In this episode, Thomas takes us through an iconic piece of queer culture: “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” We discuss what the movie is about, when it was made, why it’s so highly controversial, and what it means to us and the wider queer community.
Come join as as we also talk about Dolly Parton’s shameful connection to Thomas’s family (the shameful bit is on his family's side, obviously), and his love of Creature Features (and by extension: Vampira, Elvira, and Anjelica Huston).
Check us out across the web!
Content Warning: This episode makes brief mentions of cannibalism and sexual assault.
Sources:
Benshoff, Harry M. Monsters in the Closet: Homosexuality in the Horror Film. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1997.
Cox, Laverne. “Laverne Cox Recalls First Rocky Horror Experience.” E! Insider, 11.10.2016. Available here.
Curry, Tim. “Tim Curry Talks About the Rocky Horror Picture Show.” Film Talk, 9.1975. Available here.
Duffy, Nick. “Rocky Horror Star Richard O’Brien: Trans Women Can’t be Women.” Pink News, 7.11.2017.
Garcia, Oscar. "Why Queer People Like Horror Films: An Empirical Study." (Unpublished BA Thesis, New College of Florida, 2026.)
Gilbey, Ryan. “Rocky Horror’s Richard O’Brien: ‘I should be dead. I’ve had an excessive lifestyle.’” The Guardian, 5.1.2020.
Hixon, Ben. "In Search of the Authentic Queer Epiphany: Normativity and Representations of the Queer Disabled Body in Rocky Horror." In Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock (ed.), Reading Rocky Horror. The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Popular Culture (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 177-192.
Ivan-Sadeh, Larushka. "Rocky Horror Picture Show: The film that's saved lives." BBC Online, 19.6.2020.
Locke, Liz. “’Don’t Dream It, Be It’: Cultural Performance and Communitas at The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” In Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock (ed.), Reading Rocky Horror. The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Popular Culture (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 141-156.
Matheson, Sue. “’Drinking Those Moments When’: The Use (and Abuse) of Late-Night Double Feature Science Fiction and Hollywood Icons in The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” In Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock (ed.), Reading Rocky Horror. The Rocky Horror Picture Show and Popular Culture (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 17-34.
Noecker, Miles D. "Let the Monsters Out of the Closet: Overt Queer Depictions in Hollywood Horror Films." Media and Communication Studies Summer Fellows 28 (2022).
Roach, Jackie. "“Don’t Dream It, Be It”: The Rocky Horror Picture Show’s Impact on Queer Communities in the 1970s." Rushton Journal of Undergraduate Humanities Research 1 (2024).
Russo, Vito. The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies. New York: Harper & Row, 1981.
Snæbjörnsson, Bjarni. “Don’t Judge a Book by Its Cover: The Camp and Queerness of Rocky Horror Picture Show.” (Unpublished BA Thesis, The University of Iceland, 2012.)
Stadlen, Matthew. "There's a Lot of Male in Me – and a Lot of Girl as Well." The Telegraph, 14.9.2015.
Sharman, Jim (dir.) “The Rocky Horror Picture Show.” Michael White Productions, 1975.
Sharman, Jim (dir.) “Shock Treatment.” Lou Adler and Michael White, 1981. (Commentary edition with Patricia Quinn and Nell Campbell). Available here.
Vena, Dan and Islay Burgess. "The New Border War? An intergenerational Exchange on Bad Trans Horror Objects." Journal of Crime and Media Studies 61, nr. 2 (2022): 189-193.
Winchester, Nick. “Why The Rocky Horror Show is Still as Popular as Ever.” Newsweek, 16.10.2018.
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