I think that shadow casting specifically in the Rocky community helps break the barrier, that theater is way more accessible because of it because anybody can do it. It also makes a good space for excitement. I think Rocky Horror is one of the few places where we encourage people to be excited and show that in thinking about different cons like with cosplay and things you want to keep the character face. You want to keep the character look with Rocky. You want to have fun, you want to see people having fun. You don't want to see Hopi Tuti like done where people are straight faced or anything. You want to see people enjoying it. You want to see people enjoying time warp. And I think that kind of celebration of being silly is one of the best parts about Rocky Horror. Absolutely. It's not just a place where you can, you know, go get fucked up and have sex in the back row anymore. It's really about the community. It's also a place where you could go get fucked up and have sex in the back. But if you have a champagne room that's even better. We have a staircase. Yeah. It's, it's, it's very narrow. We have a basement. I'm so jealous. I'm so jealous. But when the newer members of the community talk about their first exposure to Rocky, it's a lot of the same stuff. I imagine you guys hear over in New York, the 2016 remake Glee, all that kind of stuff. Oh, yeah. I mean, we've been hearing Glee from new cast members as like their first Rocky exposure ever since it aired, you know, back in what, 2010. Yeah. If they're 18 and they're looking to join cast, they were like six when that thing came out and the remake in 2016, that was six years ago, they were 12. Do you remember what you were like when you were 12 or six? Oh boy. I try really hard not to. So then what was the first thing that exposed you guys to Rocky? So there was this man in the back of a church van. Uh No, no, no more exposure. You Rocky horror on ramp. What brought you into the fold? Well, they both involve vans. I just call my partner a van. It was supposed to be an on ramp joke that it like went back to van, but I think it didn't actually really work. All right. Well, I started dating somebody who was part, who was still part of the, uh, hold on my leg. So I was dating somebody who is, you know, still currently part of the New York City Rocky Horror Picture Show cast, uh, who had drugged me to go see the show. They gave me some of their clothes and they told me to wear them for the show and because I was trying to get their pants, obviously, I did that and, uh, I had a great time. It was fantastic and I know that I just said not five minutes ago that I'm a big musical theater person. But up until then I had never seen the movie nor have I ever heard the show. So it was a new experience for me. I enjoyed it. I thought it was fun. But at the very beginning, I didn't really care about the show itself and I just wanted to go and see them perform and support them. Uh And then that led me to being a fucking bottom and taking photographs for them. And obviously, because I had a fancy camera, all the cast members would be like, oh my God, if you take any photos of me, please let me know and, and share them with me. I would love to like post them places. And I was like, ok, so I did that for like six or seven months. And then I got a new job, which meant that my old job, which was my previous kind of like creative outlet for theater since I was losing that. I wanted a new one. So then I applied for Rocky got in and, you know, 5.5 years later here I am the classic Rocky horror honeypot. A What about you, Sam? What about me? Well, when I was in high school, I wanted to join a friend group that was into all the theater stuff and they said that I needed to watch Rocky Horror and read Perks of Being a Wallflower. So I did that. And then once Halloween rolled long, they semi kidnapped me and brought me to my first actual showing of Rocky Horror where I was just enthralled with the whole mess of it. I loved how crazy it was, how messy it was and how much fun people seemed to be having, I was one of those people that tried to learn all of the callbacks and I tried to join cast. I wasn't yet 18. And so I wasn't allowed to. But then as soon as I turned 18, I joined cast as quickly as possible. And I'm sure Aaron has some super obscure stupid answer. I do not actually kind of. Um So I had always uh seen the Rocky Horror V H S sitting on the wall in my house when I was a kid, my, my parents had seen the movie back in the late seventies and early eighties. Uh and they had picked up a copy on V H S as soon as it came out, but it was always sitting on the wall still in its cellophane wrapper. So I'd always look at it and be like, oh, there's blood and lips on this. It must be a scary movie. So I was too young. I wasn't gonna watch that. I didn't like scary movies. And then around 2000 or so that was like with the 25th anniversary, uh there was a ton of content that was being pumped out by VH1. I was like a high school freshman at that point. So like, I was just glued to MTV and VH1 all the time and I saw the karaoke special that came out. I saw the Behind the Music and like, I just watched a ton of Rocky stuff on VH1 on repeat over and over that whole year videos. Right. Uh, and a few years later, uh, when I finally, uh, went off to college, there was a local Rocky cast and I just was like, oh, I, I kind of have to see this. One of my friends was really, like, interested in going and I was like, absolutely. Um, she regretted that because she got drugged to like three or four shows over the next couple of weeks. Um, and it was super fun and that's how I got in. I went and, uh, met Ruth Fink Winter and said, hey, maybe I want to join this cast. And she said, great, we need an Eddie and, uh, went home over, I think it was spring break or something. And just went to my mom and said, mom, I need an Eddie costume and she said, oh, sit down, get out the, uh, get out the sewing machine. Let's go to town and, and that's, uh, that's how I came in. I, uh, went, went to the next show after I got back, uh, fully fully decked out and all of my Eddie stuff. And from there it was, uh, you know, the start of the next 17 years and, you know, still going strong called it. I mean, is the 25th