with the day the earth stood still. How he told us, will he stand? And flash Gordon with the heavens over and away. God reigns with the invisible man.
Hi everyone and welcome to the Naughty Podcast. It's a Naughty Podcast at this hosted bar in Northern North. I am one of your hosts, Sam. And I am the other host, Paul.
And joining us tonight is an absolute dream come true. We have, how do I put it in words? We have the legendary, the great Richard O'Brien. Thank you.
So thank you so much for joining us. And I'm a bit speechless at this moment as well. But... I'm not.
I'll talk to you. It's fine. So women should control the world, shouldn't they? Exactly.
Richard the bitchens always used to say that. I get to agree absolutely entirely. But the money stream, that man went, he was a nice voice for rationality, wasn't he? But Sami is the sacred boss of everything we do, so that's fine.
But we have a little bit of a disclaimer. So if you want to read your disclaimer, it's kind of like a little bit of our mission statement as well. Yeah, but... So everything discussed in today's episode.
Here's our opinions and our opinions alone. If you'd like to discuss anything from today's episode, I'm gonna join us on Facebook, page You Can Join Us on the Discord, or the comment section where we can have a normal discussion. Well, what we want to have is anyone coming for us and telling us our opinions are wrong, because we can all agree to disagree and fund them. So let's keep it fun, keep it kind and keep the toxic behaviour out of her nerdism.
Very well said. Thank you. And I think that's more important in missions these days as well, because with social media and all the different vices that come with it, it's hard to stay positive, it's hard to stay... I can say there's so many negative connotations out there, but we're here to kind of embrace and enjoy...
No, but either celebrate Rocky Horror. Yes, 50 years of Rocky Horror as well. Not just that, we did get a chance to watch, like I say, Linus' documentary, Strange Journey, The Story of Rocky Horror this week. And I have to say it was magical.
I fell in love with it as well. Just ask me your experience as well, Richard. What was your first reaction to watching the documentary? I was relief, it was my feeling.
I had countless overtures from different companies wanting to, you know, take note of this 50 year anniversary. But to have Linus come and say he wanted to do it was wonderful, because I knew that I was in safe hands. I knew the project was in safe hands. I didn't want somebody to be halfway through the project and the person behind it with the money at the top.
Let's get a bit more funky with the attitude. Let's make this more interesting and go down a negative alleyway, which is just for simply getting clickbait really. Yeah. Oh, 100%.
Oh, 100%. And when we're watching the documentary, it was such a love letter to Rocky Horror. And I'll say to yourself in the cast as well, it was just so beautifully told. Like as I described, it felt like I was watching magic.
Like literally there was times where I was sitting there smiling. I was crying at points just because it brought, and this is what I'll do. But that's why I love about Rocky Horror as well. It brings back memories for us because as we made Sami as we talked last week, we experienced it at a very young age, probably younger than we should have, but it's still the themes and the tones of it that kind of brought back.
And as I was saying, like the shock and horror of my mum as I was walking down the street going to school, singing down a street transvestite at 12 year old, was an interesting take in the North East in the summer, but it was definitely an experience as well. But one of the things I did, like say, love part of the documentary as well, was the acoustic versions of the songs that you were doing as a, just a question, is there a CD for an album possibly there? No, but that's interesting to say that because people have actually, since then I've actually said I should do it, just me on it with the guitar doing the songs, maybe with a couple of chums. But my hands are becoming turning into talons, into claws, I asked the writers in the thumbs, and it's terrifying going up in front of an audience now because you never know whether you're going to stuff it up and hit the wrong chord, you know, at the wrong time.
And that's always a worry. I love singing. Thankfully my voice hasn't suffered from old age, but my hands have unfortunately. But to many of course.
I was ground news. I was never a great guitarist. You did a bloody good job on that, and then once on the documentary, because I think they were the moments that really caught us off guard, because I was like, I was sorting in it, and I was like, ripped by everything you were singing. It was so moving.
I loved it. That's very kind of you. So with a turn in 50 years as well, there must be a lot of moments, a lot of memories that the documentary brought back as well. Reminiscent through that time, watching it, what was the experience like for you going back down memory lane?
