On the night of October 11, the Curran Theatre will host a screening of The Rocky Horror Picture Show — and the man who first played Brad Majors on screen, Barry Bostwick, will be in the building.
Bostwick, the original Brad Majors, is hosting a one-night-only screening of The Rocky Horror Picture Show at the Geary Street landmark, part of the nationwide "Spooktacular" tour marking the film's 50th anniversary. The show is a full participatory ritual rather than a passive revival: the original, unedited film in a new 4K restoration, a live shadow cast performing the movie in sync on stage, a costume contest, and a memorabilia display that includes artifacts and an actual costume from the movie. A limited number of VIP tickets add a meet-and-greet with Bostwick, a personal photo, and an autograph.
The shadow cast duties fall to Barely Legal, the Bay Area troupe known as BL Rocky, which has been performing interactive Rocky Horror screenings across Northern California for more than three decades. Their history is woven into the region's own Rocky lineage. Barely Legal formed in Berkeley in 1995, after the legendary weekly cast Indecent Exposure called it quits, specifically to keep Rocky Horror alive at the UC Theatre. When the original UC Theatre closed in 2001, the cast kept performing, eventually settling into the reopened UC Theatre in Berkeley. Today BL Rocky performs at the UC, the Phoenix Theatre in the North Bay, and the State Theatre in Modesto, and it operates as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit.
The Curran itself is a fitting host for a piece of theater history. Built in 1922, the theater opened on September 10 of that year and became known for hosting major pre-Broadway tryouts. The venue changed hands when the San Francisco Giants organization acquired it from longtime owner Carole Shorenstein Hays for an undisclosed sum. Shorenstein Hays had owned the Curran since 2010 and led a restoration that reopened the theater in early 2017. BroadwaySF continues to operate the venue.
What makes the Curran date more than a standard midnight-movie screening is a song most fans have never heard in a theater. At Bostwick's tour stops, audiences get a live rendition of "Once in a While," Brad Majors' solo ballad from the original 1973 stage musical. The song was recorded for the film but cut by director Jim Sharman, who wanted to keep the story moving after Brad's encounter with Frank-N-Furter. It survives on the complete soundtrack releases and in stage productions, but it never made the final movie — a genuine piece of Rocky Horror's stage history that even longtime devotees of the film likely have never heard performed live.
The tour's cast lineup shifts from city to city. The Spooktacular run brings co-stars Patricia Quinn, who played Magenta, and Nell Campbell, who played Columbia, to select multi-star stops. For San Francisco, Bostwick is the sole original cast member scheduled.
That fan culture has deep roots in San Francisco. Beyond Barely Legal's involvement, the city sustains a year-round interactive Rocky scene through groups like The Bawdy Caste, which performs monthly screenings at the Balboa Theatre in the Richmond District. The Curran's October 11 show adds a marquee night to that ongoing tradition.
The film at the center of it all has a pedigree few movies can match. The Rocky Horror Picture Show opened in North American theaters in September 1975 and initially bombed, written off as a loss. It never left. Still in limited release more than 50 years later, it holds the record for the longest continuous theatrical release in cinema history. Directed by Jim Sharman and adapted from Richard O'Brien's 1973 West End stage production The Rocky Horror Show, the film was an intentional parody of the B-grade science fiction and horror movies of the 1930s through the 1960s. O'Brien wrote the music and co-starred as Riff Raff.
This year's tour arrives with added weight for longtime fans. Tim Curry, who originated the role of Dr. Frank-N-Furter on stage in 1973 and starred in the 1975 film, died in August at 80. Curry's performance built the foundation of the film's enduring cult — and, for many fans, of friendships and communities that formed around it.
For the Curran audience, the night will be equal parts revival and ritual: a restored print, a live troupe acting out the movie in real time, a costume contest, and the rare chance to hear Brad Majors sing a song the movie left behind. Tickets went on sale in June, and the show is set for 7:30 p.m. on Sunday, October 11.