anniversary, all that unusual. It's the biggest thing that happened 20 years ago. And, I mean, ballpark numbers that lines up with the remake from five years ago, Glee from 10 years ago and 15 years ago was the height of the perks of being a wallflower craze. The book really writes around the 25th in 1999. And the film adaptation a few years after Glee in 2012, which I know everybody out there wants to talk about it. Can we, can we talk about perks for a minute because I know you have firsthand knowledge all about it? I mean, it's written by an author from Pittsburgh. The movie was shot in Pittsburgh at J C C P's Home Theater. It features J C C P cast members. So like spill, please. Absolutely. So for anyone not familiar with perks to be in a wallflower high level, it's a coming of age story about, you know what, I'm just going to read the Amazon description, you know how to read. No, I actually have somebody next to me who's reading it in an earpiece in my ear saying that I'm just going to recite it. First dates, family drama and New Friends, sex drugs and the Rocky horror picture show, devastating loss, young love and life on the fringes caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it. Charlie must learn to navigate those wild and poignant roller coaster days known as growing up. I don't know why he's complaining because he's friends with Emma Watson. Suck it up, bitch. I actually sat and watched the movie adaptation just the other night. I hadn't seen it in years and I had totally forgot that it was Emma Watson and Ezra Miller. Yeah. Her mighty Granger and the Flash, I ship it. So, what's the story Sam? Tell us all about perks of being a wallflower? I mean, where did Rocky Horror even enter the picture there? Sure. So, with the book, it's written by Stephen Chai Bowski, he's a Pittsburgh native that actually grew up not far from the Hollywood theater. A lot of the book takes place in and around the place that we do. Rocky Horror here in Pittsburgh. He wrote it about basically his high school life more or less and fictionalized a little bit added a lot of drama and made it almost as if the character is writing letters to the reader. That's how it's kind of set up. He latched onto Rocky Horror because he came to shows whenever he was younger, he just would come to shows, watch it and help with different things that the cast was doing at that time and it was something of a safe place for him. So that's why he wanted to involve it. Uh In the book perks is really the, the place where his friend group gets along the best, the place where they have something to do and to work towards the show, they end up making fan scenes, they end up creating their shows, I believe in the book, it's monthly shows where each character is represented by a character from the movie. So, one of the most flamboyant characters in it plays Frank, uh the scared uncertain character plays Rocky, the, you know, beautiful girl next door is played as Janet. Um So I think that was a really cool representation and a really cool way of showing how perks of being a wallflower people matched up with the Rocky Horror pitchers show as he saw it in the nineties. That's awesome. And, and Stephen, it still comes around your guys show occasionally like you've talked to him about all this stuff. Yeah. Yeah, he and I are actually friends. We email each other, which I don't know about you, but it's, we're talking to people you look up to as if they're real people. I don't know. I think it's strange sometimes, but he's very, very nice whenever he comes to Pittsburgh to visit family, he usually stops in to some of our rehearsals and watches us rehearse or if he can, he'll come see a show in which we usually invite him up for the pitch at the beginning and hang out with him afterwards. I actually got to hang out with him after a rehearsal once and we drove through the Fort Pit tunnels together, which is really neat. Oh, that's awesome. Total perks moment. Yeah. In the book, they go through the Fort Pitt tunnels and in the movie they do that as well listening to David Bowie. However, I request did that. We listened to a Bruce Springsteen song whenever we did it. That's very on brand. I approve. Although I have to me meg brought this up while we were watching the movie the other night. She was like, oh, what is, what is this group that goes to Rocky Horror and drives through a tunnel? And it's like, I've never heard this song before. Who's this David Bowie guy? I don't know. That's some people I don't want, don't cast. Yeah. I mean, if you look at the mixed tapes, I mean, like Charlie's never even heard of the Smiths, you know. So, I, I don't know, I guess they were just sitting around listening to the Pittsburgh Polka the whole time I listened to it all on vinyl, but never heard of this lead Zon band. Uh, I don't know. I don't know, but that, that David Bowie sure sounds like some guy with like space spiders. Uh, yeah, I don't know. They sound very similar. Oh, fantastic. It's a great story, a great coming of age story. And I mean, I, I love that. It's so centered in Pittsburgh, right? Like it really embraces the setting. Yes. But it's still, you know, representative of any small ish city where a lot of these suburban kids try to find places to make themselves feel ok and feel welcome in this world. Imagine feeling. Ok. Yeah. What Cha Bowski always wanted to make a film out of this story, but it took a decade after the novel was published by MTV books in 1999 to make the movie a reality. See Bowski was pretty busy in the mid 2000 s having written the film adaptation of rent in 2005 as well as other screenplays and other things as well. But eventually the film adaptation was produced and released in 2012 to a hugely positive of critical reception. Cha Bowski actually directed the movie as well as helped write the screenplay of it. Oh, very cool. Yeah, that was his directorial debut. Oh, yeah, that was his first movie he directed and then afterwards he did some other movies too. Yeah, we don't talk about the other movies. We don't talk about Evan Hansen. It was all right there, Steven, what did, what did you, why did you, what did you do the Rocky horror scenes for? I don't know why I started so disappointed there. I'm just really mad that the Deron hits