Well, it's the longevity of rock ears has been a continual surprise. Even after five years, it was a surprise. It's still going. It's still working.
Seven years. Oh, that's a surprise. Still working. Ten years, 15, 20, 30.
I kept, I can't, it's difficult to understand why, because it's a slight piece of theatre. It's an entertainment, a light frothy juvenile piece of entertainment. It meant only to entertain and make a laugh and make a tap your foot and have a nice evening out and a bit of a laugh. But it didn't have any, I was asked recently by a journalist, wherever I thought Rocky was an important piece of theatre.
And I said, well, absolutely, I would have said until this moment, I would have said no. But since, but it has become important in a different way. It's one of the things about our audience as a collective experiences to have disappeared in my lifetime. You know, we don't listen to the same radio every day and listen to the same tip rates every day and discuss more common why it's so we saw on Saturday Night on the television.
We don't share collective experiences very much any day, any more in days. And Rocky is one of those places where it is a collective experience. And our audiences are a rainbow audience, despite default. And that is a really happy, that fills me with joy.
I love that you call like a rainbow audience as well. Because as me and Sami are, we are the alternatives. We are the weird kids. We are still the weird kids now.
And it feels like when we watch Rocky Horror, or even when we discuss Rocky Horror, it feels like there's a place for us. There's a place where we belong and can be a part of. And even now, next year in some and the Rocky Horror is coming back as a stage show. We're making plans with all our friends.
We're going to see it again next year. It's like a tribal event. Yeah. I've been, I've known this.
This has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. I have incredible parents who, you know, incredibly accepted. But I also have a, an amazing, and you know, and I want to tell them, because they will be listening to me. We only chat, we only chat with young young young Charles, who really got us into it.
And the minute I told them about this interview and the fact that sport aligners, the first thing the stage was, it's coming back in January. You come back? I was like, yeah, yeah, I'm going absolutely. And that's what I love about as well.
Because like, we're from the North East of England, where it's meant to be like, called hard, minors down and stuff like that. Where the men and men and the women, like the women, where when the horror comes around, everyone embraces it. Like literally the streets are covered with people walking about in Stiletto's fishnets. And no one.
It's fantastic. The town is just buzzing. And it's like, say them type of moments and that kind of recognition that brings back as well. Yeah.
It's something that resonates with everyone. And just going back to the documentary of it as well, because like this, like without giving too many spoilers, because I know it's coming out in October. Everyone has to see it. Yeah.
The moment that I found was quite special was when you were sitting with Linus reading back the comments when he was telling the story of, like the song from, it's going home and even their reactions. That must have been an emotional moment to hear it, like all the different stories and different, how it's affected too many people like, say in their lives from you as well. Yes. Well, I have heard that over the years as well.
And it's been interesting, hasn't it, to have lived through these times where homosexuality was an illegal act. And in fact, as seen as a psychological disorder, actually, I mean, officially, it was a psychological disorder. That's changed in my lifetime. And to have made all these wonderful progressive steps with liberal democracy and kindness and civility for all.
Turn into this dreadful nightmare of MAGA, America, and right-wing creation of fantasies insisting that for some reason or other, I shouldn't exist, apparently. It's disgraceful. And living in a secular person, a Darwinist, a secular person in a secular world, I find it so rude of these small-minded, medieval-minded people with their Abrahamic creation of fantasy telling us how to live, how to live by their own pathetic, small-minded rules of small-minded world. The world is such a joyous place.
To be alive is a gift. To be given conscious thought is a wonderful gift. To be able to touch, to feel, to know is a gift beyond belief. And to think that we all came from a single cell to this is far more, far more exciting and far more joyous than a miserable, mean-spirited God that wants to be adored continually.
It makes me very cross. That's my say, Fox. Over to you. I love the passion, I love it.
I think that message needs to be spread across so much more as well. We have to stand out for rationality, don't we? Absolutely. It's not an issue, that we have to fight for rationality.
