Rocky Horror Show

It’s a tale as old as time. Two clean cut American kids meet, fall in love and are engaged to be married. Driving through a storm, their car breaks down and they seek help from a mansion that just happens to be occupied by alien transsexuals from the planet Transylvania.

I’m sorry, what?

A parody of the science fiction movies of its time, and a rock musical on both stage and screen, The Rocky Horror show is a worldwide phenomenon and quite possibly one of the strangest things I have ever seen.

Upon walking into the Sydney premiere last week I was greeted by an extraordinary amount of fishnet stockings, basques and platform high heels – and that was just the audience. My friend Livia and I queued for the obligatory slushie cocktails in the glowing plastic “glasses” and lamented the fact we were clearly wearing too many clothes. We took our seats, wrapped ourselves in our complimentary red feather boas and spent a good many minutes star spotting in the crowd.  Clearly Rocky Horror is the MUST SEE musical of the moment!

The show opened with the very talented Jayde Westaby as a 1950s usherette, introducing the show with my now favourite song “Science Fiction/Double Feature”. (After all, who wouldn’t love a song with lyrics like “Flash Gordon was there in silver underwear”?) and the curtain was pulled aside to reveal a fantastically bright, almost cartoon–like set.

I was looking forward to seeing Craig McLaughlin in the show that he originally played in 1992 and which earned him the Helpman Award for Best Actor in a Musical for the role in 2014. Clearly I wasn’t the only one. His appearance on stage as Frank N Furter was greeted with thunderous cheers and applause. He was clearly very comfortable in the part, not only in his high heels, but with sassy comebacks to comments from the audience. He was outrageous, hilarious, and as for those biceps… well, like Janet sang, “I’m a muscle fan”.

Stephen Mahy and Amy Lehpamer were fabulously cast as the naïve Brad and Janet, and I was delighted to see Jayde back on stage as Magenta. I want to see and hear more of Jayde. Kristian Lavercombe was fantastic as Riff Raff, while Bert Newton as the narrator was, well, Bert (as underwhelming to me as always, but still a crowd favourite). Yet it's clear this show is all about Craig in his role as Frank, and he is the star.

 The show is high energy and a lot of laughs. Unlike the original, which I have heard was shocking and made plenty of people uncomfortable; this “tamed down” version plays up the comedy. Craig hams it up as Frank, and the crowd adores him for it. I can’t imagine anyone playing a better Frank N Furter in this production.  

Liv and I leapt to our feet to perform the Time Warp, delighting in the confusion of some audience members who were very taken aback by the whole thing.  We sang along with the cast, reliving every school disco of our childhood. The songs are catchy, the atmosphere electric, and I had an absolute blast.

The Rocky Horror show is playing at the Lyric Theatre in Sydney until 7th June. Don't miss your chance to see it. To book your tickets click here. 

Note: Livia and I attended the premiere as guests of Gordon Frost Productions. My review is unbiased and all thoughts are my own.

Dirty Dancing - The Classic Story on Stage

When Dirty Dancing hit the screens in 1987, I wasn’t allowed to see it. At 13 years of age, my parents deemed it too risque, and it wasn’t until it was released on VHS that I got to watch it at a friend’s house. I sat glued to the TV set, the coming of age story capturing my imagination and my heart. Patrick Swayze replaced John Travolta as the man of my dreams and I dreamed of a love story like Johnny and Baby’s.

In 2004 I saw Dirty Dancing – The Classic Story On Stage during it’s worldwide premiere season in Sydney. Kym Valentine played the gawky 17 year old Baby and her chemistry with Josef Brown as Johnny was tangible. The set was simple, the songs were magical, although somewhere along the line I had missed that this stage show was not a musical. I expected the leads to sing, and was disappointed when they didn’t. It tainted my view of the show for years to follow.

Recently I had the opportunity to see it again, 10 years after the original debut. Over the years the show has adapted and grown and so have I. Rather than lament the fact the leads don’t sing, I embraced the show for what it was – a nostalgic walk down memory lane and a new way to appreciate the original movie. I shared it with a good friend of the same “vintage” as me.

Kirby Burgess was brilliant as Baby, delivering most of the comic moments in the film. Watching her clumsily learn to dance was a highlight,  her true dancing ability masked by her over exaggerated steps. Her passion and enthusiasm is infectious, and she shone as the star of the show.

Kurt Phelan is clearly an accomplished dancer and does Swayze proud in the dance numbers, but I longed to see more chemistry between him Kirby. I missed seeing those vulnerable moments in Johnny that made Baby fall for him, which I guess is the hazard of a stage production vs the intimacy of a movie screen.



These moments of wishing for the movie were more than compensated by the “musical” additions to the stage show, particularly Mark Vincent singing “In The Still of The Night” as Billy.

There are new scenes not seen in the movie which add a new feel to an old favourite, but the story remains largely true to the film with scenes you know and love re-enacted live. The atmosphere in the theatre is electric.

Like the rest of the audience, we cheered when Johnny delivered his line "Nobody puts Baby in a corner" and when Baby masters the lift in the final dance. We thrilled at the memories of 1987, and the dream of meeting a dance instructor like Johnny on a family holiday. (I went to a caravan on the South Coast every Summer and I never once gave up hoping).

Overall, Dirty Dancing – The Classic Story on Stage is a lot of fun. If you are anything like me and have a soft spot for the movie it is definitely worth the ticket. The story is timeless, the music is uplifting and the time spent in 1963 makes me long for a simpler time (backyard abortions and fights for civil rights aside!).

Grab a girlfriend and go see it. You may just have “The Time Of Your Life” (of course I had to say it!). and then want to watch the movie again