movie is so fucking bad. Anyway, honestly, it's honestly, it's not, it's not even Stephen's fault. It's literally Ben and Mark Platt's fault. The movie actually holds up despite the fact that Ben Platt has five o'clock shadow as like a Twinkie senior in high school. I thought we were just going to leave it at Twinkie. Yeah. Also that and the Rocky horror scenes for the perks of being a wallow movie were all filmed in Pittsburgh and it even featured members of the J C C P. So, like, what was that like? Like, how did your cast get involved? What was the shooting for that like? Yeah. So our president at that time was Jordan and he was working as a P A on perks of being a wallflower. And it just so happened that Steven really wanted us in because a lot of the Rocky horror scenes had people who had never seen Rocky Horror performing as a Rocky horror cast. Um So the J C C P helped, you know, with the floor show, we supplied the boas and things like that. Um And also taught them the steps and you know, did the chant of step, step, step, kick, step and all of that um to try and help them out. And it was a lot of fun. We got to do filming inside the theater where we do Rocky Horror. Now at the Hollywood Theater, that was the place that they filmed a lot of the Rocky horror scenes. That's our home and has been our home for a long time. So a lot of us actually are in the movie, in the front rows. We were the ones that were shooting off confetti cannons and yelling a lot of the things you can actually see me specifically whenever Charlie turns and is revealed as Rocky. If you look over his left shoulder. I'm dressed as Riff Raff and I'm the first one to put their hands in the air for it. You probably wouldn't recognize me though because I had long hair at the time. But, yeah, so that was really, really cool afterwards, we went out with the cast and Steven and we all got some breakfast. It was a lot of fun. Um, Steven still talks to us, still asks us questions. I think one of our most fun times was when the cast of Perks came and saw a shelf, they sat up in the balcony and got to watch one of our shows and kind of gained their rocky horror experience that way. Oh, that's so much fun. Just like getting, getting to, to bring these a list actors in and be like, ok, you're in our territory now. Yes. Some of the silliest things that happened though was Ezra Miller is a very fun person to be around, at least whenever he's in Franken Furter gear because I don't know if he had a lot of practice at that time in heels, but he was skipping around, running around and our theater is not level. So I don't know how he was able to do all that. Um, as well as whenever Emma Watson was dressed as Janet, she had a small corset malfunction and we got to see a lot more of Hermione Granger than we expected to see. Oh, yeah, that was fun. Um, and then she, she, she is a beautiful, beautiful person and took the microphone and said, thank you. All her mighty Granger has died today. I'm glad you got to see my tits. How could I have been so stupid? But yes, she's a sweetheart and we got pancakes with her after and said, hey, we've all been there right now. That's the true initiation. We all have been there but none of us are Emma Watson. So, right. Not today. At least our tip picks don't go for millions. Yeah, but it was a very nice um goofy time where just a theater full of people were told when to yell, fuck, when to yell certain callbacks. Um So that at the same time you could hear it, you know, heard well and clearly, but it was a lot of fun. I would do it in, but probably with at least a little bit more knowledge as to how these things work because I didn't realize that it would take all day to film just some rocky horror scenes. I'm used to being at the theater and just doing the show and we had to watch floor show on repeat for I think an hour. So just like rehearsals like this is, it was just like rehearsal where you just watch floor show and you just chant kick, kick, kick so many times. Yeah. I, I honestly think one of the funniest things that I noticed while I was watching the movie, all of their like, uh backstage kind of stuff where they're in their dressing rooms and whatever. I looked at it and I'm just like, man, that's, that's a poor representation. J C C P's, you know, Clubhouse is way bigger and nicer than that is like, but it's not. Right. Yeah. Um, but a lot of it was filmed at the Hollywood, um, all of the audience parts, all of the Rocky Horror on stage parts and then the dressing room parts were actually filmed in the green room upstairs. Oh, neat. Ok. So I've got a bone to pick with perks. This kid starts going to Rocky. He hangs out with the cast. There's even shots in the movie of him helping to put together a fucking Rocky fan scene and he ends up performing on stage and yet the entire second half of the movie isn't all about Rocky cast drama seems a little unbelievable if you ask me zero out of 10 Stephen, I mean, the kids on cast, right? So wouldn't that mean that all of it is just cast drama? Uh Check out the big brain on Brad. Brad was a total asshole in perks. No. Thank you. Wait. Was Brad the closeted homophobic jock? Yeah. Oh yeah. But seriously, thank you for that whole rundown Sam. I know details about perks have crept their way out into the community over the years, but never in such a holistic way. Awesome. Story, of course, so slightly tangential and not to be overly judgy. But how do we kind of rank the these big three entry points that came out, you know, in this millennium, Perks Glee and you know, the 2016 remake, I mean, in, in my mind, they kind of serve different purposes like Perks is a great example of kind of the journey that a lot of people go through. Specifically the kind of people that are drawn to Rocky Glee is more about the message that Rocky contains. I mean, it's certainly sterilized for network TV. But the message at the end of the episode is that Rocky is for those who choose to take part and it doesn't even matter if you know, spoilers here, they end up performing just for themselves, you know, without an audience like that's not the whole point of Rocky and what the remake is just Costco brand Rocky like Lee, the songs still bop. It wasn't poorly produced, it was just not what the community