It's a common sense as well. It's like, why can't people be able to love who they love, be who they want to be, and allow to express that the way they want to do as well? This is, again, I think I've repeated back in our Facebook group, this is 2025. This is, of course, to be progressive.
And again, you've been on your talk, as well. again, I got really upset the other day because we were talking about like all these different experiences that we're having and we're getting really excited and showcasing it and posting it on Instagram about interviews about who we're talking to about Rocky Horror and the comments, the negative comments, it's like you have to battle against this, it's like, like say, I'm a straight man, but again, you don't, it's not that representation, you can enjoy being whoever you want to be. And it's so sad, it's so upsetting that in 2025 we're still fighting this same old fight and still having the same argument, let people just blow up. With the same small-minded people.
Being gay is just as natural as being blonde or being red-headed, it just happens, it's not a choice. And being transgender is not a choice. In fact, it's a curse if you're living in the binary world. And so, you know, we have to put up all that.
It's a astonishing, anyway, it's just, it's just more mindedness and it's all to do with misogynism, isn't it, and speak swing and dicks, isn't it? I think. It's absolutely good to see that. That was so good.
Yeah, but you've created such a home for people with Rocky Horror. I just want to take you back just a little bit. I want to know, what was the spark that made you right, Robbie? I wasn't an academic.
I was a boy at a high school dropout with a love of all things populist. And I had been in the Jesus by Superstar and I was supposed to take over the role of Herod from an actor called Jabara, an American actor. And then Robert Stigwood decided I wasn't to do that. They were then found themselves in breach of contract and sent me home with 300 pounds in my pocket.
And I thought I write a musical that I would like to see, the kind of musical that would entertain me. A little bit of Hammer House of Horror, a little bit of Cara Carryon movies, a bit of comedy, British comedy thrown in with it. And what we had was Rocky came out at the other end of that. And we had our happy five weeks at the theatre upstairs at the Royal Court and moved down the road and stayed in London that first run for seven years, which was exciting.
And the longest run in theatre with the release of film and history as well, just back to the start. Well, actually, my best friend, we mentioned this to Linus, we are very polar opposites. I am her, even to her peacock. We are very different.
But the one thing we have, some of you think, but the one major thing we have in common is Rocky Horror. And when I told her about everything that's going on, she told her mother, because her mother's a huge fan, and she went, oh, I went to see it in London in its opening week. And I was like, oh, okay. So through that, she's been to see it every year since she's passed it on to her children, onto her grandchildren.
It's just, yeah, she should be over the moon that I told you this story as well. Well, I'm so glad to find that elderly people have still got some, they cling into their young selves because so many old people don't. They turn into their own grandparents and become miserable back as they do. A lot of the disapproval that I've ever had down the streets were from my peer group, from my age or old, you know, what happened?
When did that really happen? When you went, when you were, you know, you suddenly decided you were going to become a miserable old son. So, and so, how did that come about? Most of my friends are probably the same about me now, Paul gets all the, he just gets grumpy, which is fair.
I'll actually put your back, start, you need to start to go. But that's just my little grapes as well. I do understand the frontings of the elderly. It's just because we get things stolen from us incrementally, or bit by bit, your eyesight goes, your hearing goes, your balance goes.
And at the end of it, you just get cheese, all this things, all this, you know, things that age or activity and your daily routines have been stolen from you. And so we all get a little bit cheese from time to time. So, you mentioned things that kind of you threw into Rocky. What was your major inspirations, like movie-wise, TV-wise?
At that time when I was writing Rocky, television used to close at night, at midnight, didn't it? At midnight, didn't it? At midnight, didn't it? At midnight, didn't it?
Yeah. It was just to have BBC One, BBC Two and ITV, and that was it. And about 1230, it all shut down. He's got a lot of time.
And about an end of the clock at night, they decided we're not going to put anything worthwhile at 11 o'clock at night, because the only people watching now will be in some yaks, drunks and others. And I was at one of the others at that stage. Probably jazz cigarette which helped me through the evening. And they would put on these clunky old B movies.
