The Rocky Horror Picture Show: Let's Do the Time Warp Again

Plot

The plot of the remake is fundamentally identical to the original film, with some additional scenes wrapped around the film. These scenes show several people attending a theatrical showing of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and subsequently are used to introduce some of the audience participation elements from the original film (such as throwing toilet paper on the line "Great Scott!").

Cast

Production

Plans for a remake at Fox date back to 2002, when a 2003 release date was under consideration to mark the 30-year anniversary of the play which spawned the film, a remake for which former Broadway producer Gail Berman would have been involved as co-producer. MTV had also planned a remake, set for 2008 and for which Berman was again tapped to produce, but those plans also fell through.

On April 10, 2015, it was announced that Kenny Ortega, best known for directing the film Hocus Pocus, the High School Musical trilogy, and Michael Jackson's This Is It concert series, would direct the remake. On October 21, 2015, Emmy Award nominee Laverne Cox, best known for her role as prisoner Sophia Burset on Netflix's prison comedy-drama Orange Is the New Black, joined the cast to play Dr. Frank-N-Furter, the mad-scientist role originated by Tim Curry in the 1970s. Lou Adler, who produced the original film, is also co-producing the remake, along with Gail Berman and Kenny Ortega; Ortega will choreograph the film in addition to directing and producing. The creative team is planning "to stick faithfully to the text and the score of the original but greatly re-imagine the story visually".

Much of the film was shot at Toronto’s Casa Loma, being used for both Frank N. Furter's castle and the “Castle” movie theatre where the audience participation scenes and Ivy Levan's performance of "Science Fiction/Double Feature" were filmed. A theatre marquee was temporarily erected at the front entrance for these scenes.

TV

The film premiered on Fox on October 20, 2016. The first 25 minutes of the film were screened at San Diego Comic-Con, as well as RKO Con 2, a Rocky Horror convention in Providence, Rhode Island.

The world premiere of the film was on October 18, 2016 at Cannes MIPCOM.

Extended cut

The Rocky Horror Picture Show: Let's Do the Time Warp Again was scheduled for DVD release on December 6, 2016. An extended cut of the film will be included featuring deleted scenes and Brad's song "Once in a While".

Critical reception

The special received mixed reviews, although Cox's performance was mostly praised. Many critics agreed that the production would have been better if it was live as it was originally planned to be, raising questions why Fox decided not to due to the success the network had with Grease: Live. On Rotten Tomatoes, it has a 29% score based on 34 reviews; the critical consensus states: "Laverne Cox's fabulous portrayal of Frank N. Furter leads a strong ensemble effort, but the stars can't infuse this reimagining with enough energy, creativity, and quirk to make TRHPS: Let's Do the Time Warp Again a worthwhile endeavor." On Metacritic, the film has a 55 out of 100 rating, based on 23 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews".

Esther Zuckerman of The A.V. Club felt that the remake focused too much on the weirdness that was in the original film without acknowledging the campiness it had been filmed with. As such, viewers that had never seen the original film would be confused by the movie-within-a-movie approach used in the remake. Matt Tamanini of Broadwayworld.com said that the remake "was a strikingly disappointing missed opportunity" that "felt far more like a production on Glee than the actual production of Rocky Horror on Glee did", although he did praise the casting of Cox, saying "In the long history of The Rocky Horror Show, the musical has broken down doors and helped pave the way for an era of LGBT acceptance. So for Cox to step into Tim Curry's iconic fishnets is a victory in its own right."

International broadcasts

The film was scheduled to be broadcast in New Zealand on TV3 on October 24, 2016, three days after its original broadcast. In UK, the film was first broadcast on October 28, 2016 on Sky Cinema Premiere.