wanted. But I think as this entire discussion proves that the community wasn't really the target audience for the remake. It's those new cast members that are joining today who saw the remake when it came out when they were in high school. And I mean, I think that like we said, Rocky is supposed to be the place that is welcoming of the weirdos. I think that a lot of new people to Rocky is looking for a place to fit in a place where they can be themselves or at least a new version of themselves. It's a place to explore. Um I think really that Perks Glee and the remake all make that a big fact that whether you like yourself or not, there is space for you here. And I actually want to take a second to specifically talk about the Glee episode, Rocky Horror Glee Show. I have been asking Aaron to write a, a snack segment on the Rocky Hole show for 70 episodes and he still hasn't done it. So I'm gonna take two minutes to go over my feelings about it because something tells me that Aaron will never write a part about the Rocky Horror Glee Show which makes you be sad. I, I watched it again last night and um yeah. No, I'm still not going to write anything about that. It's good. It is good. It is good. Also meat loaf and Barry Boser current in the episode and that's really fun. Uh So I love Glee. I love Glee so much. I think it is the most tone deaf show on the face of the planet every single time they do something good. Art talks about his penis and it ruins it, you know, but Glee when it was out was monumental because it was one of the first times that a show of that caliber had unabashedly queer characters in it. Oh, Yeah. When Glee came out, it was one of the first and only times that there was this diverse of a queer cast of a show of this caliber and this episode isn't season two. So it was like, right when Glee started getting like absurdly popular and they took a show that was traditionally considered a taboo and they wrapped the idea of queer culture and a sense of community and identity and belonging into it. Obviously, Ryan Murphy did not do the greatest job at it because he thought that it was totally OK to cast Will Schuster who is the teacher as Rocky to Leah Michelle's Janet. At that point in the show has already had an obsession with him that obviously not even borders on was straight up inappropriate and they thought that it would be OK to cast him as Rocky, but just so he could do Tao with Jama Maze's character or whatever. But if we're putting that aside, the episode itself is truly fantastic. It is one of the better episodes of Rocky because it does something that a lot of major, major cable shows didn't do before. I think that's the glee episode of Rock. That's the Glee episode of Rocky. I think that the Rocky episode of Glee is one of the better presentations that people have of Rocky and mainstream media. And I also think that not only does Glee do this but perks and the remake in pretty much any place that has Rocky Horror, the actual topic of discussion, the actual subject of it is the audience. Um It's about watching it and then choosing to become a Rocky horror performer with Perks Charlie goes and sees the show, sees his friends doing this and then eventually gains, you know, the, the, the gusto to go up there and do it himself with the Glee episode. It's not about having an audience, it's about being the audience and then choosing to do this with your friends with the remake. It starts off with Trixie who is enough Charrette, who is part of the audience that goes into the movie. Um I just think it's Rocky is one of those cool things where it's about the audience and the climax of, you know, anything that has Rocky Horror in it, the climax of it is when the audience decides to become a shadow cast or to perform as Rocky Horror agreed. And also when will shuster and Emma do touch and Glee and they have Britney and Santana watching them. And it's funny because they're Magenta in Colombia in their stage show, Genius, genius. I mean, the homages in all of these are just fantastic. Like Glee really, really nailed it on that one. Although I gotta, I gotta take issue with that one. He says he needs to rehearse Rocky and he chooses to do touch. Uh If only there was another song in this movie that uh that Rocky sings during, if only, even if we look into the, the TV show thing, like I know there was an episode of Cold Case that had Rocky Horror where Barry Boss and it's kind of the same thing. It's about the audience and the distraction of the, the movie and getting out there and doing what needs to be done, which is murder. That's an absolutely fantastic episode. If anybody out there hasn't seen it, like, it's probably visually, I think one of the best homages to Rocky, like they shot match scenes from the film, like the camera moves and the angles and stuff, but they do it in that like, you know, the, the, the C SI crime scene kind of way and it, it is, it is just fantastic. I absolutely love that. Barry Boswick puts on an amazing performance in it. It's just great. I love that episode. The only thing I didn't like about that, that episode was that Rocky Horror, all of the music was played in a different order. Yeah. Yeah. Although I mean, if you go by perks apparently over at J C C P, you go straight from the intro to a floor show. So that must be a short film. Y don't do it just the way I like. It saves a lot of time. But those are just the big on ramps from the last two decades. Rocky is almost 50 years old at this point. I know, we can go even deeper into this. What's the earliest example of mass market Rocky exposure? Because it's got to be fame back in 1980 I think. Right. Oh, for sure. I mean, just like Perks. Fame was another coming of age story. This time though, the main character goes to Rocky at the eighth street Playhouse in New York. If Perks was the on ramp for millennials fame was definitely the on ramp for Gen X and it was a phenomenon. It won two Academy Awards for best original song, a best original score and a Golden Globe. Also for best original song. There was even a TV show spinoff in 82. It really was the first big example of Rocky coming to the masses. This was right as Rocky as a pop culture sensation was just entering the zeitgeist shock treatment was on the horizon. The fan