And I would be in my element, watching the unintentional humour. When you've got clunky dialogue, and you've got actors that don't actually want to be B movie actors, they want to become A movie actors, but they've got the B movie to do. But they're going to show us that they're a little bit above all that. So, the more serious they become, the more unintentionally funny it became, because it is with clunky dialogue.
It's so true. One of my favourite B movies is Airplan 9 from Out of Space. I absolutely adore that film so much. But it's hilarious when you've got the main actors who are trying to act to the back of the screen when it just doesn't quite work with the dialogue that they've got.
Steve McQueen and the Blob. If you ever want to see a method acting at it's very worse. He's trying to channel James Dean and Marlon Brando in that movie. That's not what I'm going to do.
It's the wrong movie to do it. Oh, it is. I do a horror podcast called Monsters Up North and we did that last year. Steve McQueen's the Blob.
If you watch the film, he actually is smokin' the entire time he's on screen. He's just got the cigarette hit behind his back. It's not the greatest, but it had some really, and the story really doesn't quite make sense. But it had some great moments for Steve McQueen.
Other B movie movies as well, like the Universal Classic, the Universal Monster movies, it feels like it would be at one of these type of movies as well. And I know when we did the episode, like a long time ago, we'd done The Invisible Man, it felt like Robbie Horror and The Invisible Man could just sit by side by side in the same type of universe with these old different experiments. What's the episode? What's the episode that these aliens were able to have the technology to build a spaceship that could fly light years, like years across the technology to fly light years across the universe to reach us.
And then when they get here, all they want to do is get out of the spaceship and go, ew, must kill. Excuse me. Wait, it's time to go home and then kill her. What is it?
She's an anti-am then kill her. And then it's time to go home. I think with certain like movies, it's like them type of movies, it's like humanly cluck in the mirror up against themselves and say this is what we would do. No.
I actually am after I watched the documentary, I watched Rocky Horror again and it's probably the first time I've watched it in such a long time. There is so much I missed in that. There is some apps at Patricia. Oh gosh.
No. No. No. No.
That's a lot. Yeah. It's Pat Nell. Pat, some of her dialogue is absolutely hilarious.
And I have completely missed that, because I'm sort of like amazed by how she looks. I don't think I'm actually listening to a word she's saying. Until I've watched and the amount of times Tim Curry talks to the camera, I never picked up on that before. He is constantly talking to the audience.
And I was like, why have I never seen that? It's interesting that it's breaking through the fourth wall and looking straight down the lens. It pays off time if you get it right. Oh, it does.
It's subtly done on this as well. It's not where it's like saw in your fears. One of the questions I wanted to ask as well is I know it was quite interesting in the documentary where you mentioned about being able to keep the majority of the cast from the stage moving into the movie. That's very unheard of as well.
Did you get much kickback or was that much of a hard thing to try and keep? No, it all happened very quickly and very organically. The show went to Los Angeles. We talked to him to Los Angeles.
And when it was in LA, what's it then? Lou Adler, our producer, had had contacts, of course, inside the Los Angeles community and that film world. And so that got organized quite quickly. But the only insistence was that we actually have two Americans in the Brad and Janet roles.
And that worked terribly well, because we were all a happy group that had been together, a family, if you like. And these two outsiders came to join us. And that was perfect, actually. But it does work absolutely perfectly.
Because I know it's that dynamic when I re-watched it, the other day, there's clear difference between Brad and Janet, which is what you need, to what you've got in that house. So the dynamic really works. And Susan's around it. It's just absolutely phenomenal in that movie.
Another plus was that all those transylvaneans, I think we could call them extras. And we could probably refer to them as extras, all the transylvaneans. Most of them were actors, the proper actors that we knew. And they came in because they wanted to be part of it and have a bit of fun.
And I think that, again, adds another dimension to it. If they'd just been extras, probably we wouldn't have got the same reactions and the same results. As a big influence, Christopher Bigins. Yes, Bigins!
Gay Brown, you wouldn't mind, see it there. And so on and so forth. Oh, yeah. It's interesting.
I mentioned Chris Bigins, because the last live performance I saw had Christopher Bigins as the narrator. That was an interesting take. But we asked like say Linus as well, what he would like to play if he was got a chance to play the narrator. And he actually said he wanted the narrator and said, needs to get on to the producers and they could happen.
So we're going to push for that. Chris Bigins, he has such a, he holds such a candle for everything to do with Rocky. We were at a horror convention a few years ago when the whole cast of Rocky was there and Chris was alongside them. And it was so sweet because he's only in it for a few, not a great deal, but it's just so lovely that he was still a part of the community.
He was still welcome there. Yes. So with the 50th anniversary as well, is there anything that you've got planned yourself coming up to do for the 50th anniversary? Yes.
Yes, we're doing, there's going to be a rainbow event in Taran. My time here, I mean, around the Halloween period, they're going to show the movie and have a rainbow evening. That'll be along for that. And next year, the stage show comes to New Zealand in January, February, next year.
So that's about it, really, apart from talking to chap-cycle stuff, of course. I mean, I feel very lucky to be in this situation. So quickly, everything's happened so fast, though, so quickly. It's always nice to prepare, but this is like just reacting to the best of the book.
Yeah, just working on the flag. Yeah, yeah. See how it goes. Well, that's fine.
Because I know you've got a lot on today, and I think so. Sorry, Sam. No, no, I just have one more question. If there was one bit of advice that you could pass on to future creators, that you wish you had yourself when you started, Rocky, what would it be?
My advice to anybody who's being creative is to whatever you're doing, whether it's a doodle, a painting, a drawing, a work of art or a writing, whatever it is, it's your creative work. Try to use yourself, write it for yourself. Because if you're writing it, for others, you get that. If you just try to please yourself and say, if I was reading this, I'd be delighted to read this.
If I was looking at this picture, I would have been delighted to say that I've drawn it. It's my be the best you can for yourself, because at the same time while you're doing it, you're having fun, you're having joy. And that will come over, I feel. And if it doesn't, there's a waste paper basket.
Never underestimate the power of the waste paper basket. There's a lot of people that should have one, very handy, very nice. Not a lot of, when when All-Bron War was the editor of the literary review, he was a poetry, the competition each month at the back. And of course, apart from length, that would have to be a certain less than a certain semi-line.
It couldn't go on forever. But his rule was, it must rhyme and it must make sense. And I read so many blank verse poetry, and it's just like reading somebody's diary page or something running. I don't see this as poetry, I don't see this as verse, I don't get it.
There are rules out there. There are rules because we need a sentence, a sentence has structure, a punctuation provides rules, a beginning and a middle and an end. Paragraph, there's rules that are enforced. And when writing a, when writing a, like, Rocky, for instance, it falls into a category of the quest.
It's Adam and Eve. It's Adam and Eve coming out of Eden, and Adam and Janet coming out of Eden, going at the serpent is the wicked, is Frank and Verter. And there were rules. And they are there to be broken.
They're so doubt about that. But shape and form and crafts work, craft beer, craftsmen before the artist. That's what I say. And do I try and please yourself?
And at the end of the day, what you might do is find your own voice, find a voice which is, which could be nobody else's but your own. And you've become slightly unique, special, if you like. That's like, might be my advice. And have a good time.
Don't we both of you work? Love. I don't think there's anything we could actually add to that to make that. No, I was such a perfect ending.
We just, we are, one thing I just want to say as well, I know Samuel Poley's echo this is thank you so much, not just for tonight, but for everything that you've given to us. As we mentioned before, we are huge Rocky Horror fans. We are huge Crystal Mears fans. We are huge, we're huge, we're huge, we're huge, we're trying to fans.
And just even spending a little bit of time taking out changes like the whole thing for us as well. It's fun. It's just, it's been an absolute, this past week has been just an absolute dream, getting to speak to Linus and then getting to speak to yourself and just be able to talk about Rocky, with, because once we mention it, all of our friends then come out and we've all just been sitting talking about it. And we're even doing an episode this week, just based solely on Rocky Horror and everyone's experience.
So this week has just been magical. Thank you so much for everything. It's a great pleasure. Keep the rainbow banner flying high.
Absolutely high. Yes, and but same by time same by channel. Stay there. Bye.