club was gaining worldwide notoriety and Rocky was the big midnight sensation sweeping the country and fame shines a giant spotlight on that community just like Perks fame featured members of the local Rocky horror cast. The eighth Street cast from New York can be seen in the film, including Sapiro, founder and president of the fan club. He hosted and did the famous R O C K Y cheer, which perks would later replicate this time featuring Jordan from the J C C P. Sapiro tells the story of fame in his 1990 book, Creatures of the night. So in May of 1979 the casting director for fame called up Sal and told him about this new movie that was planning on being produced. It was centered around kids at the high school of performing arts in New York City. They were scouting for talented teenagers. And the casting director and the director Alan Parker came to the eighth street Playhouse on a Saturday night to watch the festivities. That night, there had been a heckler in the audience. And as Sal was doing his pre show announcements, a heckler screamed out, get on with the show to which sa replied, this is the fucking show. And if you don't like it, you can go see the movie in Staten Island. Which side note, if I ever get to use that line when I'm hosting, I will die. A happy man and the audience loved the quip. And so did the filmmakers. A few days later, the director asked for a meeting with Sal and was told that he had been able to get the rights to use Time Warp in the film for a sequence where Fame's lead character loses her performing inhibitions at a midnight showing. And he wanted Sal's hosting speech complete with the heckler to appear in the movie. The Rocky Heart sequences and Fame were shot over two days at the Eighth Street Playhouse and the audience was a mixture of Eighth Street regulars neighboring floor show casts and professional actors included in this list of extras was Dori Hartley and Sal's sister Lilias. And in the final film you see Sal doing his hosting routine, rebuffing the heckler and leading the Rocky cheer. This cameo cemented him in the worldwide consciousness as the leader of the Rocky Horr phenomenon and the fan club. But most importantly, and relevant to our sack snack as Sal recalls, fame exposed Rocky to a huge group of new fans. What was previously a primarily white waspy audience gained new exposure with fame's urban multiethnic appeal. It brought a lot of people to Rocky who would have otherwise never been aware of the film. And thus that kicked off the decade, that kind of defined the Rocky Horror experience. Rocky flourished throughout the eighties. The fan club became officially recognized by Fox for the 10th anniversary in 19 85 in 1990 for the 15th anniversary, we had the first ever Us V H S release again, a very big onboarding point for anyone who wanted to experience the cult film in 1995. For the 20th anniversary, vh1 first aired Rocky Horror alongside a special hosted by Meatloaf, bringing Rocky into millions of homes that might have never seen the now iconic Midnight movie and well, that brings us to the 25th in 2000 and all the stuff we've mentioned already perks Glee and the remake over the next 20 years. So this is a pretty clear pattern around every five years or so often. Coinciding with anniversaries. Some big on ramp generally happens. But let's talk about all those in between years where you're bringing on new cast members from the latest big on ramp, keeping a cast afloat, engaged and relevant requires a lot of flexibility. Yeah, it's the stuff you do within a cast on the local level that really counts. It's the meetings, the rehearsals, booking outside shows, you know, just actively working on costumes and blocking and going out and visiting other casts and just all of that other rocky paraphernalia and this is where stuff like theme shows. Preshow Con and all the non Rocky movies fit in like shock treatment. Reefer madness, rebo so on and so forth. We'll definitely do the occasional theme show here when you're lucky enough to have talented people on a cast that want to be doing more and they're willing to put in the effort. Rocky as in the Rocky community. I supposed to be classified as the wider shadow casting community is really great at doing more than just Rocky. Yeah, you guys do a ton of other shows over at J C C P MEG and I were just over there for shock treatment and we're gonna be seeing everyone up in Buffalo for shocky next weekend along with a ton of people from all over the northeast. A lot of members of the community have been traveling lately. It's been a fantastic engagement opportunity and honestly, a great honor for people who are further along in their rocky career. The kind of thing that keeps folks around for the next five years or the next decade. And it's been fantastic to see and, and everyone else from the community over the last few months, especially after the whole panorama. And there's so much more in store for the rest of the year. I think we've seen very clearly that a big draw for the wider community is outside shows like shock treatment and reefer ma this and all the shows where casts are collaborating with guest performers. So for anyone out there who has the people clamoring to do things like shock treatment or Buffy or maybe they just want to dip their toe into something that isn't traditional Rocky, something like a comprehensive theme night with a choreograph pre show. What are some tips for anyone who is branching out? I mean, I think that if we're going with a theme show because Rocky is kind of the guiding point there, it's a lot easier for people to get into doing alternative shows. After theme shows, theme shows can be anywhere between very, very specific, like specifically Disney villains and Disney characters. Like I know in New York did to a little bit more broader, like eighties themed Rocky horror that we've done before where we just basically had a, everyone looked like they were from the eighties. They can pick their favorite eighties character. Be it a cartoon, a celebrity, whatever else. We did a similar thing with like a punk show before. And I think that vagueness with theme shows allows for more participation. Whereas these alternative shows are a little bit more specific and a little bit more, more work for the cast to do. Oh, for sure. And I mean, the, the first stage of that, right, is like, just getting out there with your idea, talking to your cast members. Right. Right. I mean, for us at the J C C P, um, we do other shows, alternative shows quite a lot. Um, so we kind of almost have a schedule where in, um, we'll do shock treatment sometime either in the summer or late winter, one or the other. Um, and we'll do Rio the opposite of that and we'll do Reefer Madness in April because of good for 20 reasons. I don't get it. Oh, it's because it's just a good day. Um, it's not too hot, not too cold, it's just light jacket weather, you know. Oh, ok. Yeah. Yeah, I got it. Now. It's Hitler's birthday. Yeah. Thank you for clarifying. I think that with alternative shows there is a lot more emphasis on either screen accuracy or at least making it your own. Whereas with theme shows it's more or less just a fun party and a fun way to do Rocky a little bit differently with theme shows. We've had different things like Batman shows and come book shows, cartoon shows where people can be really creative uh with their costuming but still follow the same blocking with shock treatment. It's all different. Everything's different every time. And our props are so big and so different. Whereas Rocky doesn't have a lot of big huge G props. I don't know. What, what do you do for your theme shows and alternative shows? We don't really do any alternative shows. Honestly, we haven't done a theme show in a while yet either. But I think the reason why we haven't done any theme shows is just because we're settling into a new theater right now. It's getting to the point where literally every other show that we are doing right now, you know, we're adding onto our lights, we're adding onto our props. We're trying to figure out kind of like where we sit in this new theater before we can put something together like that. But I think that something that is really important, especially, you know, using us as an example is like, you got to make sure that you even have those resources to begin with. So like for us right now, we don't really have those resources yet. For example, you can't do Rocky on ice when only three of your cast members can skate. You know, you can't do a big preshow that includes live vocals. If you're the only person that sings, I mean, you could, but then you're just going to look like an asshole because then everything clearly the preshow is supposed to be about you. And I know we're talking about the Rocky horror community here where all of us have the biggest egos on the planet. But sometimes we do have to dial it back for the good of the audience. And also you can't do a R K O size preshow without R K O size numbers, you need to make sure that you have the cast, the enough cast in involved in order to do these different shows. Guesting at shows is great, but you don't have that time to practice with people um from other casts. So I feel like a lot of guesting tends to be semi theme shows as well. Um It's, it's the draw. Um It's the thing to draw people in, hey, come see people from a different cast and see if it jives, you know, and via Pao is actually a perfect example of this because we had talked about this when we had Zeti Zey Gofer on our show a couple of weeks ago when he was talking about Victorious and me and Aaron were talking about like how wonderful it would be able to, to pull something like that off here with N Y C. But the realism is is that we literally can't like sure the theater that they were able to book and rent for Victorious as a preshow the video, preshow that they put out is beautiful and wonderful, right? But we literally can't do that in New York City because all of those big beautiful theaters are Broadway theaters and I don't know about y'all, but I don't want to know how many zeros are at the end of an eight hour booking fee for one of the Broadway theaters. If it is even possible. Seriously, we are, we are committed to filming our stuff. If we do video, preshow, we are committed to filming that shit in our apartments, which I'm not saying is anything is better or worse than what they did with Victorious. Obviously, it's worse than what they did with Victorious because have you seen Victorious every night? Yeah, every night before I go to bed, I just pop it on and put it on a repeat. I fall asleep to it. So that also brings in the idea of, you know, your resources. What do you have to work with that you can use to put on this best, the best pre show or the best, the night that you're doing and you have to be really, really creative if nobody has money for those costumes because we don't get paid to do this. And I think that that's one of the reasons why a lot of people don't like alternative shows and don't like, I shouldn't say people don't like alternative shows. I think everybody loves them as an idea. But then when they realize that there is more of a cost that goes into it outside of Rocky, especially for something that they're probably, unless your cast is name the Junior Chamber of Commerce players, you're doing it. It's a one off, you know, it's gonna be rare, difficult for you to perform that over and over and over again to justify spending all of that money, all of your own hard earned money. All you have to do is change your cast name to J C C P and it just magically happens. Oh, shit, we've been doing it wrong this whole time. Only agreed. I mean, that, that's a lot of it, right. It's like, especially if you haven't done a lot of theme shows or outside, you know, or, or other productions out there. Like you, you've got to come up with this idea, you've got to like, make sure your cast is on board with it that you have the resources for it. And then you really have to play that like, logistic game of judging if the payoff is worth the cost and the hassle. Right? Like if you can't get 10 people together to do a rocky horror rehearsal, I don't think you're gonna be able to get 25 people together to rehearse the orgy for Reefer madness, right? I mean, if I, if you don't have the budget for props, you probably aren't gonna be able to use mirrors for look what I did to my ad in shock treatment, right? Like you've got to really set the expectations around that and that's not saying that you can't do something scaled back, but you want to make sure that it's cohesive and that everybody is able to kind of participate in the way that they really want to. Yeah, I think a good example of that is um how Buffalo is doing their shock treatment. Our stage at J C C P land is huge ginormous and we have a place to store all of our ginormous props. The, the theater that Buffalo is using is much, much smaller. So their props are much, much smaller and they look great because it matches the space. Yeah, it's definitely like finding those constraints and working within them, right? Like that's the classic Rocky. Like, what can we do? We don't have boas. All right. What do we got, you know, kind of thing? Yeah. And I think that it lends itself like the scale down this of it lends itself to Rocky because that's how it started. You know, it, like when Rocky started, there were no props, there were no set pieces. It was just the people going up in front of the screen and doing their shit, all of that stuff came after. And I think now when you do these alternative shows, there's a level of expectation on how big a lot of them should, should look and, and when you have big thunderous productions like reefer, you expect it to have these like awesome set designs. You have all these people on stage because it is objectively, it is a more difficult show to shadow cast than Rocky is because Rocky was the O G. It is the Y O G for the reason. And then that idea of shadow casting then spread to different shows. So Rocky started bare bones, all of the others didn't. So then there becomes an expectation that those shows have to be big and thunderous and full of like these wonderful, amazing set pieces. Whereas realistically like, like I said, you got to understand your resources if your resources are not that big, but you still want to put on the show, it's still feasible. You just have to get a little more creative with it. And there's definitely nothing wrong with simple pantomimes even instead of a replacement, just pantomime because for the most part, a lot of the props involved are one off props. You can just reference the weed garden over on stage left. You know, it doesn't, you don't have to build it. You don't have to build a whole thing like that. Um Even with Reefer madness, I know a lot of our rehearsals right now. We pretend like we have our reefer sticks because we're not having all these cigarettes just being crushed underfoot throughout every rehearsal, you know. Um And, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that because from an audience standpoint, the audience is usually pretty far away. Really? Um So would they see all these props and even like shock treatment? Yes, you can do the big giant letters and everything like that. But is the giant D E N T O N letters necessary? I mean, we think so, but I get it if you don't, I mean, and, and this is why theme shows are a great entry point, right? If, if you are hearing us talk about this and you're like, it's so great that you guys can go off and do all of this crazy stuff and all that. I mean, if you just want to dip your toe into it, if you just want to get your cast kind of in this direction, start with something easy. Start with that eighties theme night, that seventies theme night, the, the Pokemon, you know, theme night, whatever it is that gets your cast excited that people are willing to say like, all right. Yeah, I could go out and buy an ash costume. That's fine. I, I could, I could make use of that for something else. I'll do Franken Fur or Pikachu. You know, like you can, you can get people on board with some of these kinds of things and maybe they will find that. Ok, that was really fun. What else could we do is, is what about shock treatment? You know, you gotta gotta start small within your expectations and then it, it will grow just like all rocky stuff, it will grow. And also, I mean, you have to keep in mind the inclusivity. Um if your theater doesn't have the availability or the space or, I don't know the rehearsal space even, you got to kind of keep that in mind as well as can, you know, cast, do these things. I know that Reefer Madness has a lot of dance numbers. If you're, if you're expecting every single person to be able to do these dance numbers, that's not gonna work. Um So you just play to each cast members, strength and each, you know, cast members willingness to do things. You can't expect everything. And I think that's really actually a good way of looking at not only these specialty shows or theme shows, but Rocky in general because I think that that makes way for more people to do it if we're being inclusive in not just Rocky, but also theme shows and shock treatment and Reefer madness, more people will be able to do them and it'll change, it'll be a little bit different every time we do it. That was one of the reasons why I loved our preshow. We did a few years back for pride. We did low by Tatra featuring Rope all and for anyone who knows the song, obviously, the verses are wrapped and then the chorus is sung and the chorus has a very like epic sound to it. So we wanted to do something that was kind of conducive to what everybody was good at who were interested in it naturally. You know, we have been known for our more like intricate dance related uh pre shows because a lot of the people on the New York City cast are dancers. We have a lot of people who are very good at movement and there are some people on our cast who are not, you know, me included, I can take direction but I'm not a dancer. So when we put together low as an idea, we had, you know, three dancers, we had Savannah Adam and one of our alums Megan who were all exceptional dancers and incredible choreographers who were the people who kind of like led the charge for there. But then the verses, it was like kind of like acting dancing at the same time kind of thing. And the moves were simplified to be more inclusive of anybody who wanted to be interested in it. And normally when we do a preshow, if we have an idea of a preshow, that preface is immediately at the beginning, like we are looking for people who are experienced dancers for this. We are looking for people who are experienced in video editing for this. We are looking for people who are X Y and Z and also with N Y C. It's like anyone can pitch a preshow too. So even if this show, this one that you really want to do is inaccessible for you. There's another one that's going to be coming up the alley. That is more your speed inclusivity and accessibility matters. Oh, absolutely. I mean, pre pre shows are a great kind of middle ground, right? If you don't want to just be doing Rocky, but you're not quite ready to take on a whole separate show. Do a preshow that's on non rocky. Preshow. It'll really, really kick you in the ass real fast. And like you will understand how much work goes into just putting together a five minute number or a 10 minute number. And then just, that'll set your expectations for if you want to, you know, suddenly do Reefer Madness or Buffy or something like it's that ramped up till 11. Yeah. Try to put together something like Rocky goes to Broadway or once upon a Saturday night and, you know, two pre shows that we have done that we have brought to cons that have taken literal months to perfect. And then try to see if you can do an alternative show. But even otherwise, even the smaller pre shows I think are really important to the community as well as the inclusivity in, within a cast because I may not have, you know, the ability to do a choreograph number with 10 or 15 people, but I can probably choreograph something with my friend on cast and that's kind of how, whenever we did our tick tick boom, preshow, it was just me and um Rosie Cheeks and that's it. We both just liked take tick boom. We thought it worked for the characters and we did it just the two of us and we showed the director and said, hey, can we do this and it worked out really well? Um And I think that's a lot easier for people to get into is the smaller ones and then work up to the big ones. But that's also saying things like, yeah, sure, Rocky may be the O G but like honestly shock treatment, you just pop in and out and you stand and talk a lot. There's not really a lot of dancing involved except for ID. So I, I think that each different thing that we do is important in order to keep Rocky going. Um, in order to keep shadow casting going in order to keep a community where people are just being weird and goofing off going. Oh, yeah, absolutely. It's, it's all about engagement and these are all great ways to keep your cast engaged, whether it's 20 people for a dance number or it's you and your friend singing to Paradise by the dashboard lights and just having a good time, you're gonna, you're gonna get something out of it and you know, if you haven't tried it, you know, on your cast out there, maybe, maybe give it a thought Yeah. And even if you wanted to as, like, a little trial thing to see if people are into it, even do it as, like a Riff on Trixie as, like, you know, for science fiction double feature. If I'm thinking about doing it, doing an eighties show, maybe I'll do an eighties Trixie and see how that goes over first. And really, then it's, it's just you doing it more or less if you wanted it to be amazing. I think these are all absolutely fantastic tips for everybody out there. Did we hit everything? Is there anything else we want to cover? No, I, I think this wraps up this week's sack snack. Always wrap up your sack. That is terrible fucking advice. You're a terrible fuck vice. Anyway, thank you so much for joining us today, Sam. I'm honestly just sorry that we didn't have more time to talk about all the other stuff that we've had so much fun sitting down and shooting the shit about in person. We're absolutely going to have to have you back on the show. Whenever I finally sit down and watch shock treatment, you're gonna watch shock treatment. I mean, no, we'll watch it together. We'll hold hands the entire time. Why do you got to tempt me with a terrible time? And that's our show as a longtime listener. And first time call in, I would love to personally thank Jacob for his work on the script. And Aaron down in Tennessee for doing God's work as an audio editor and making us all sound like we know what we're doing and hopefully auto tune me. If anyone has a question that they'd like to answer on air for our A A Q segment. A back some community news that they like to talk about or even a cool story to share with the community. We would love to include it on our show. Just go to our website rocky talky podcasts dot com and fill out our contact form to tell us about it. And if you want to check out the JCC P, we've got some great stuff going on April 23rd Reefer Madness movie, Musical April 30th, the Rocky Horror Hatch show, as well as so many more things. Of course, all of that will link for Yin in our show notes. Oh, you use Ys, right? Aha. It's because the script told me to good job. If you're enjoying Rocky Talkie, please help us out by rating reviewing and subscribing to the show. You know, it makes the podcast more accessible to new listeners which helps us to really grow the show. And if you on even more Rocky talky content, check out the show on Facebook, youtube, Instagram and tiktok, all at Rocky Talkie podcasts. We'll talk to you all next week. Good bye bye. Bye bye now. Good bye. Oh boy. I was a good Tory. So if you have a line let Aaron take it. Yeah, that's fine with me. You can take all of my lines. Born Richard Timothy Smith on March 25th, 1942 in some place in England. Thanks. How do you say that? Shelton? I'm assuming we going with that. Sure. After performing and you fuck one sheet and, and something, staff writer, Jacob feels surprised hasn't been talked about on the show yet. O'brien has done work on Age X sequel to Rocky Horror. Not Shock treatment titled Revenge of The Old Queen of Rocky Horror, which was indefinitely shelved after the studio head, Joe Roth was ousted from Fox in 1993. Jacob. We have both talked about revenge of the old queen so many goddamn times that it's just mind boggling. You don't listen to the show at this point. And second, it's not called Revenge of the Old Queen of Rocky Horror. It's just called Revenge of the old queen. Rocky and fact straight, I would have cut that whole paragraph. I, I wanna make a teeny weenie. I want to uh God damn it. So you wanna make it teeny weenie? Wow. In just seven days at the high school of performing arts in New York at the New York skitty.